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04 Dec 2008 at 18:08:59 by Andy Alderson

You’ve also been involved in game design too, with a credit on Knockout Kings for the N64. How did you become involved in that?

That happened at a time when no-one was doing boxing games. When the Playstation first came out, on the very first console box, they had screenshots of upcoming games. And they showed a boxing game, but it never actually came out. And so the Playstation had blown up and the N64 was out, but no-one had done a boxing game.  I sat down and put together a game design document from of about 100 pages and we shopped it around to EA, Sony and a bunch of different place and EA picked it up eventually.  I was seeing all these things happening with Virtual Fighter and Tekken and there was this one game called K1 Fighter for the Playstation. It was a kickboxing game with broken controls and I thought “why are people playing kickboxing when boxing is arguably the biggest sport on the planet?” And so we set about making a 3D boxing game which was very fun to be involved with.

So are you looking forward to the next Fight Night game?

You know what: what was that last boxing game I just played from EA? It really sucked.

That’ll be Facebreaker.

Boy did that suck. Fight Night on the 360 and PS3 blew me away – the facial details and the sweat dripping off on the PS3 version. And that was early next-gen technology. Now they’ve had a couple of years to become familiar with the new hardware, I can only imagine what’s coming next. I’m really looking forward to the next iteration.

Do you have any plans to get back into game design? 

I just don’t have the time now. On the early games I worked on, the dev teams were small. Back then you almost had to be a game designer as there were only eight or so people on the team. So I used to help out whenever I could. I would sit down after the music was done and help design levels. I did that on Cool Spot. It’s always been something I’ve been interested in but these days things are very different. I have a couple of crazy ideas in my head but... maybe when I retire. But I don’t know if that will ever happen.

What do you make of the new breed of rhythm action games hitting the market recently? Do you think they’re good for both the music and games industries?

Absolutely. We actually use Guitar Hero in the VGL show. I was hugely influenced by Steven (Tyler from Aerosmith, Tommy’s cousin) when I was growing up and we play a Guitar Hero segment with Sweet Emotion in the show. And, of course, there’s Guitar Hero: Aerosmith. I’d like to think I had a little influence in getting that made.

The impact of rhythm action games has been phenomenal. About a month ago the music industry released a report which said 32% of all the money it has made so far in 2008 has come from games. Video games are not only becoming the entertainment medium of choice for the 21st century, they’re also becoming a distribution channel now. Look at Guitar hero: Metallica. The same day they released the new album in retail and on iTunes, they also released it through the game. If I’m a 17/18 year old kid which version am I going to choose? I want the one I can play along to. Also, a lot of new bands are getting their break from games – Good Charlotte got their start in an EA game, ask Avril Lavigne where she got her break too.

One of the first examples of gaming’s impact on the music industry that I was part of was the original Tony Hawk pro-skater. I was doing all this sound design and music direction and they said “do you want to create a bunch of punk/ska/alternative songs for the game?”  And I said “no, why? People don’t want to hear me ripping off the bands, let’s license the actual bands.” When we picked the songs that appeared in the game, that was the first time the music industry turned its head because Tony Hawk went on to sell 11 million units on the Playstation alone. And the music industry reaped the benefits as people went out to buy albums after hearing bands in the game. The power of video games is increasing every day.  

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A Video Games Live CD is now available in shops and is called Video Games Live: Volume One.

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