Dauntless At PAX South & The Community Of The Hunt
By TJ Denzer ·
Monster Hunter: World isn't the only cooperative hunting game turning heads. We spoke to Phoenix Labs Community Manager Ian Tornay about how Dauntless is bringing players together in its free-to-play hunts.
PAX South has come and gone, but there are lingering memories from it that delight us still. One of them was the Dauntless booth presented by the Phoenix Labs team. Dauntless is an upcoming online free-to-play game very much in the same vein as Monster Hunter. Players join up in teams of up to four to take on hunts of giant and creative behemoth monsters that will push players to their limit in tracking and cooperation across the floating isles of Dauntless’ world. If you can’t get it done in time or the behemoth threatens the team of hunters too much, the hunt comes to an end. Teams must find a way to survive and make the best use of their time and abilities if they want to win the day.
It was at PAX South 2017 that Dauntless actually appeared for the first time in public, so a lot of things had happened between their appearances in 2017 and 2018. At the time of Dauntless’ announcement, Monster Hunter: World was not a thing anyone knew about yet. There was no promise of a Monster Hunter-style game for PC players. In the following months, Monster Hunter: World was not only announced, but the series would be coming to PC for the first time. Though it’s only on Xbox One and PS4 as of this writing. We caught up to Phoenix Labs Head of Community Development Ian Tornay on how the Dauntless team was working to set their experience apart, if at all. Tornay answered that the team was not only receptive Monster Hunter, but excited about its arrival on PC alongside Dauntless.
“Monster Hunter is a game that we’re inspired by and love to play.” Tornay explained. “Between the team, we probably have around 10,000 to 20,000 hours logged into those games, but we also take influence from games like Warframe and Destiny. When you make games, every game speaks to and influences you in some way. You either say ‘I like this’ or ‘I don’t’. The biggest influence Worlds has on us is that when it comes, a lot of us are going to be taking that Friday off to stay home and play. We’re friends with the guys over at Capcom and we look forward to playing their game with them, but there’s some folks over there that are looking forward to playing Dauntless with us too. I think if you’re a really hardcore Monster Hunter fan, then you’re going to enjoy that game, but if you’re maybe ready for a new take on the style and want to play on PC sooner than later on a free-to-play system, we’re going to have something really great for you.”
If you’re going to have a hunting game with single targets, you’re going to have people that want to join up, strategize for the fastest hunts, and show off their achievements to viewers. For that, we asked Tornay about speedrunners and streaming for Dauntless. Because each hunt is timed and there are over 20 monsters to chase down, this is the type of game that lends itself well to challenge and competition. Tornay let us into a little bit of what he and his crew are doing to make connections with speedrunning and streaming crowds and cultivate that community within Dauntless.
“We’re starting to have those conversations more often,” Tornay said of the speedrunner community. “Fun fact: We’re the most productive when people are telling us what they want and we’ve been the least productive during Games Done Quick marathons if that gives you an idea. We’ve actually started reaching to the Games Done Quick crews to see if we can work together at an event. We’ve also talked to people that are speedrunners for games like Dark Souls, Warframe, and even Monster Hunter. We’re learning a ton from them. What we’re really excited to do is build an environment that invites the speedrunning element entirely. So we provide the tools necessary to make that easy for the speedrunning community. That means putting the tools in-game to help people figure out what constitutes start and stop time alongside a bunch of other stats and tools we’re working with the speedrunning folks to put together to make it as fluid and fast as possible.”
For those kinds of possibilities, players have got to have easy ways to connect, not just to friends, but to groups of people they’ve never met before. They have to be able to find their place among like-minded crews to take on the game’s challenges. We asked Tornay what the Phoenix Labs crew is doing with community hubs and clans, as well as if the team is actively invested in building those connections in-game or letting them happen outside of Dauntless.
“We’re trying to strike the balance between both in-game community building and organic community outside the game,” Tornay answered. “My philosophy as a community manager is that it’s not my job to build the player community. It’s my job to give them the tools to build the community easily on their own. I’m one guy with one perspective. I like the movies, music, and games I like. My perspective appeals to a certain group of people, but a community is ultimately made richer and more impactful by a variety of perspectives. So for me, it’s about building the tools that make that environment accessible.”
