As most of you know, I'm here in San Diego for the much anticipated 2010 edition of Comic Con International. While checking out the Marvel booth (after a minor communication error with Joey Q) I managed to catch up with Matt Powers, the producer of SEGA's latest comic movie/video game adaptation,
THOR:
Pietro Filipponi: How soon did your team begin production of the game?
"The started production of the movie about a year and a half ago so that's when we first started working on the game. But then they delayed the movie and pushed it our for almost a year so it was a bit hard for us to continue without knowing the direction [the studio] was going to take."
PF: It seems you we almost leapfrogging over each other, so who was responsible for the designs of the Nine Realms, the intricacies of the costumes and all the aesthetic details?
"We wanted to start on the designs of the Worlds and such right away but we had to slow down for a bit to let the film crew finish conceptualizing them. Worlds like NIFLHEIM and ALFHEIM aren't featured in the film but the movie people needed to take the lead on their designs. And they really learned their way around the comics mythology, they're true experts."
PF: Is this game based on the film's storyline or is it an original one?
"It's a complete original story. Matt Fraction helped us by consulting on it."
PF: What's been the most difficult part of the process?
"I'd have to say it's getting in tuned with the movie crew. We had a tough time making a lot of forward progress because the movie guys took a long time to finalize what they wanted. Just learning to pronounce the names of these characters and places in hard enough, but we didn't know how Kenneth Branagh was going to direct Chris Hemsworth, or how Chris was going to 'speak' as Thor, so writing the game's script was a hard thing to lock down until production of the film was in full swing."
PF: Was there anything that the production crew did to help you guys along?
"The Marvel guys were a tremendous help. Like with the cape, they sent us actual swatches of the cloth so we can make sure the game matched up with the film. As for the helmet, which you don't see here [in the concept art], Marvel changed the helmet design three times on us so far. Even now they are still tweaking the helmets and costumes with CG, even though they are already done filming. We're constantly getting new designs in."
PF: When comparing the Thor game to others like Iron Man or Wolverine, what would you say it the biggest difference?
"This whole experience has been great and mostly because it's so different. It's not grounded in Earth or technology, it's so vast and deep with all the Worlds and characters that there is so much more room to be creative with it. It's a very fun time"