Some gamers may not know that critically well-received tactical squad shooter Ghost Recon Future Soldier unlocks content in a separate game in the Ghost Recon franchise (and vice versa). The game GRFS unlocks content in is Ghost Recon Commander, a tactical shooter game on Facebook which was developed by Loot Drop, a studio founded by industry veterans John Romero and Brenda Brathwaite that specializes in social games. Brenda, the COO and co-founder of Loot Drop, was kind enough to take time out of her undoubtedly busy schedule just a short while after Ghost Recon Commander made its arrival on Facebook to speak to me about it and its ties to GRFS.
Ghost Recon Commander is called a “gamer’s game on Facebook” and, although some core gamers may react cynically to the claim, playing GRC for even just a few minutes reveals that this game has core game DNA running through it. Part of the reason for that core game DNA’s existence is the passion that both Brenda and John have for the Ghost Recon franchise. Brenda and John are hardcore fans, having logged roughly 180 and 200 hours respectively on a classic Ghost Recon title — the same amount of time that some gamers may have spent playing massive open world RPGs such as Skyrim. They’re also in pursuit of a goal of a perfect game — meaning that they cannot die even once. The two are such big fans of Ghost Recon that it caught the attention of Josh Mast at Ubisoft, who recommended that Loot Drop be contacted to make a Ghost Recon Facebook game.
Brenda is no stranger to some of the feelings that some core gamers may have had about some Facebook games that are a part of big core game licenses:
“…sometimes I will get very excited about a Facebook game that I hear that’s coming out [that’s] related to a hardcore release. It’s like, ‘Oh, this going to be great, I’m gonna go play this’ — and then I find out that it really is just an add-on. It’s not even really even a full standalone game, it feels like a marketing thing that they attached to it.”
However, Brenda says that Ubisoft didn’t want that approach for Ghost Recon Commander — they wanted a standalone game right from the beginning, not a marketing add-on. In that regard, GRC does not disappoint, as the game offers the same kind of gradual learning process that gamers have come to expect from Ghost Recon games: figuring out more about the game’s A.I. and enemy patterns through repeated playthroughs. Playing through missions will make players more tactical and by being more tactical, they can get better at the game and earn more in-game money.