To that end, Tornay explained to us one of the most accessible features in the game for not only players coming together, but also those looking to broadcast their gameplay or speedrun the game.
“We already built a guild system in-game in which players can band together under their own banners, but one of the newest things we’re putting together is sort of a streamer guild system. If you’re a person who likes to stream, create content, do speedruns, or work towards various stat or playstyle achievements and efforts, we’re building special classes of guilds that will facilitate finding like-minded people with similar goals to you and providing tools in those particular guilds that will better help with those goals. We’re also working on events and stats that will be relevant to those particular types of groups.”
As an example of a specific community focus, Tornay mentioned that the team is in the process of building a lot of in-game tools that will help streamers to gather and reach their audience with ease.
“We took a step back and looked at the entire streaming process and from there, we’re building a tool for the game that can literally get you to a broadcasting state with minimal effort or going outside the game to set up extra tools. Additionally, if you’re in a stream-focused guild, we’re working on an invite system that will pretty much send out the call to people in your guild to join you as teammates so you can get into a game and get to broadcasting quickly and easily. In that way, not only can we learn from player interactions, but they really can play Dauntless and grow their cooperative interaction with it on their terms.”
In all of this, Tornay mentioned that it isn’t just an effort by Phoenix Labs either. They’re not above reaching out to their audience and incorporating things that players build or come up with if they’re willing to let Phoenix work with them.
“We’re really passionate about meeting people halfway. If we see someone asking for tools or building a tool we think is awesome, we’ll happily ask them how they did it, why they did it, or what could be better, and we’ll experiment with them as a peer to build something better. At the end of the day, we’re all gamers and we all care about this stuff. Anyone who can help us make a better game is someone we’re excited to work with.”
All tools aside for the community and the ease of access, we certainly wanted to know what the players have been doing with Dauntless as well since it’s been in closed beta. Tornay took us through the grandiose tale of one clan who had been the most massive of successful hunting streaks in the game so far.
“There was a clan out there that got a streak going on successful and challenged themselves to see how long they could keep up a winning hunting spree across consecutive hunts,” Tornay recalled. “They were taking on the hardest behemoths we had in the game. They would swap members and weapons out and still pull off successful hunts, taking on monster after monster and winning. They got ridiculously far – into the high double-digits – before they finally ran into a single unsuccessful hunt. It wasn’t just a testament to their individual player skills, but also their ability to coordinate. This was a thing that took many, many hours. That means coordinating that event and passing the baton between active and inactive guild members. It means sharing strategies, encouraging the active players, and continually watching. It was one of my favorite moments out of the bunch and an amazing snapshot of the things people are doing with our game.”
Tornay mentioned that even though the guild eventually failed, there was an amazing sentiment between them of the sort of event they’d be able to carry with them for a long time.
“There wasn’t even a sweaty, ill feeling where they wondered who would drop the baton first. They were just blown away by how far they’d gotten and how hard it was. They were having a good time and building a legendary experience they could look back on with pride. And it sets a precedent for everyone else to chase. I’d love to see a guild break into the triple digits on consecutive successful hunts.”
Marathon running aside, we had to ask Tornay what the single craziest instance in the game had been. To that, he answered of the insane timing and coordination between four players who all took the game’s axe into a hunt.
“The axe has always been a deliberate, heavy weapon in Dauntless. It used to be extremely slow and chug stamina between hits. We once saw a team of four axe players that went in with the idea of building as much stamina as possible, taking turns between hits, and hitting as hard as possible on each shot. It was a demolition derby and the timing between their strikes was absolutely perfect. It was incredible how they bounced off the behemoth and just crushed it. They loved it. We loved it, too.”
Dauntless is in closed beta right now, but the game is set to launch in free-to-play form in 2018 ahead of the PC launch for Monster Hunter: World. If you’re looking for a great way to team up with pals and take on a lush hunt with glorious opportunities to explore between the game and your own creativity, Dauntless looks to be something that will welcome you and your friends and give back with a variety of rewarding experiences.
If you’d like to learn more about Dauntless, you can check out the game’s official website or follow it on Twitter or Facebook.
Looking for another game to jump into with your friends and get competitive in the meantime? Check out our full PAX South community feature on Guns of Icarus!