Interview: American McGee on Alice Madness Returns

Mike Bantick
Thursday, 26 May 2011 14:16

Opinion and Analysis

In a world of Space Marines, why would a company bring a video game to the world with a little girl as the main protagonist?  Well Alice is no push-over and as developer Spicy Horse CEO and Senior Creative Director American McGee along with Art Director Ken Wong point out in this discussion sometimes creative people need creative worlds to explore.

iTWire sat down with Ken Wong (Art Director) and American McGee (Senior Creative Director and CEO) of Spicy Horse to discuss their new work Alice: Madness Returns.  We thought it apt to begin by asking how in a world of space marines why Alice?

American McGee: 'you have answered your own question, it is a world of space marines and my entrance into this industry was actually through space marines, Doom, the penultimate space marine game, and then we did Quake which was another space marine, and so after making a few space marine games, I kinda had the sense that we needed to do more by stretching the technology creatively.  When EA asked me originally to go off and create an idea for a new game, I think they were thinking 'hey, he's going to go off and make a space marine game for us.'  But it struck me you could do something fantastic with Wonderland, because it so surreal, because of the possibilities.  For me it is an ideal world in which to create a game, and it turns out, that as a character, she is a really compelling as a video game character.'

iTWire: Is it because of your team and technology advancements that enable you to realise the dream of the original game [American McGee's Alice was released on PC in 2000] some ten years on?

AM: 'I actually think this is the ideal version, and like the first what we have seen is that this team has come together, you have so many people with so much energy and creative ideas , pouring all that energy and enthusiasm into the game,  one of the things that makes working on Alice really pleasurable is that it is a really inspiring thing to build, there are so many things you can do with it.  Technology has moved on, but it is not a technology showcase, there is a lot of really nice technology in there but, it's a creative showcase, for Ken and the artists.'

iTWire: Does working in Wonderland free up many constraints during development?

Ken Wong: 'Well I am happy not to be working on space marines, there are only so many flavours of space marines and it seems like there is an audience that likes to see this year's space marine and what new do-hicky they have on their gun , but for someone that is creative, interested in art, interested in story, Wonderland is an exceptional place to be working in, anything goes, you are working on a psychological level, exploring ideas and themes and putting them into landscapes and characters and figuring out what is in Alice's mind.  So you don't get to do that so much in games, and I wish we could do that more.'

'There's a lot for gamers to look forward to, and a lot for ordinary people to look forward to in our game.  Some people they don't dig the space marine thing, and aren't interested in shooting Iraqi civilians over and over again, this is something different, whether it's just popping her head off, and rolling around the environment or growing giant and squashing five guards under her feet, or shrinking to get through a keyhole we think that offers something different.'

 

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