Quantum Break will let you switch between hero and villain with Junction Points

Enough with the next-gen this-gen consoles hugging the news! What about the freakin’ new games man? One of those games that I have my eye on is Quantum Break, from Alan Wake developers Remedy Interactive. The team behind it has some ideas to make it unique, including a chance to play as either the villain or the hero.

Speaking to Game Informer, Quantum Break writer and creative director Sam Lake explained that their game would have an antagonist who wasn’t only harder than Christmas fruit cake in March, but “really cool” as well. “Think about Die Hard. The bad guy (Alan Rickman) comes close to stealing the show,” said Lake.

This is our interactive dynamic way of doing these scenes where in the action movie you see the bad guy planning and making his moves. You get to play Paul Serene during the junction moments and make these choices.

We want to make even the bad guy a deep, complex character that you will see different sides of. You will understand why he’s doing what he’s doing.

It really amounts to dynamic, player-created cliffhangers at the end of every act of the game.

During Junction Moments, players will get the chance to switch between the heroes Jack and Beth, and their villainous counterpart Paul Serene. The Junction Points form the key selling point of the game, as they’ll cross over with the Quantum Break episodes that are required viewing.

“He has this time power that gives him the ability to see glimpses of different timelines and different futures,” Lake said of the villain.

At the end of each act of the game, you actually get to play him during these junction moments. You get to explore and discover these glimpses of different futures, and you get to make the choice. Which of these two futures that are presented will come to pass?

This leads into the next episode of the show. Immediately the first scene of the show is affected by the choice you made. It’s very much alternate content depending on the choice you made. The idea is that it will feel relevant to the plot of the show. You’ll learn important things that you’ll need for the game.

At the same time, the junction moment is just one gameplay scene, and the glimpses you see can be approached in two different ways. They are fragments.

You are learning about certain things, but all options have both positive and negative from the bad guy’s perspective, but also from the heroes’ perspective.

Lake explained that Junction Points would not only “affect the tone of what will follow,” but will also unlock extra content and paths throughout the game. Honestly, all these ideas sound familiar and have been used in the past before, barring the transmedia one that Quantum Break is flaunting.

But I’ve got faith that Remedy can finally make Junctions relevant once again, something which I haven’t seen since Final Fantasy 8.

Last Updated: November 25, 2013