Everyone has a fighting chance
With everyone at home right now the team working on the upcoming Warhammer: Odyssey Mobile MMORPG have taken the time to answer another set of our interview questions. In round 3 of our developer interview James York, co-founder of Virtual Realms, answers further questions covering everything from from quests vs. grinding to the current state of development.
With everyone at home right now the team working on the upcoming Warhammer: Odyssey Mobile MMORPG have taken the time to answer another set of our interview questions. In round 3 of our developer interview James York, co-founder of Virtual Realms, answers further questions covering everything from from quests vs. grinding to the current state of development.
One topic that has always been up for discussion in EVE Online’s New Eden is the health of its economy, and the ecosystem at large. We sat down with Snorri �rnason to discuss the topic at legnth.
In part 2 of our interview with Saga of Lucimia’s creative director, Tim Anderson, the developer chats with us about inspirations for his MMORPG, why group content is a focus and more.
Mortal Kombat fans and Spawn fans alike have been filled with excitement since the character’s confirmation as a DLC fighter last May.
Being a fan of both franchises, I had to reach out to Spawn‘s creator himself, Todd McFarlane, to get his insight on the character’s interpretation in Mk11 as well as discuss his previous work in fighting games.
Austyn “Lazybones 2020” Roney: Mortal Kombat is one of the biggest titles in the fighting game community and whenever Spawn was announced for Mortal Kombat it was a huge deal for not only Mortal Kombat fans and for Spawn fans, but for me personally because I am both!
First, I wanted to congratulate you, Spawn is doing incredible right now, Spawn 300 was one of the best-selling comics in 2019, I have actually been collecting them since 300 came out. Starting there and going back while keeping up with the new releases.
Todd McFarlane: Oh, thank you, now you just have to procreate and have all of you guys buy up all of the comics. (laughs)
Lazybones2020: I just read 305 earlier, that was a really cool story, I am excited to see where it goes!
Back to Spawn in being in Mortal Kombat, back in 2015, you stated that NetherRealm could use Spawn for a couple of their games, but that offer was set within a certain window. With Spawn being in Mortal Kombat 11, was that window you mentioned earlier coming to a close?
McFarlane: Spawn being added to Mortal Kombat had nothing to do with any kind of window on my side. These kinds of things, where companies will call me up and ask me if they can use my character, will come up from time to time.
Lazybones2020 Well, the timing couldn’t have been better for how great things are going for Spawn and when the record was broken with issue 301.
McFarlane: Well, none of us knew that would happen right? They had hundreds of other characters to pick between and they landed on Spawn and all I could say is, “cool, let’s do this!”
When these guys came to me and asked if they could use Spawn, I said the only requirements were that I need you to make him a really exciting character in your game, so that if nobody knows Spawn, they will go, this guy, he’s my favorite. I told them to make Spawn work in their game, play to what your audience likes. Make a cool video game character.
Take someone that we both know is the Intellectual Property “Spawn”, but literally do whatever it is that you want with him to make him fit your game. Don’t feel tied to the comics, or the show, or the movie. If that means you make up some new stuff to make him cool for your audience, then so be it.
Even if you tell someone to do whatever they want, they will take baby steps. At first, they showed me a few ideas and I would have to keep telling them, “Get crazier! Go bigger!”
I told these guys, look, I am not in my twenties anymore, I’m older, I’ve got thick skin, get creative! Eventually, the guys at NetherRealm got to the point where it all clicked. “Wow, we can really do anything!”
Lazybones2020: That is incredible, and it has to be a great opportunity for NetherRealm because it seems that with most guest characters, there are a lot of limitations in their interpretation. But with Spawn, it sounds like you are giving them free rein!
McFarlane: Being an artist, I know what it is like to feel boxed in, being told what you can and cannot do with the thing you are creating. I assume these people feel the exact same way. By giving them the freedom to create whatever character they want, that is when you get good results.
Instead of saying, here are the rules, I say, Spawn in this game is not a continuation of the one from the comics, this is a Spawn for people who like video games, and not just video games, but Mortal Kombat games. They need to think he is cool for who he is in the game. Make him fun, make him cool, with his abilities and his cape, which might not always be red with a push of a button!
Lazybones2020: That’s awesome! A really cool detail. With Spawn, he was in SoulCalibur II, and you also created the original character, Necrid for that game as well. What was it like working with Namco and how does that process differ from what it has been like with NetherRealm?
McFarlane: Namco wanted a lot more input during the development of SoulCalibur II. It was Greg Capullo, who was working on his book at the time, and I and they wanted a lot of drawings and input on what was going on with Spawn in that game.
With MK11 I haven’t voiced my opinion too much. I figured that if I sit back and told myself, let’s just see what they can do, they could pull off some really cool stuff. If I needed to, I could reel them back in, but that never happened. They have never disappointed me.
