With the Battle Royale craze going on with a lot of shooters (which admittedly is not for everyone), there’s the question of whether upcoming/current games will have a feature added to cash in on the genre’s popularity. In an interview with GameSpot, Crytek product manager Angela de Castro and level design director Chris Auty were asked just that in regards to Hunt: Showdown, which is currently in Early Access on Steam.

“Right now we’re focused on making Hunt as we have it,” De Castro explains. However, there is a possibility that we could see the mode added in the future, due to Hunt being “flexible”. “Because we’re in early access, this is really good for us; we can fine-tune it to what the community wants. If we were to make a Battle Royale mode or if we were to explore different kinds of modes for the game, we would also try to make it unique. We would also try to make it fit the mood and the spirit of Hunt.”

Auty states that based on feedback from fans, the game is “pretty unique”, which the team is quite proud of. However, if they were to introduce a Battle Royal mode, it would have to fit in with the game itself. “If we were to introduce a [Battle Royale] mode, it would have to be our take on it. We wouldn’t want to do a cookie cutter, same as everyone else. It would be detrimental to our playerbase.”

Aside from the Battle Royale question, the question of why the team opted for Early Access is brought up. Auty talks of the necessity for Hunt to be in Early Access. “We couldn’t have done anything like this if we didn’t have the Early Access model,” he says. “It would have been impossible. The feedback we get and our ability to make changes–we can make changes within an hour. We couldn’t have done this with a boxed product.”

Hunt: Showdown looks to be in Early Access for another year before the final release, depending on player feedback.