1. We are happy for the opportunity to familiarize our readers with your company and your game through this interview. Please, tell us a little about yourself and your company.

Sl0th: Thanks for taking the time to interview us. Well, for starters, my name is GM Sl0th. (That always looks weird on paper.) I’m the Community Manager and a member of the Tales Runner Team. Tales Runner is one of many games offered through our gPotato game portal. gPotato is a host for a great variety of different games including MMOs, racing games, and adventure racing games like Tales Runner.

2. Is Tales Runner the only and/or the first MMO you are producing/publishing?

Sl0th: No, not by a long shot. Our gPotato portal currently hosts five games, and we’ll be launching our 6th one pretty soon. This is, however, our first foray into the “casual game” genre. It’s been an interesting challenge, taking what we’ve learned from three years of publishing “hardcore games” and applying it to something as brilliantly simple as Tales Runner.

3. What kind of game is Tales Runner? Why should players be interested in it?

Sl0th: As I mentioned, Tales Runner can be considered by most players to be a “casual game”. The game play is extremely similar to Mario Kart and Diddy Kong Racing but it’s about twice as fast and you can play with you have the ability to play with more than double the amount of people.

It’s not uncommon to find a game that you can pick up and play for a few minutes then put down feeling pretty satisfied. Tales Runner is definitely one of those games but its real beauty is in its hidden depth. Anyone who plays for a few minutes a day is going to have a pretty good time but playing it for just a little longer makes it obvious that the game has more to it than just simple racing.

Unlockable items, gear, characters, are available throughout the game, regardless of a player’s level. There’s techniques being invented and discussed by players everyday that are pretty easy to learn, but difficult to master.

More than any of this though, Tales Runner is fun. Plain and simple. Which is really what it’s all about isn’t it?

4. The game is free-to-play. Could you please explain how is this concept implemented in Tales Runner?

Sl0th: Tales Runner is completely free to download and play via the gPotato.com game portal. There’s no subscription fee. The only time anyone has to pay anything is if they decide they want special items from our Premium Shop. These items, while nice to have, aren’t necessary for any type of progression. They’re just there for players to get a bit more out of the game.

We also hold events, nearly every day of the week that reward players with items from this Premium Shop for free.

5. What type of players is Tales Runner aiming for, in terms of age, occupation, social category and other target traits?

Sl0th: While we’ve never been a fan of actively targeting a single group of gamers, there are definitely aspects that are going to appeal to certain members of the gaming community. Tales Runner, with its emphasis on competitive game play, and its anime-esque art style has been drawing a lot of teenagers to the game.

We’ve also noticed that the high level of character customization, co-operative aspects, and active community have drawn a large female following as well. Which, given the constant use of our “Couple System” adds an interesting and sometimes intense dynamic to races, as Couples race against each other.

6. The game seems to be covering a large area of difficulty ranges, so most likely many players would need a certain degree of motivation in order to continue playing. Can you please explain a little the structure of the game, the storyline, the experience system, items and especially the reward system?

Sl0th: TR definitely encourages practice and improvement. There are 3 game channels: Beginner, Easy, and Normal.

The Beginner channel is designed so that only players level 2 or below can play and is basically a place for new players to go if they are wary of being griefed by high level players. (Luckily, our community isn’t into the whole griefing thing, so the Beginner Channel stays unpopulated most of the time).

The Easy Channel is where most of the action happens. Races there are focused on having a good time more than fighting for 1st place.

The Normal Channel is where you’ll find the “pros”. Normal Channel maps have an increased difficulty that really pushes even the best players right to their limits.

Player Levels are a status symbol in TR. If you’re a high level player, everyone’s watching you for techniques and tricks that they may not know. The level does not, however, give you an edge when playing. If you’re a level 30 player going up against a level 3 player, you’d better make sure that you’re on your game otherwise you’ll get taken down just the same as anyone else.

There are close to 300 items in Tales Runner currently which, for a racing game, is pretty unheard of. There are the 15 different capsule items you can use during a race then there are the 200+ items you can use to gear out any characters you may have unlocked. The items help, to be sure, but they won’t overpower a character. Especially in a race with Capsule Items turned ON, you’re going to be relying more on timing and skill than what stats your outfit gives you.

7. What is so special about Tales Runner that makes it so much different than other similar simple online racing games?

Sl0th: We’re trying to show players that they can have fun with a game without having to devote their lives to it. There are too many games out that leave you in the dust if you take a break for even a little while. Your friends out-level you and are moving onto a different zone, your gear becomes outdated, or any number of things.

What we’re trying to do is present players with a rare sense of stability. You can leave the game and come back in a couple weeks. We’ll still be the same game. Yes, there will have been updates and new content added but you’ll still be able to play with your friends and if you were good, you’ll still be a force to be reckoned with. We’re not asking you to play Tales Runner to the exclusion of everything else; we’re inviting you to come hang out for a bit.

8. Can you tell us something about the upcoming content patch and your strategy about adding new content periodically?

Sl0th: We do content updates in sections called “Chapters”. Our next Chapter, The Alchemistis set to go live in February and focuses on our all new item crafting system, called Alchemy. Alchemy is a way for players to create custom gear using “Alchemy Cards” that they earn at the end of each race. The recipes for each piece of armor or each item are listed in the Alchemy Shop and once you’ve fulfilled an item’s recipe requirements, you can unlock the item.

Alchemy isn’t the only thing we’re adding. We’ll also be adding the “Family System”. This system allows players to form families (essentially guilds) that will grant bonus experience and in game currency for racing with “Family Members”. It’s something that our community has been waiting for, for a while now and they’re all quite excited to see it just on the horizon.

In addition to these two huge game systems, we’re also going to be release 2 unlockable characters, roughly 200 more items, 10 new maps, and an extremely rare pet. We’re looking to add more depth to the game with this update and so far, things are shaping up nicely.

As for our updating strategy: Initially, we wanted to do several large updates that would have been released every 3 months or so with nothing new in between. After doing a bit of research we discovered that players would rather see more content sooner, so we changed our plan. Now, we release large blocks of content (our Chapters) every 2-3 months and do several smaller updates in between each Chapter. That way, our players get their regular dose of content but are assured big updates at the same time.

Thank you very much for your participation. We hope to talk to you again in the future.

Sl0th: Thanks for inviting us. Hopefully, we’ll get to talk again soon! And we are waiting for the Romanian players to join our Tales Runner community.