The only criticism that will come from me will be that they didn’t go far enough. Big corporate brands want to protect everything because they have so much money invested in these characters and things like that, but that really limits what you can do. So I said, go full boat.
Assume I just signed over the copyright to Spawn, show me what you would do with that freedom. From there they went on to create a character that they wanted to play.
Lazybones2020: I recently saw all of the Mortal Kombat toys that you and your team have been working on in stores and they look incredible the detail is fantastic.
McFarlane: The detail is theirs; it is all on them. I just take the detail that they give me. It is all their design; it belongs to them.
Lazybones2020: Which isn’t common with a lot of toys, they usually don’t go all-in on the details, but the toys at McFarlane, they don’t sacrifice a single thing.
McFarlane: I have a sense of pride when it comes to the quality of the products that we create. Going back to what we were talking about before, these toy companies that are publicly owned, they do everything to maximize their profit margins.
I don’t need to protect the brand of Spawn. To me, I see Spawn within a word cloud. I feel that if you polled 1000 people, they would all come back with two words that described the essence of the character. Those two words are cool and badass.
So, whenever we make something those two words are being applied to it, and we make sure the products we sell are as accurate as possible. It is okay if I lose some money by making a figure more detailed, because to me, at the end of the day we will sell more toys if they are of a higher quality! So, I’d end up making whatever investment I made back because I know that people want the properties they enjoy being well represented.
Lazybones2020: I saw an ad for the Spawn figure coming out in the MK11 line, and he looks awesome! That is the first look at the full design at Spawn. His cape was something we didn’t get with SoulCalibur, it had to become his ax.
So, just with the technical improvements, it is something that is really cool, and without going into too much detail, like you said his cape could change with a touch of a button, can we expect a lot from it in Mortal Kombat?
McFarlane: You know yeah, his cape is alive, you can take advantage of that, you’ve seen it do all sorts of things in the comic books. He has his weapons and all of his powers, there is a lot of opportunity with the character.
They did a good job of making sure that if you like the mystic part of Spawn, you can play him like that, if you like the weapons that he uses, you can play him like that, if you like fisticuffs, you can play him like that. You can do each of those things or all the above. They did a really good job of giving options.
Lazybones2020: And that’s how I view Spawn, he is the “All of the Above” character, he’s got it everything. I did notice though that he has a sword which is something you don’t see Spawn with too often, but you do see him with one at the end of Spawn 305, so it will be interesting to see some swordplay with Spawn in both Mortal Kombat and the comics.
Let’s say if you made an original character, like you made Necrid in SoulCalibur, in this Mortal Kombat universe, you were given that same opportunity, what kind of character would you create? What would be the McFarlane take on Mortal Kombat?
McFarlane: You know there are already so many characters in Mortal Kombat that they have made themselves, that I think I would rather reverse the role of some of these guys. I would be interested in taking the original ten who have been around for the longest and make them a bit different, not better, just different than what people are used to.
Lazybones2020: Going back to Injustice 2, they did a poll for who fans wanted to join the game that was a non-MK character, and Spawn lead the poll. It is great to see these things come full circle.
While it would have been nice to see Spawn in that game so he could interact with other comic book characters, the world of Mortal Kombat feels like a better fit. Especially given all that is possible in that series, the sky is the limit in terms of the action and the fatalities.
McFarlane: The one thing I think is super smart on their end, you know we are all in competition with everyone, but the thing they did that was super cool was the fatality. They went all-in on that whenever they first started and you know, either people were going to be offended or they were going to think it was super cool.
There are a ton of people like us who see those kinds of things and chuckle, you know it’s out there and it is kind of funny, but there are other people who really can’t grasp this concept. These are the people who don’t play video games so they couldn’t understand, and to me, this is offensive to us on a couple of different levels.
There is no documented science that proves that video games correlate to real-life violence. If there was, you know that whenever this conversation comes up, they would wave it in front of our faces, but it doesn’t, so they don’t.
Lazybones2020: It really stifles creativity if we let ourselves get too concerned about the potential of anything we make being used to justify whatever they have going on already in their own head.
McFarlane: People are capable of partaking in media and not being influenced to do terrible things. Kids know the difference between the ages of 5-7 that what they see on TV isn’t real. Whenever they are watching Looney Tunes, they know there isn’t a 6-foot tall rabbit that can talk, or you know a talking mouse named Mickey.
Somehow, somewhere down the line, when we all get older, people who are between 18 and 25, they all of a sudden become incapable of doing this. I don’t buy that, that’s not how people work.
Just say you don’t like the content. These things are no more harmful than the typical action movie. There are bad people out there sure, psychopaths, who do awful things, but we can’t let them control what we can create.
I fight on your side; I am a very vocal advocate of defending the content we enjoy.
