Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, according to the development team at MachineGames and Bethesda, will prioritize melee combat over gunfights. This design choice reflects the iconic character's personality and established lore.
Indiana Jones and the Great Circle: More Hand-to-Hand, Fewer Guns
Stealth and Puzzles: Key Gameplay Elements
In an exclusive interview with PC Gamer, MachineGames design director Jens Andersson and creative director Axel Torvenius detailed the game's gameplay focus. Drawing from their experience with titles like the Wolfenstein series and Chronicles of Riddick: Escape From Butcher Bay, they emphasized hand-to-hand combat, improvised brawls, and stealth as core mechanics.
Andersson explained, "Indiana Jones isn't a gunslinger; he doesn't charge into situations blazing away. Hand-to-hand combat, however, makes perfect sense." The team leveraged their Chronicles of Riddick melee combat experience as a foundation, adapting it to suit Indy's unique style.
"He's not a fighter by nature, though he constantly finds himself in fights," Andersson added. Players will utilize everyday objects—pots, pans, even banjos—as improvised weapons. "He's an unlikely hero, lucky—we aimed to translate that humor and luck into the gameplay experience."
Beyond combat, players will explore the game world in diverse ways. Inspired by Wolfenstein's blend of linear and open areas, Indiana Jones and the Great Circle will shift between structured paths and more expansive, explorable environments. Some larger areas will approach immersive sim design, offering players significant freedom in how they approach challenges. Andersson described these areas: "There are more open areas, almost immersive sim-style, such as enemy camps where you need to infiltrate a main building—you can explore and figure out how to do it."
Stealth will play a crucial role, incorporating both traditional infiltration and a novel "social stealth" mechanic. This allows players to find and equip disguises to blend in and access restricted areas. Andersson stated, "Every large location features numerous disguises to discover. These disguises help you pass as someone who belongs, granting access to areas otherwise difficult to reach."
In a previous interview with Inverse, game director Jerk Gustafsson highlighted the deliberate downplaying of gunplay. Gustafsson explained, "Our starting point was to largely ignore the shooting aspect. We're confident in our ability to handle gunplay well, so it wasn't a concern. We prioritized elements like hand-to-hand combat, navigation, and traversal—areas we knew would be challenging, particularly in a first-person perspective."
The game will also feature challenging puzzles designed to test even experienced puzzle solvers. Gustafsson noted, "Players seeking difficult puzzles will find them," adding that some extremely challenging puzzles will be optional to maintain accessibility.
