Activision Teams Up with X-Men Scribe Penn
At A Glance
- Activision taps a film writer for the new X-Men game.
Activision, Inc. has had success with its Marvel Comics video games, whether they're based purely on the comics (X-Men™ Legends) or tied directly to a film adaptation (Spider-Man® 2). With X-Men: The Official Game, the game publisher, along with developer Z-Axis, pulls the best from both worlds. Thirty years of X-Men comics mythology and three feature films serve as inspiration for the new game. To unite the film universe with the comic mythology, Activision turned once again to Hollywood screenwriter Zak Penn, who previously wrote the Fantastic 4 game.
Wolverine takes matters into his own claws.
"Zak Penn represents the voice of these characters to the film audience," says Scott Bandy, executive producer for Activision. "His sensibilities about their speech patterns, internal conflicts, and the relationships between them allowed us to provide the player the opportunity to discover what has happened to the X-Men between the time that X2: X-Men United ended and X-Men: The Last Stand begins."
Further connecting the film and game worlds, Hugh Jackman (Logan/Wolverine), Patrick Stewart (Professor Charles Xavier), Alan Cumming (Kurt Wagner/Nightcrawler), and Shawn Ashmore (Bobby Drake/Iceman) provided original voice work and allowed their likenesses to be used in the interactive adventure. The Fox film production also offered the game team early access to the script, locations, character lists, and artwork.
"If the audience is curious why Nightcrawler isn't
with the team in X-Men: The Last Stand, they're
going to have to play the game to find out."
"While X-Men does not contain any actual digital assets from the film, their cooperation was crucial in assuring that we had the opportunity to understand what the film was about so that we could incorporate that into our character choices, design concepts, etc. whenever possible," says Bandy.
X-Men: The Official Game puts you in the roles of three playable characters from the films, Wolverine, Nightcrawler, and Iceman, as they battle through 28 levels of gameplay plus bonus missions. With the variety of characters, you are given a full range of action gameplay fighting mechanics to contend with and master.
Wolverine's revenge mission focuses on hack-and-slash combat. Nightcrawler can crawl up walls and attack while teleporting from one area to another, opening up a unique arsenal of combat options. And Iceman's forte is with melee combat as he navigates environments atop his ice slide.
Unleash Your Mutant Writer
Penn says that while writing for games can be more challenging because of the nature of cut scenes and the level structure of a game, it's also a much freer process for a writer.
"As a writer you can do what you want without worrying about shooting budgets or writing by committee, which are constraints for Hollywood films," says Penn, who's a gamer. "There are aspects of writing a game story that's a lot of fun. But at the end of the day, a game is judged by how it plays. A great cut scene doesn't make or break a game."
Penn acknowledges that he skips through cut scenes in video games to get right to the hacking and slashing. And he's the one responsible for writing these types of sequences.
The Iceman cometh.
Unite Against Plot Holes
The new X-Men game delivers the full story to comic and film fans who can experience the game before they see the third, and potentially final, film in the X-Men franchise. (That is, aside from the Wolverine spin-off film with Hugh Jackman.) Bandy says that while Nightcrawler plays a major role in the game, he is absent from the upcoming film.
"This is one of the key areas where our story expands on a character's arc away from the film's fiction," says Bandy. "If the audience is curious why Nightcrawler isn't with the team in X-Men: The Last Stand they're going to have to play the game to find out."
Penn adds that the game offers an explanation of Nightcrawler's powers that may or may not be true to the comic, but is consistent to the film universe. Kitty Pryde/Shadowcat's character is explained in the game, which familiarizes gamers with her. She plays a major role in the new movie.
Nightcrawler scopes out the city.
Good to the Last Stand
Penn says the new X-Men game serves as a great experience for X-Men fans who want the full story. He says there's a huge audience of fans who know the X-Men from games like Activision's X-Men Legends. The blending of the game and film worlds, while not on the scale of Atari's Enter the Matrix™, does its job in offering gamers and film fans a new experience.
"Games are a pure art form," says Penn, who acknowledges that Hollywood can market a bad movie to make money." Bad games won't sell. Gamers are very savvy consumers. The X-Men games have succeeded because they're good games."
Article by John Gaudiosi