Lazybones2020: I’ve been reading Spawn from the beginning since I started collecting with 300 and back when things were on a smaller scale, the stories in Spawn would talk about the darker things that do happen in the world. But Spawn as a character would try his best to put a stop to them, something we wish was possible in reality, for a powerful force to do the things we can’t.
McFarlane: In issue 29 of Spawn, there was a dad who was beating his kids. Spawn found out about this and knew he couldn’t just kill him; these kids couldn’t lose their dad. Spawn decides to tattoo the abuser instead, he tattooed “I beat my kids” all over his body.
Al thought that this would embarrass the father, put him on the right path, humble him to stop what he was doing, but instead, it makes him twice as angry. One day one of the kids ran for his dad’s gun to protect his brother, he shoots his dad, and he ends up dying anyway.
This was just one of those stories about how you can’t play God. Like Stan Lee said, “With Great Power Comes Great Responsibility.” Al Simmons is a completely flawed character, just trying to figure it out. To figure out how to deal with the circumstances he is in. It is way more interesting to see the flaws.
If you or I were just shot by lighting, we wouldn’t change just because we got powers. Austyn, you would just be a strong journalist. It wouldn’t make you any smarter or any better of a person.
What makes the story interesting is thinking, “Hey, how did Austyn get to now from who he was ten years ago?”
Not everybody is created equal, Al might succeed and become the greatest hero ever, or he might fail miserably.
Lazybones2020: How is the movie direction going? I have been reading your interviews each time there is a new development with the film and with the success of Joker, you were saying that it breathed new life into Rated R Superhero flicks. Without having to go too deep into it, what is going on with your movie?
McFarlane: Last week I got some discouraging news, we had an academy award-winning guy who was going to do the movie with us, but he fell off. We had people willing to fund the movie as long as we had this guy attached but schedules were conflicting, and things had to change. That’s how close we are to getting this thing off the ground.
Hollywood is a different place right now; they understand the value of what Spawn can bring to a reasonable budget. Joker lit the fire, up until now it felt like I was pushing up this bolder on my own, but now there are others joining me who know that these stories should be told.
I have very few demands for the movie. It has to be Rated R, there’s no debate around that. With the story I want to tell, my intent goes back to that Spawn Cloud. I am less concerned about what happens in the movie as long as Spawn is “cool” and “badass”. The last demand is that I am the director. That’s it. Everything else is up for conversation.
I just want to show that there are better and smarter ways to entertain an audience than what they are used to. So much more is possible once you open yourself to Rated R stories. But I can’t just do a cardboard version, I need the budget to do it. Just enough to make it the right way.
Lazybones2020: I am right there rooting for you and I hope that things move ahead smoothly.
Now before I forget, I’ve got to ask, who are your favorite characters in Mortal Kombat and SoulCalibur?
McFarlane: I’d have to say Scorpion. I know that’s not very original, Scorpion is everybody’s favorite, but I really like that guy.
In terms of SoulCalibur, you know, it has been such a long time, that I would have to say it was the character I worked on, Necrid. I think he came out really cool and gave the cast a little bit of a different flavor.
Lazybones2020: Thank you very much for your time and best of luck at Toyfair 2020! I am excited to see what comes from McFarlane Toys.
McFarlane: Oh, we are going to kill it! I know we are going to do awesome. After that, I am heading Final Kombat in Chicago where we are finally going to unveil Spawn! Keith David is going to be there; you aren’t going to want to miss it.
Unfortunately, by the time this interview was published, the public event for Final Kombat was canceled due to the coronavirus. The tournament will still be live-streamed, Sunday, March 8 so be sure to tune in for the first look at Spawn in MK11 and some great fights.
Spawn will be available in Mortal Kombat 11 on March 17 through the Kombat Pass or sold separately.
Sources: Polygon; McFarlane Toys; Mortal Kombat
Mortal Kombat fans and Spawn fans alike have been filled with excitement since the character’s confirmation as a DLC fighter last May.
Being a fan of both franchises, I had to reach out to Spawn‘s creator himself, Todd McFarlane, to get his insight on the character’s interpretation in Mk11 as well as discuss his previous work in fighting games.
Austyn “Lazybones 2020” Roney: Mortal Kombat is one of the biggest titles in the fighting game community and whenever Spawn was announced for Mortal Kombat it was a huge deal for not only Mortal Kombat fans and for Spawn fans, but for me personally because I am both!
First, I wanted to congratulate you, Spawn is doing incredible right now, Spawn 300 was one of the best-selling comics in 2019, I have actually been collecting them since 300 came out. Starting there and going back while keeping up with the new releases.
Todd McFarlane: Oh, thank you, now you just have to procreate and have all of you guys buy up all of the comics. (laughs)
Lazybones2020: I just read 305 earlier, that was a really cool story, I am excited to see where it goes!
