Rage 2 Director Says He's Happy the Game Leaked Before E3

Walmart isn't exactly known for being able to keep a secret and Bethesda themselves even hilariously trolled the retailer during their E3 2018 press conference. What was meant to originally be revealed during the showcase ended up being a blessing in disguise. This is of course talking about that gigantic Rage 2 leak but it turns out - the team was actually relieved at the early announcement.

In a recent interview with GamesIndustry.biz, id Software Director Tim Willits let fans in on a little secret about how everything went better than expected since the massive May leak occured. Willits told the site that it nded up being "quite nice" for the team for the simple reason that it didn't have to compete with a "55,000-ton gorilla" known as Fallout 76.

"That's why I positioned this as the post-post-apocalyptic game," he told the site. "From the story and the different biomes we've created, we tried to evolve the game past the 50 shades of brown we had in Rage and [Rage 2 developer] Avalanche had in Mad Max. So we really embraced the colors, the vibrancy of the personalities, the characters, the story, and of course the marketing, which has done really well for us. You have to be at the top of the scale, otherwise you're just at that bottom. You're ballast."

This topic of conversation did lead up to a noteworthy question regarding Rage 2; why now? And why the return to a post-apocalyptic setting that seems to be everywhere?

"The reason we like the setting is it's grounded in things people can understand, or easily imagine, but it's set in the future where we can have sci-fi stuff, because we're a bunch of sci-fi nerds," admitted the director. "So we can create these over-the-top weapons and over-the-top creatures, but we can ground it in something people know - 'Oh yeah, this could be our new future.'

"We can have these high fantasy, sci-fi-type experiences and over-the-top action in a world that people may not be able to directly relate to, but they can relate to it easier than some super fantasy alien world. We don't have to explain buildings and roads and all that; people understand it, and then they come on the journey with us."

At the end of the day, it's about not taking everything so seriously and enjoying the process of creating the game and ultimately playing the game. To read more about the upcoming title Rage 2, check out the full interview here - including what it means to be a hero.

Rage 2 is expected to launch for PS4, Xbox One, and PC in June of next year.