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Interview | Telltale Talks Strong Bad on Nintendo�s WiiWare

on 17.09.2008 at 12:17 User Icon

Posted by Jorge Ba-oh (jb) Number of Comments

Comments: 6 Number of Reads

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Tags: TellTale, WiiWare, Wii, Strong Bad, Homerstar Runner

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So far Telltale Games has released two episodes of Strong Bad's Cool Game for Attractive People, its collaboration with the makers of the Homerstar Runner website, the Chapman brothers. Episode 1: Homestar Ruiner proved to be a major hit, whilst Episode 2: Strong Badia the Free has just hit the US WiiWare download service to glowing reviews. With hopes high for the new episode hitting Europe this coming Friday, Cubed³ caught up with Mark Darin, Lead Designer on the project, and the ever helpful Emily Morganti of Telltale to discuss the series in general, as well as future plans…

Cubed³'s Adam Riley: What was the reason for bringing Strong Bad to WiiWare, rather than something like PSN or XBLA? And why choose the episodic route again as opposed to a full disc release?

Mark Darin, Lead Designer on Strong Bad's Cool Game for Attractive People: Our company was built from the ground up to do episodic games. That's what we do and we do it well. We believe in games that you can experience in small doses, but on a regular schedule. We've all been doing this for years with television, and now that the consoles that share the living room TV have the ability to download games, we fully expect it to be a natural part of your regular entertainment. That said, we frequently release the episodes on a disk after the season wraps up, again similar to a season DVD pack for your favourite televisions show.

Emily Morganti, Marketing Co-ordinator: As for why we went with WiiWare and not one of the other services, we felt the Wii was the best place to start out the Strong Bad series. The Chapman brothers (creators of the HomestarRunner.com website) are huge Nintendo fans and the Homestar Runner cartoons have always been full of retro gaming references and Nintendo in-jokes. We thought (correctly, as it turned out!) that there would be a lot of crossover between the HomestarRunner.com audience and the Wii audience. For all of our games, we try to make decisions based on what works best for the license, and WiiWare was the right fit for this one.

AR: What were some of the major hurdles faced when working on the WiiWare service? And were there certain aspects of the first episode that could not be included due to the space restrictions?

Mark: I guess our major hurdle was time. We started working on the series at the beginning of the year and we wanted to release Strong Bad's Cool Game for Attractive People relatively close to the WiiWare launch, so we had a lot of work to do in a short period of time. As far as the Wii space restrictions are concerned, I'm happy to say that it turned out not to be much of an issue at all. We have a 3-4 hour game that is wonderfully cinematic and fully voiced and NONE of it had to be trimmed for size! I was amazed at the wizardry our tech guys were able to perform to get everything to fit, and in the end we even able to expand on our designs and include extra features like the collectibles and the "awesomeness" ranking.

AR: How have you ensured that the videogame version will appeal to people that have never seen any of the web-episodes?

Mark: While we do include enough "in" jokes to keep long-time fans happy, our writers and designers are very good at creating universal humor based on the characters that you get to know as you play. We do regular play testing and inevitably there are always a few people who have no idea what a "Strong Bad" is, yet these people still laugh and have no trouble playing or understanding the game. Strong Bad, Homestar Runner, and the rest of the cast are very accessible characters and it doesn't take long to be affected by their charm and comical antics. The long-running success of homestarrunner.com is testament to that.

AR: So far the first two episodes of SBCG4AP have not used the Wii motion controls other than for pointing and clicking. Will this change as more episodes are released, with aspects making more use of Wii gestures?

Mark: If we find that the Wii gestures somehow help us tell the story better or if a particular puzzle really lends itself to it, we will consider it. What we do not want to do is just start adding in gesture control just for the sake of doing it, especially if it doesn't fit the rest of the gameplay.

AR: Currently the number of photos Wii users can send to each other is limited. Will this limit be removed or at least extended later into the series? And do you have plans to make use of WiiConnect24 in other ways, such as sending comically rude emails from Strong Bad's Lappy?