Back to Spawn in being in Mortal Kombat, back in 2015, you stated that NetherRealm could use Spawn for a couple of their games, but that offer was set within a certain window. With Spawn being in Mortal Kombat 11, was that window you mentioned earlier coming to a close?
McFarlane: Spawn being added to Mortal Kombat had nothing to do with any kind of window on my side. These kinds of things, where companies will call me up and ask me if they can use my character, will come up from time to time.
Lazybones2020 Well, the timing couldn’t have been better for how great things are going for Spawn and when the record was broken with issue 301.
McFarlane: Well, none of us knew that would happen right? They had hundreds of other characters to pick between and they landed on Spawn and all I could say is, “cool, let’s do this!”
When these guys came to me and asked if they could use Spawn, I said the only requirements were that I need you to make him a really exciting character in your game, so that if nobody knows Spawn, they will go, this guy, he’s my favorite. I told them to make Spawn work in their game, play to what your audience likes. Make a cool video game character.
Take someone that we both know is the Intellectual Property “Spawn”, but literally do whatever it is that you want with him to make him fit your game. Don’t feel tied to the comics, or the show, or the movie. If that means you make up some new stuff to make him cool for your audience, then so be it.
Even if you tell someone to do whatever they want, they will take baby steps. At first, they showed me a few ideas and I would have to keep telling them, “Get crazier! Go bigger!”
I told these guys, look, I am not in my twenties anymore, I’m older, I’ve got thick skin, get creative! Eventually, the guys at NetherRealm got to the point where it all clicked. “Wow, we can really do anything!”
Lazybones2020: That is incredible, and it has to be a great opportunity for NetherRealm because it seems that with most guest characters, there are a lot of limitations in their interpretation. But with Spawn, it sounds like you are giving them free rein!
McFarlane: Being an artist, I know what it is like to feel boxed in, being told what you can and cannot do with the thing you are creating. I assume these people feel the exact same way. By giving them the freedom to create whatever character they want, that is when you get good results.
Instead of saying, here are the rules, I say, Spawn in this game is not a continuation of the one from the comics, this is a Spawn for people who like video games, and not just video games, but Mortal Kombat games. They need to think he is cool for who he is in the game. Make him fun, make him cool, with his abilities and his cape, which might not always be red with a push of a button!
Lazybones2020: That’s awesome! A really cool detail. With Spawn, he was in SoulCalibur II, and you also created the original character, Necrid for that game as well. What was it like working with Namco and how does that process differ from what it has been like with NetherRealm?
McFarlane: Namco wanted a lot more input during the development of SoulCalibur II. It was Greg Capullo, who was working on his book at the time, and I and they wanted a lot of drawings and input on what was going on with Spawn in that game.
With MK11 I haven’t voiced my opinion too much. I figured that if I sit back and told myself, let’s just see what they can do, they could pull off some really cool stuff. If I needed to, I could reel them back in, but that never happened. They have never disappointed me.
The only criticism that will come from me will be that they didn’t go far enough. Big corporate brands want to protect everything because they have so much money invested in these characters and things like that, but that really limits what you can do. So I said, go full boat.
Assume I just signed over the copyright to Spawn, show me what you would do with that freedom. From there they went on to create a character that they wanted to play.
Lazybones2020: I recently saw all of the Mortal Kombat toys that you and your team have been working on in stores and they look incredible the detail is fantastic.
McFarlane: The detail is theirs; it is all on them. I just take the detail that they give me. It is all their design; it belongs to them.
Lazybones2020: Which isn’t common with a lot of toys, they usually don’t go all-in on the details, but the toys at McFarlane, they don’t sacrifice a single thing.
McFarlane: I have a sense of pride when it comes to the quality of the products that we create. Going back to what we were talking about before, these toy companies that are publicly owned, they do everything to maximize their profit margins.
I don’t need to protect the brand of Spawn. To me, I see Spawn within a word cloud. I feel that if you polled 1000 people, they would all come back with two words that described the essence of the character. Those two words are cool and badass.
So, whenever we make something those two words are being applied to it, and we make sure the products we sell are as accurate as possible. It is okay if I lose some money by making a figure more detailed, because to me, at the end of the day we will sell more toys if they are of a higher quality! So, I’d end up making whatever investment I made back because I know that people want the properties they enjoy being well represented.
Lazybones2020: I saw an ad for the Spawn figure coming out in the MK11 line, and he looks awesome! That is the first look at the full design at Spawn. His cape was something we didn’t get with SoulCalibur, it had to become his ax.
So, just with the technical improvements, it is something that is really cool, and without going into too much detail, like you said his cape could change with a touch of a button, can we expect a lot from it in Mortal Kombat?
McFarlane: You know yeah, his cape is alive, you can take advantage of that, you’ve seen it do all sorts of things in the comic books. He has his weapons and all of his powers, there is a lot of opportunity with the character.
