Playboy: The Mansion Interview

Lead Designer Brenda Brathwaite and Cyberlore CEO Jon Walsh.

Our wannabe raconteur Steve Polak had a chat with Jay Adan, Marketing Director at Cyberlore. This lucky bloke is helping to make the digital incarnation of Hugh Hefner come to life. Jay had lots to say about digital lovin, a game that might be better than The Sims and the all-important 'money shot.'

IGNPC: What inspired you to make a game based on the Playboy world?

Jay: I wish that Cyberlore could take credit for the initial inspiration, but that really came from our co-publishers, ARUSH and Groove. Still, once they came to us with that inspiration, we really ran with it. I've often thought of this as the "ultimate fantasy game," because so many guys have had the fantasy of living Hugh Hefner's life at some point or another. There's a lot of inspiration there.

IGNPC: How will talking to the Playboy bunnies work?

Jay: Talking with other people and developing relationships is really the core of the game.

When you talk with another character, at the most base level, there are two things you can do: "talk" to them or "command" them. Let's say you go the talk route--you'll have lots of different options available to you. Everyone in the Mansion--and that includes Hef--shares three different relationships with each other: professional, casual and romantic. Every talk action is geared toward one of these. Let's say you're having a romantic conversation with someone you just met. It starts out pretty basic, just like you'd expect it to. As you talk, your relationship grows and so do the options available to you. We tried to make the options, their risks and their rewards as intuitive as possible. For instance, if you try to make out with someone you barely know, odds are high that you're going to fail pretty spectacularly. The conversation system is also evolving, so it pays attention to what you're selecting and offers you options in that vein.

On the "command" side of things, you'll have options like "Request Centerfold" and "Follow Me" that give you the ability to control or direct your staff and guests as you see fit.

IGNPC: What sorts of things will you be able to ask the bunnies to do?

Jay: Let's do a little clarification here. In the game you have Bunnies and you have Playmates. Bunnies are patterned after the classic Playboy Club Bunny. That is, they're a part of your staff, and they're generally there to host the guests. Playmates are models that have been, or will be, photographed for the centerfold. In real life, that's no longer the case. Bunnies are currently all former Playmates who act as spokespeople for Playboy. Not all current Playmates are Bunnies but all current Bunnies are Playmates.

With that cleared up, let's answer the question. Hef can talk with pretty much anybody in the game and suggest things that they might (or might not) enjoy doing. These things range from having them play a game of backgammon with you, watching a little TV, or talking with another guest.

You can ask your Bunnies to greet the guests, serve drinks, mingle, or any of the other things that you could ask other guests to do as well. You might even decide that one of your Bunnies should be in the magazine and ask her to pose for a photo shoot.

IGNPC: What sorts of challenges will you face?

Jay: Let's take the Playboy Foundation mission as an example. This one is based off the real-life Playboy Foundation. The Foundation, of course, is Playboy Enterprises' corporate giving program that is committed to protecting and enhancing the principles of personal freedom and social justice. In the mission, you need to create the Playboy Foundation by putting your money where your mouth is to fund your first important film project. There are several things you'll need to do which seem pretty straight forward: sign the necessary people to do the film and get a group of philanthropists together to introduce the project and the Foundation. Unfortunately, the director you had your sights on gets jailed for political protesting, and the composer you hired seems to be in desperate need of a muse. While you're figuring out what to do there, you'll need to hold a party for the philanthropists--and here's where getting to know people can really pay off, literally. Finally, just as you think it might all be coming together, a group of leery politicians threatens to raise a huge commotion and demands a meeting with you. Naturally, you'll work it all out. You're Hugh Hefner. You always do.

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