So Kotaku recently sent out interview questions to the IGF finalists to show in a feature they were doing on the independent game festival.
Our interview went up today, but sadly the interview was edited down to 2 questions and because of that our answers were taken a bit out of context.
The following is the full Kotaku Interview.
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Q: What was the inspiration behind your game?
Edmund: Super meat boy was inspired by a divine guidance or influence exerted directly on the mind and soul of humankind.
Tommy: My grandfather had a saying, "I don't know what the key to success is, but the key to failure is trying to please everyone". That quote has stuck with me all this time and when I am helping with a game I really remember him saying those words to me.
Q: Q: What do you do for a living now? What do you hope to do?
Edmund: I currently make video games for a living, actually my most recent title Super Meat Boy has been nominated for both excellence in audio as well as the grand prize in the IGF. The IGF (Institute for global futures) is a festival that was established to provide leading-edge intelligence about the emerging trends, innovations and forecasts that will impact consumers, business and society in the future. To better prepare leaders to direct change and shape the future.
Tommy: I'm actually a Assistant Manager / Barrista at StarBucks in my local mall. I work there pretty much full time, doing coding contracts on the side as well as some game dev. I hope that one day I can actually manage my own Starbucks, I'm currently going through their corporate training program and I'm very excited about finishing! That being said, I would like a career in video games. Its nice to have a solid platform to launch off of, and Starbucks internal promotion program really allows me to stay grounded yet reach for my pursue my goals. I hope to continue to make a living off said game once it is released on Steam, Wiiware and other yet to be announced console or consoles.
Q: Who or what are your greatest influences when creating a game?
Tommy: Many of your readers (probably most) have never seen the show M.A.S.H. It ran in the early 70's until the early 80's and was about a M.A.S.H. platoon in Vietnam. In M.A.S.H. Corporal Maxwell Klinger (played by Jamie Farr) constantly dresses up as a woman in order to be thrown out of the military so that he can return home. This influences me because Klinger is doing something extraordinary to get out of a of a situation that was ordinary to thousands and thousands of enlisted men and women. He is brave in his attempt to do something very unorthodox to meet a personal goal. I feel when I work on a game. I am doing something that to many people does seem extraordinary (as you mentioned in your previous question, there are several forms of expression), however it is something that I am willing to do to accomplish a goal.
Edmund: Ive found my greatest influences to be the ones with the most capacity or power of persons or things to be a compelling force on or produce effects on the actions, behavior, opinions, of others.
Q: Name your favorite book, movie, album and game?
Edmund: To Kill a Mockingbird, Citizen Kane, Beach boys: Pet sounds, Pong.
Tommy: The Help by Kathryn Stockett, Up in the Air, U2: No Line on the Horizon, Modern Warfare 2.
Q: How did you come up with the name to your game?
Tommy: I actually had no say in the name of the game, but I'm very happy with the name that was chosen.
Edmund: Seeing as A name is a label for a noun, normally used to distinguish one from another. I took the name "Meat Boy" to identify a class or category of things, or a single thing, either uniquely, or within a given context, in this context i choose Meat Boy because the character was both a boy as well as made of meat. A personal name identifies a specific unique and identifiable individual person, and may or may not include a middle name, but in this case i choose to forgo a middle name in exchange for an introductory adjective to build on to said name.
I choose the adjective "super". a word whose main syntactic role is to modify a noun or pronoun, giving more information about the noun or pronoun's referent. the word Super is given to show that in this case "Meat Boy" is to be looked at as of the highest degree, power, etc.
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The original Kotaku post can be viewed here:
http://kotaku.com/5468754/mile-marker-27-super-meat-boy
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