They did a good job of making sure that if you like the mystic part of Spawn, you can play him like that, if you like the weapons that he uses, you can play him like that, if you like fisticuffs, you can play him like that. You can do each of those things or all the above. They did a really good job of giving options.
Lazybones2020: And that’s how I view Spawn, he is the “All of the Above” character, he’s got it everything. I did notice though that he has a sword which is something you don’t see Spawn with too often, but you do see him with one at the end of Spawn 305, so it will be interesting to see some swordplay with Spawn in both Mortal Kombat and the comics.
Let’s say if you made an original character, like you made Necrid in SoulCalibur, in this Mortal Kombat universe, you were given that same opportunity, what kind of character would you create? What would be the McFarlane take on Mortal Kombat?
McFarlane: You know there are already so many characters in Mortal Kombat that they have made themselves, that I think I would rather reverse the role of some of these guys. I would be interested in taking the original ten who have been around for the longest and make them a bit different, not better, just different than what people are used to.
Lazybones2020: Going back to Injustice 2, they did a poll for who fans wanted to join the game that was a non-MK character, and Spawn lead the poll. It is great to see these things come full circle.
While it would have been nice to see Spawn in that game so he could interact with other comic book characters, the world of Mortal Kombat feels like a better fit. Especially given all that is possible in that series, the sky is the limit in terms of the action and the fatalities.
McFarlane: The one thing I think is super smart on their end, you know we are all in competition with everyone, but the thing they did that was super cool was the fatality. They went all-in on that whenever they first started and you know, either people were going to be offended or they were going to think it was super cool.
There are a ton of people like us who see those kinds of things and chuckle, you know it’s out there and it is kind of funny, but there are other people who really can’t grasp this concept. These are the people who don’t play video games so they couldn’t understand, and to me, this is offensive to us on a couple of different levels.
There is no documented science that proves that video games correlate to real-life violence. If there was, you know that whenever this conversation comes up, they would wave it in front of our faces, but it doesn’t, so they don’t.
Lazybones2020: It really stifles creativity if we let ourselves get too concerned about the potential of anything we make being used to justify whatever they have going on already in their own head.
McFarlane: People are capable of partaking in media and not being influenced to do terrible things. Kids know the difference between the ages of 5-7 that what they see on TV isn’t real. Whenever they are watching Looney Tunes, they know there isn’t a 6-foot tall rabbit that can talk, or you know a talking mouse named Mickey.
Somehow, somewhere down the line, when we all get older, people who are between 18 and 25, they all of a sudden become incapable of doing this. I don’t buy that, that’s not how people work.
Just say you don’t like the content. These things are no more harmful than the typical action movie. There are bad people out there sure, psychopaths, who do awful things, but we can’t let them control what we can create.
I fight on your side; I am a very vocal advocate of defending the content we enjoy.
Lazybones2020: I’ve been reading Spawn from the beginning since I started collecting with 300 and back when things were on a smaller scale, the stories in Spawn would talk about the darker things that do happen in the world. But Spawn as a character would try his best to put a stop to them, something we wish was possible in reality, for a powerful force to do the things we can’t.
McFarlane: In issue 29 of Spawn, there was a dad who was beating his kids. Spawn found out about this and knew he couldn’t just kill him; these kids couldn’t lose their dad. Spawn decides to tattoo the abuser instead, he tattooed “I beat my kids” all over his body.
Al thought that this would embarrass the father, put him on the right path, humble him to stop what he was doing, but instead, it makes him twice as angry. One day one of the kids ran for his dad’s gun to protect his brother, he shoots his dad, and he ends up dying anyway.
This was just one of those stories about how you can’t play God. Like Stan Lee said, “With Great Power Comes Great Responsibility.” Al Simmons is a completely flawed character, just trying to figure it out. To figure out how to deal with the circumstances he is in. It is way more interesting to see the flaws.
If you or I were just shot by lighting, we wouldn’t change just because we got powers. Austyn, you would just be a strong journalist. It wouldn’t make you any smarter or any better of a person.
What makes the story interesting is thinking, “Hey, how did Austyn get to now from who he was ten years ago?”
Not everybody is created equal, Al might succeed and become the greatest hero ever, or he might fail miserably.
Lazybones2020: How is the movie direction going? I have been reading your interviews each time there is a new development with the film and with the success of Joker, you were saying that it breathed new life into Rated R Superhero flicks. Without having to go too deep into it, what is going on with your movie?
McFarlane: Last week I got some discouraging news, we had an academy award-winning guy who was going to do the movie with us, but he fell off. We had people willing to fund the movie as long as we had this guy attached but schedules were conflicting, and things had to change. That’s how close we are to getting this thing off the ground.
Hollywood is a different place right now; they understand the value of what Spawn can bring to a reasonable budget. Joker lit the fire, up until now it felt like I was pushing up this bolder on my own, but now there are others joining me who know that these stories should be told.
