Pollen is a first-person exploration game, set on a space station orbiting Titan, Saturn’s largest moon. A fatal accident happened to one of the crew members, so you are sent to the station to replace them. When you get there, you notice some things are not quite right. You take it upon yourself to work out what’s gone wrong by finding clues in books, photos, or audio logs.
Pollen is best played with a VR headset, and Mindfield Games is still working out how best to use the HTC Vive controllers. The focus on VR is so strong that certain things in the game change when in or out of VR.
After Jaakko and I had a brief conversation about the overall idea of Pollen, we got to talking about the role of VR in the game, as well as its interactivity and immersion.
GameSkinny: I guess VR is fundamental to the game then?
GS: You mention being able to pick up any object. I’m guessing that was quite a large part of the initial design?
GS: So VR is becoming a bigger and bigger thing, but what made you want make your game in VR?
GS: You mention consoles, does this mean that Pollen will be on Sony VR?
GS: So no plans for Xbox One owners?
GS: When designing a VR environment, you need to be able to look everywhere. So what was the biggest challenge with designing the environment around that?
GS: I see you have also modeled the bottom of the helmet, I’m guessing that’s an immersion thing? Is that a decision you made from the start, or did you try without?
GS: Would the helmet have any gameplay elements then, like health or oxygen?
GS: You mention no fighting, does that mean no aliens or no jump scares?
GS: So kind of like a space detective?
GS: You mention Gone Home, was that a big inspiration for Pollen?
GS: Any other games, or films, or books?
GS: That all sounds fantastic. Could us give an idea of when the game is coming out?
GS: It was great talking with you.
Again a massive thank you to Jaakko Kemppainen from Mindfield Games for the interview.
If you want to stay up to date on all things Pollen you can head over to the official website, follow Mindfield Games on Twitter or Facebook. You can even check out the trailer for Pollen on their YouTube channel.
