Double Fine's Tim Schafer Interview

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Eurogamer: So in terms of the creative process when you come to work on new projects, obviously you have limited resources for how many things you can do at any one time, so is that how it works? You throw around a few ideas and you see which the team responds to the best?

Tim Schafer: Sometimes you can't choose what you do next, because you get this idea and you just have to do it. That's the way it was with Psychonauts, and with Brütal Legend it was just like, you get an inspiration and you have to follow through on it. And then you have to adjust it for practical situations, like what kind of team you have at that time: do you have the team in place to make that game right then? Could you get someone else interested in funding it? That all comes together, all those things start turning green and giving us the go ahead on Brütal Legend.

Eurogamer: I also read that the success of Guitar Hero helped you make this game, because it made heavy metal big business all of a sudden.

Tim Schafer: Yeah, when we were first pitching Brütal Legend, it was before the first Guitar Hero game was announced and we were like, there's this game in a heavy metal world, [and they said] 'We like the game, but could we change it to be a hip-hop game, or maybe country music?' There's nothing against that music, but it doesn't have a lore of heavy metal, in terms of a certain kind of mythology that leads to epic, medieval battles.

And then after Guitar Hero came out and [Black Sabbath's] Iron Man was one of the first songs on it, it seemed to expose a whole new generation to that kind of music, so by the time we were pitching the game for a second time there was a lot more interest in it being exactly what it is, which is a brutal heavy metal action-adventure.

Eurogamer: It worries me that some suit somewhere thought that a country music game would have sold more than a heavy metal game! That's a terrifying insight into the pitching process.

Tim Schafer: The pitching process is terrifying, and you meet a lot of people who are... They're business and they care about the bottom line, and they've got to make that work. That's when we knew that we had a good partner with EA, 'cause they've been talking to a lot of different creative partners like Suda 51 and Valve and Harmonix, and all these great teams that were doing creative stuff. Doing something creative involves a certain amount of risk and launching a new IP is a very big investment. [EA] were interested in doing both of those things and that's how we knew that was the right place to go.

The bearded man and wiggling skull in question.

Eurogamer: There's a lot of appeal with the theme of the game, and the soundtrack and the character himself, and Jack Black being in there, all of that, but what excites you about the game?

Tim Schafer: I like the open-world environment and how it feels like a real place to go. I like that you can control minions and have them at your disposal; and I like that in that setting somehow humour comes out of that. When you're playing the game you can be surprised - and even though I wrote it and someone else programmed it and I know what's going to happen, it still makes me laugh because one of the characters will say something at a certain time when it's unexpected, and just these great moments happen.

Eurogamer: What for you is the appeal of the roadie?

Tim Schafer: I met a roadie years ago from Megadeth who had all these stories about the world of rock and roll, and the decadence and the excess of it were told from the perspective of a foot-soldier, a guy who has to come in, make sure everything still works and get the sound perfect and clean up afterwards. It's still a really glamorous lifestyle, but told from a point of view people don't usually hear. And also there's a certain air of humility about them because they put on the show, they make the show work, but they don't really get the applause. The applause goes to the rockstar, and after the applause has died, the roadie comes and cleans it all up, puts it in the truck and takes it to the next town.

Schafer admits there aren't many funny games about, but reckons titles like LittleBigPlanet are filled with comical moments.

So there's something about that guy that just does the work behind the scenes and isn't interested in taking much credit for it and can fix anything, can deal with unexpected situations. That was a fun character to drop into the most unexpected situation of all: being pulled back in time.

Eurogamer: One interesting thing someone tweeted to me - given your stature as a game maker, they wanted to know if your name is going to be on the box? 'Tim Schafer's Brütal Legend'?

Tim Schafer: Why would I want to be teased like American McGee for my name? You know, we had our name on the box... Ron Gilbert [game designer and ex-LucasArts colleague] put his name on Monkey Island. He said he did it as a joke, and made the font really, really big as a joke and sent it back, and then they used that on the box. Even though they're really team efforts, they're really not made by just me, there's a huge group of people going together to make the game. It's helpful to get your name on the box because it helps you to pitch your next game, that's the main thing.

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