I have very few demands for the movie. It has to be Rated R, there’s no debate around that. With the story I want to tell, my intent goes back to that Spawn Cloud. I am less concerned about what happens in the movie as long as Spawn is “cool” and “badass”. The last demand is that I am the director. That’s it. Everything else is up for conversation.
I just want to show that there are better and smarter ways to entertain an audience than what they are used to. So much more is possible once you open yourself to Rated R stories. But I can’t just do a cardboard version, I need the budget to do it. Just enough to make it the right way.
Lazybones2020: I am right there rooting for you and I hope that things move ahead smoothly.
Now before I forget, I’ve got to ask, who are your favorite characters in Mortal Kombat and SoulCalibur?
McFarlane: I’d have to say Scorpion. I know that’s not very original, Scorpion is everybody’s favorite, but I really like that guy.
In terms of SoulCalibur, you know, it has been such a long time, that I would have to say it was the character I worked on, Necrid. I think he came out really cool and gave the cast a little bit of a different flavor.
Lazybones2020: Thank you very much for your time and best of luck at Toyfair 2020! I am excited to see what comes from McFarlane Toys.
McFarlane: Oh, we are going to kill it! I know we are going to do awesome. After that, I am heading Final Kombat in Chicago where we are finally going to unveil Spawn! Keith David is going to be there; you aren’t going to want to miss it.
Unfortunately, by the time this interview was published, the public event for Final Kombat was canceled due to the coronavirus. The tournament will still be live-streamed, Sunday, March 8 so be sure to tune in for the first look at Spawn in MK11 and some great fights.
Spawn will be available in Mortal Kombat 11 on March 17 through the Kombat Pass or sold separately.
Sources: Polygon; McFarlane Toys; Mortal Kombat
Making MMORPGs, especially in today’s industry, isn’t easy. It’s especially got its own set of challenges if you’re a small studio working on your first project as an MMO. We sat down with Saga of Lucimia’s Creative Director, Tim Anderson, to discuss topics such as crunch, the business of making MMOs, the games industry, risk and more.
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One of the strongest albeit underrated players coming out of the United Kingdom, Cygames Beast’s DC “Infexious” Coleman has been making waves in the Capcom Pro Tour since the Street Fighters IV days and now really coming into his own and taking names in Street Fighter V for the past three years.
Finishing in 4th place in the European standings and most recently, placing himself 2nd at Kumite, Infexious might have seemed to come out of nowhere for some who are new to the scene, but if you’ve followed him for a while, one can find out that his fighting game roots go a bit deeper.
I sat down with Infexious the day before Evo 2019 to talk about his surprising humble beginnings in the fighting game community as well as his life outside of it. He also goes into detail about what kept him from traveling more to compete in his early days, his competitive mindset, the UK fighting game scene, and his thoughts going into Capcom Cup 2019.
MB: First of all, I have been following your career since you first appeared on the CPT with Hugo in Ultra Street Fighter IV back in 2015. I just found out recently through the magic of YouTube that you’ve actually been playing competitively since Vanilla SF4 using Ryu, Sagat, and sometimes Akuma.
It seems like people are learning more and more about you lately but somehow you have been somewhat of an enigmatic player all this time. How long have you been playing fighting games?
Was Street Fighter IV your first competitive game and what drew you to it? Was there a specific moment or realization that made you decide to pursue a pro gaming career in competitive fighting games? If so what was it and why?
Infexious: Dead or Alive 4 got me started. Street Fighter IV was the game I started traveling for and diving into it. When I started playing Street Fighter IV, it was very different from Dead or Alive 4 since it was a 2D fighter. I never played 2D fighters competitively up to that point.
Applying frame data, spacing, pokes, and all types of things were quite tricky because to me, Dead or Alive is a rock-paper-scissor game, and Street Fighter seemed so much more complex than that. It was really interesting to get into…to put loads of times into understanding, learning it, reading loads of stuff online, and watching lots of videos.
I played a ton and I was beating people. I was winning a lot. Then I played players like Alioune from France. He was a guy who I just couldn’t beat like I would beat other people. I would play him for hours and hours.
All of that got me stronger again so I would play and play and I thought, You know what, I got to go to tournaments and see. I would go to my local tournaments and win those. Then I thought, I’ve got to travel out. I would go to London and play loads of people.
Whilst that was all going on, I was still doing the studying, but then as times developed and esports started to become a thing and there were opportunities because gaming was growing so fast, I thought, you know what, this is something that if I’ve been put my all into it. I could potentially do some great things in it. So I would give myself the opportunity when the stars aligned and things became available.
MB: What are some of your other hobbies and interests? Any other games you enjoy playing other than fighters?
Infexious: I used to play CVS2 when I was younger. I played the Tekken games when they first came out. Dead or Alive 4 was the first game that I played where I started to understand what frame data was–that there something deeper to fighting games than just doing special moves and pressing buttons. I’ve played a couple of shooters like Gears of War and Call of Duty, but never took them that seriously.
