Q&A with David Perry on The Path Neo and Wachowski Brothers

Conversations at Shiny Entertainment: David Perry talks on working with the Wachowski brothers to bring Neo to life.

To no one's surprise, The Matrix has special meaning to its creators, Larry and Andy Wachowski. David Perry, president of Shiny Entertainment, relates what it's like to work with the "fathers" of Neo.

Gamepro: Are you getting the same level of involvement by the Wachowski brothers as you did with the first game [Enter the Matrix]?

David Perry: With Path of Neo they have definitely done more. The last time they were doing three movies at once plus the videogame, plus the comic books [The Matrix Comics], plus the anime [The Animatrix]. I thought they were going on vacation after the Matrix Revolutions released. If anyone deserved a vacation, these guys did, and I was waiting for them to go take a vacation...but they didn't. They started working on the path of Neo and actually wrote the design for the game.

GP: Was Path of Neo part of a two-game deal with them?

DP: I believe it's part of a multiple game deal, but the real truth of it is that if the Wachowski's didn't want to do another Matrix game, there wouldn't have been another Matrix game.

GP: So they like the videogame medium?

DP: Their first videogame basically raked in $300 million dollars...that's the point. So they seem to like the videogame business.

GP: SO, did Shiny then hunker down with the Wachowski's to brainstorm about the game?

DP: The way we communicate with them is through a website. It's the Path of Neo site. Of course, it's password protected. The site has all the different story beats.

GP: What are "beats?"

DP: A beat is a key element of the story. It's a term that the Wachowski's use, so, hey, it works for us. Gamers might call them "levels."

[At this point Perry logged onto the secure Path of Neo website.]

GP: What kind of creative exchanges can you have via website?

DP: For instance, say you want to set your difficult level. Instead of talk about it as you would a regular game where you select easy, medium, or difficult, here's an entry for "Difficulty Setting Tutorial."

[Perry reads from the display.]

"To begin the player should first choose a red pill. The screen should then raindrop away leaving darkness from which we hear a voice as though it was in our heads. Have you ever had a dream that you were sure was real? A piledriver sound effect slams us into a bright, dreamlike version of the government lobby, not the actual location but a symbolic representation of it. The edges are locked in fog and always recede towards infinity. As Neo, the player faces the basic progression of foes from the Matrix: security guards to SWAT dudes to soldiers to agents to exiled Agent Smith. Above the music and effects the players will be bombarded by a super condensed dialogue track from all three films flutter cut together into a Gatling gun spray of juxtaposed ideas." This is how they write!

GP: It sounds almost like a stream-of-consciousness movie script.

DP: Yes, it's really interesting to experience their writing style. If you read their movie scripts this is the way they write their movie scripts, too. They have a very clear vision in their heads of what they want to hear and see.

GP: And in this case: what IS that?

DP: What they've asked here is: can we "play" the difficulty level setting? