DESIGN MUSINGS

This particular section will grow over time. I won't say, "It's under construction", since what I have now is perfectly readable..

Whenever I had to give a personality to one of the characters, I had two methods: the 'intuitive' method, and the 'gag' method. The intuitive method was simple; just go watch the character in action and try to glean what the character was like from what little I saw. I say 'little' because fighting game characters don't do that much; they just fight. :)

But the characters did make noises and strike poses; I also had whatever character art I could get my hands on. From all that, I tried to suss out what the character was like; sort of like trying to read what the game artists were trying to non-verbally communicate. Often, in the end I based a character around just one or two images that I could get a handle on. For instance, in DT2, Geese Howard became a "experienced and reservedly professional fighter, weary due to his middle age but still strong" solely based on the way he adjust his wristband in Fatal Fury I. :)

Of course, DT ended up as mostly a comedy: if I was truly successful in reading the characters we'd have a drama instead. The 'gag' method was simple; read the character's background, pick something broad, and exaggerate it. HAOHMARU WAS A GOOD EXAMPLE OF THIS. Actually, Haohmaru was a mix of both methods - I started out inspired by the powerful, confident sounding cries he made when he swung his weapon in Samurai Shodown I, and from there started expounding on his cockiness and loud manner until he was almost unbearable to every other character around him. The 'legendariness' shtick of his came from the fact that he was based off the historical Miyamoto Musashi, who was, well, legendary.

Naturally, not every character was created by the above methods. Ryoko of World Heroes got her 'unwilling cuteness' shtick from Mark Maestas, who threw in as an off-hand comment that Ryoko didn't always like being thought of as cute and was getting sick of it. The writers all grabbed the sentence and ran with it all through the tournament, much to Ryoko's dismay.

Some characters were group-characterized by the game they came from; the Time Killers for isntance. Mark introduced them to DT2, saying that he really, really wanted them included in the tournament. I said okay - they were in. I hadn't yet seen the game, though, and could only go by what Mark gave me when he wrote the Time Killers introduction. The Time Killers ended up as fun-loving, immature, gratuitously violent idiots who had a habit of being a nuisance to the DT staff and cracking color commentary of a Beavis and Butthead style. (At the time, I hadn't yet seen Beavis and Butthead, either - believe it or not. Actually, come to think of it, I still haven't seen an episode of that show..) Imagine my surprise when, a month later, my arcade received a copy of Time Killers and found out they were rather dark and nasty personalties. At least I got the 'gratuitously violent' part correct. :) But the natures of the DT Time Killers were pretty much locked in, and proved popular to the readers anyhow.

Coming up next on the Musings: a few words on the mythology of the Video Multiverse. After that, maybe I'll take requests. Anyone curious about anything?