MB: What’s the meaning behind the “Infexious” handle?
Infexious: It’s a combination of my first and middle names. It’s shortened because people often butcher my first name.
MB: You have a very patient playstyle that seems to stem from your Hugo play in USF4. You are also very stoic with a stoneface look that rivals that of Momochi and Daigo from back in the day and you rarely, if ever, are fazed when you lose a game or a full set.
Was this level of patience self-taught or nurtured over time or have you always been like this?
Infexious: I think it actually stems from me observing how a lot of the top-level Japanese players played very early on in Street Fighter‘s lifespan when I first started to find out about tournaments and how long the series has been played at a competitive level.
So I watched those players and saw how focused they were, how calculated they were and the things that they were doing and so I thought that I need to implement this into how I play if I wanted to compete at a higher level.
MB: Who are some of your biggest rivals and gatekeepers in competition? Who or what do you see as your biggest obstacle at Evo 2019 and what’s your mindset and gameplan going into this tournament?
Infexious: There are many, many obstacles. This is one of the time periods where you really cannot underestimate anyone. There are top-level players who you know to look out for and then some of the dangerous players are the ones you don’t know who to look out for.
You don’t even know their name! (laughs) One of the great things about tournaments now is that you can see your path on Smash.gg as to who you may have to face.
Well when you come from Europe, the gatekeepers are the three kings of the region: Phenom, Problem X, and Luffy. They’ve been on top of the European scene for many years. So if you want to become one of the best players in Europe, you have to take on those three.
Luffy has been my demon for the past year. I’ve played Phenom and got the better of him a couple of times. Problem X as well….we played recently where he won one set, I won one set, and then he won one set. I’ve been able to compete with them, but they’re the main players that anybody should be focusing on in Europe if you want to compete at the top level.
On the world spectrum, you’ve got your Punks, the Tokidos, the Fujimuras, the Bonchans. There’s a whole host of different players, characters, and play styles that you’ve got to be ready for if you want to compete at a high level.
MB: What have been some of your biggest mental hurdles to improve on as a competitor? Was there a certain moment or match where a player mentally cracked you even if you don’t show it? What was your saltiest loss? You don’t seem fazed ever!
Infexious: I don’t know when the point was, but one hurdle that comes to mind is going into the losers bracket in a tournament and still playing to the best of your ability. When you go into the losers bracket, especially in this game, it can mentally shock you and take its toll. Being put in the losers bracket puts you at a significant disadvantage.
So being able to fight out of it is a hurdle. There have been times where I’ve been able to do that which I’m proud of. It’s an ongoing thing where you see some of the best players do it and climb out of it.
I try not to be (laughs). In the moment, I know that whatever happens, happens now, it’s time to review afterward. So there’s no point in getting emotional, getting thrown off-center during the match. Let it play out, apply what you prepared, and then after that, you go back and review and you see what was the right strategy and what were they doing in response. All the emotion comes out afterward when you sit down and review.
I’m very rarely salty after a loss. The one that sticks out in my mind was Evo 2018. I dropped a winning combo against Poongko’s Kolin last game and round and that’s how I got put into the losers bracket. That one was a bit frustrating, but it doesn’t play on me because I just think that happens. If you’re a competitor you will drop the winning combo.
Everyone is a human being. I just see it as part of the road, part of the journey. If you’re consistent in a tournament, those drops won’t even matter. The next tournament you’ll do well and the next one you’ll do well and maybe this one you got unfortunate. I just don’t dwell on it because it’s not going to make me better.
MB: Looking at your past results, you placed consistently in every tournament you’ve entered even though they are so few in number. What prevented you from traveling to other events outside of the UK and Europe earlier in your career?
Infexious: For years, I first studied for a law degree and that was back in 2008/2009 when Street Fighter IV was coming out. I then worked at a law firm for a few years. It wasn’t quite my thing so I went back to the university to get a teaching degree. So I was doing all of that alongside putting my all into gaming.
It was tough. They require a lot to get through those qualifications, but I managed to juggle both and still be able to compete at a good enough level to put my name out there.
MB: What is the competitive scene in the United Kingdom like now? Are you still able to get solid practice both offline and online? Who are some of your training partners other than your CYG teammates?
Infexious: It’s actually quite good. There are a lot of events situated in the south. I live in Manchester and a lot of the events are in London. So I don’t quite get the chance to go down and compete in as many as events as I’d like to.
But there is a thriving scene in the north where we have events starting around small scenes and sometimes people come together to compete there. In London, there are a lot of weekly events that go on so there’s a lot of competition.
I’m a strong advocate of online play. I’ve had an offline scene….back in the days of early Street Fighter IV, I used to go to my local and play in tournaments there. It was a good enough scene and it did improve my ability to compete in a tournament environment, but the vast majority of my experience, my knowledge, my skills have been acquired playing online.
