Sleeping Dogs has been one of the most overlooked games of the year. The reviews were good to great and the few people who did buy the game mostly loved it as well. Today we learned that we should be looking forward to at least “6 months total DLC planned at this point” according to Sleeping Dogs producer Dan Sochan. He also had this to say when interviewed about the DLC:
“A few months before we shipped Square told us they wanted to do DLC so we made sure we could technically do add ons. But we really spent every waking hour and then some making sure the game was as polished and as bug free as it could be.”
However, they only worked on the DLC after Sleeping Dogs was “done and shipped out the door”. Apparently they had no initial plans for DLC, but according to Sochan that is not uncommon:
“Every contract is slightly different. More often than not with a new IP you want to assess the interest in the market, the consumers. How are people feeling a few months before launch? And you hedge your bets”. Square, from the very beginning, were showing that they believed in us and believed in this game as a potential franchise”.
As for what Sochan and the United Front team have planned for the next six months, there are a variety of things headed our way including content packs:
“That explore other aspects of Hong Kong cinema and ones that are a little more serious. We’ve got some more fun, interesting character packs which we’ve recently had up on the website– giving people different options and asking what DLC pack they wanted, Monkey King, “a character pack with a vehicle, new animations and some weapons as well”.
Finally, Sochan was asked about the future of the Sleeping Dogs and would we be seeing sequels because Square Enix believes Sleeping Dogs has franchise potential: “I can’t really comment on a sequel right now. Our main focus is on putting out quality DLC so people see value and continue to want to show interest in the franchise. Then we can evaluate and look at it at that point”.
Square Enix did a great thing by rescuing Sleeping Dogs from Activision, but the sales for the game were disappointing. I would love to see a sequel to Sleeping Dogs or even a new setting with new characters from United Front but it might be tough considering the sales even though the game was reviewed favorably by both customers and critics.
