Drink Up: Your Enemy? Robot Ice Cream Truck
There are some really whacked out ideas in games. You know, crazy characters, insane levels. Ever wonder where they come from? Drunk people, apparently. Don't believe me? Game translator Matt Alt recalls when he was working on a difficult-to-localize PlayStation game:
During a late-night meeting with the game's director at the local izakaya pub, I half in jest suggested that we re-envision one of the enemy characters as a giant transforming ice cream truck. In robot form it'd have ice cream scoop hands, an ice cream cone head, an ice cream parlor awning "skirt," the works.Little did I realize he had taken me seriously. When we showed up at the office several days later he showed us a short loop his animator had created based on the idea. In the end it never did make it into the finished product, but seeing my clumsy-looking, beer-drenched robot concept come to life on a Japanese animator's computer screen was an amazing experience for this American-born mecha-maniac. I wish I still had the cocktail napkin with my original sketch, if only to highlight the difference between my drawing abilities (which are on par with a third grader) and those of a professional mecha artist.
Shame it never made it in the game, because I would so play this. And the company's name? That, dear reader, is a secret. But it's probably not who you'd think!
I Scream Robo [AltJapan]
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