Playing strong players online, grinding, playing battle lounges with a group of players…that has been the cornerstone of my development. If you train the right way and with the right opponents, online can be just as good as offline. Offline prepares you for tournaments. That’s the experience you can’t get online.
I play with Gunslinger and Hurricane. A lot of UK players play online. Thankfully, connections between certain regions in Europe are very stable. We get some good connections with people from France and anywhere in the UK.
MB: At the beginning of SFV, you were playing both Zangief and Necalli with great success. Now it seems you’re committed to maining Zeku and so far your tournament results in 2019 have not only been consistent, but it seems like you’re placing higher.
Why did you decide to switch to Zeku and which matchups do you think he’s the strongest and weakest in? Do you still keep Necalli or Zangief in your pocket just in case things don’t go well with Zeku?
Infexious: I’m slowly fazing Necalli out. I’ve played him in certain matchups where I felt a little bit more comfortable like F.A.N.G. and Dhalsim. Recently I’ve played Zeku for Dhalsim and so I’m learning a lot of the matches that I was comfortable with Necalli as Zeku. If you focus on one or two characters as Zeku and Necalli, it’s easier to learn matchups more intricately.
If you’ve got a whole host of characters, you have a benefit because you can change it up like a swiss army knife. The disadvantages are that you can’t know the matchups, the spacing, how people can respond to that character over thousands and thousands of games–that kind of instinct. You can’t have that with a big array of characters so I wanted to cut it down to just one or two characters.
At the start, I really enjoyed playing Zangief because it was a good transition from Hugo in USF4. As time went on, I understood a bit more about how this game worked. I realized that Zangief was in some ways he was fundamentally flawed in this game engine.
One of the main reasons is because since command grabs are five frames, has two active frames, and you’ve got variable wakeup on knockdowns–it’s extremely difficult to do a meaty command grab on someone in this game.
So if you play against a character like Dhalsim and they do a wakeup teleport which isn’t invincible to throws and you’re Zangief and you read that with a command grab, but you mistime it by a frame because you five frames to work with, he’s away from you even though you mad the right read! Things like that were frustrating to me.
I didn’t feel like I wasn’t able to make the correct reads consistently so I thought maybe that’s not the style that works for this game. In the old games you a had two-frame command grab where you could easily do meaty with it. So I thought I’m going to move away and play another character that has a command grab in Necalli. He’s a bit more mobile and doesn’t just rely on those hard read situations.
Thankfully that was a good choice and I saw some success with him as well.
MB: From what I’ve seen of your Zeku play, you tend to use old Zeku quite a bit. Does that pertain to particular matchups or certain players?
Infexious: When I first started using Zeku, I thought young Zeku was miles better than old. I would always play young and I basically learned young before I learned old. As time I went on, I started to understand the strengths of old Zeku and how to play the game–even after years and years of play you’re still learning new things–I realized old was a lot better than I thought. Using both old and young styles is the key to mastering Zeku and making him a top contender.
MB: Now with your new sponsorship under CYG, you will be able to travel a lot more and experience different parts of the world. With that said, where do you see yourself going say five years from now? What are some of your goals and aspirations both in your pro gamer career and your regular life?
Infexious: One of my main aspirations was to make sure I have a foundation, qualification, and a profession that would allow me to teach something that you can take around the world. I wanted to get something that would give me a foundation so that if I went and pursued a passion such as gaming which is what it has been for years and that doesn’t work out, I’ve always got that to fall back on.
Right now I’ve put that on the back burner and I’m focusing on my passion. Hopefully, I can win big tournaments, achieve big things, build a brand as the saying goes, and within five years be a member of the FGC that’s recognized as a great competitor. That’s my ultimate goal.
MB: You’re currently ranked 22nd on CPT Global Standings and second place in the European regional standings. What do you think it’s going to take for you to push through even further on in the CPT season to guarantee your spot in Capcom Cup 2019?
What do you feel you need to improve on in order to grow as a competitive threat to try and win it all? (Update: Now ranked 20th globally and finished in 4th in Europe).
Infexious: I think to get into Capcom Cup I need to maintain form. If I carry on the way that I am performing right now then I should be able to acquire enough points to get in and attend as many events as I can leading up to that. It’s been a good start so I think maintenance is one of the most important things to push myself to the point where I can start thinking about winning the whole thing.
I need to open up my game even further and open my knowledge of the top players. Now we’re getting into the realms where if you’re placing highly consistently, you’re going to be coming into contact with similar faces.
So you need to become aware of how these people play, what their tendencies are and how you can best exploit them to get the big wins out of it. Working on that is the next phase if I can keep up this type of momentum.
Sources: Capcom Fighters, Capcom Pro Tour (website)