Mark: The number of messages and attachments you can send to Wii friends via WiiConnect24 is limited by the hardware and the service. It's not something we're able to change. And since you can already use Strong Bad's Lappy to write and send your own emails, there is no limit to how comically rude you can make them!

AR: Also, will there be cases where items of clothing can be randomly generated in a particular episode so that different people with the game will be able to send unique photos showing off their different costume get-ups to friends?

Mark: We don't want to deny any player any content that is in the game. But, many people don't realize that after you beat the game, you can go back to the photo booth in "Extended Play" mode, dress up in the costumes and LEAVE the photo booth with the costume on. Now they can go to a variety of locations in costume, and take pictures in wild outfits in places they couldn't before.

AR: We have already seen some 'space' when Strong Bad ventures into the photo booth, but will we see him venture into Outer Space in the future? And can you give any hints to other things we can expect in future episodes?

Mark: That's another great thing about being episodic, I get to say, "Tune in next time and see what happens!"

AR: Are the scripts and in-game jokes mainly written by the Chapman brothers or are some of the ideas thrown into the pot from the comical folk at Telltale as well?

Mark: The scripts are actually first written by the designers here at Telltale. We have a team of three lead writers who alternate on the scripts. Mike Stemmle wrote the first and third episodes, Chuck Jordan wrote the second and is writing the fifth, and I am writing the fourth episode. This is very similar to the way a TV series is written, with different episodes handled by different writers. Once the script is written, we then give it to the Chapman brothers, who fix it up and make sure that everything has that authentic Homestar feel. In the end, it's a really close collaboration between us all.

AR: It has previously been stated that the WiiWare edition of Homestar Ruiner has been selling at a faster pace than the PC version. Can you elaborate a little further?

Mark: Don't misunderstand, the PC version is selling great! It's simply numbers, there is a larger console market in general at the moment and the sales reflect that.

AR: Has the game's success proven to be a surprise at all, with it topping the WiiWare charts in both Europe and the US? And are there any plans to bring the game to the Japanese audience at some point?

Mark: Of course the goal with any game is to make the best piece of entertainment you can and hope that it resonates with our audience of gamers! It is certainly an honor and a thrill to be recognized at the top in Europe and the US!

Emily: Humor can be hard to translate and in particular, the Strong Bad humor seems to resonate best with English-speaking audiences. (This is true of the cartoons, too.) Story games are big in Japan and it would be a lot of fun to bring a Telltale game to that audience, but if we were to do it, we'd have to first evaluate whether Strong Bad is the right fit.

AR: Will you be releasing a full retail disc with all the episodes contained on it once each WiiWare episode has launched in order to reach an even wider market?

Emily: There are no concrete plans for a retail Wii release yet, but we'd love to. This is another example of how similar episodic gaming is to TV. With TV, after a season runs on broadcast, it's usually put out on a DVD and sold at retail. You reach a completely different audience that way.

AR: If successful enough, is there any chance of seeing Strong Bad or Homestar Runner's exploits come to DS?

Emily: Right now we're not set up for DS development, but you never know! I'm a huge DS fan and I'd love to see Telltale's games make it onto that platform.

AR: And is it likely that once all the SBCGFAP episodes are released your team will be keen to make future Strong Bad titles?

Mark: We love Strong Bad, and I would personally love to make more Strong Bad games, so we'll see what happens after this season wraps up!

AR: Finally, as a treat for long-term fans, has any consideration gone into the idea of making a cheap compilation of Videlectrix games for a system like the DS? Or even sticking them on WiiWare for around 400 Wii Points?

Emily: You'd have to ask the Videlectrix guys about that. They're a little weird when it comes new technology. (Just don't mention that most of their games can already be played on the Wii via the web browser, or they might start shouting about good graphics and poking you with a sharpened pencil or something… Smilie

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Interview | Telltale Talks Strong Bad on Nintendo�s WiiWare

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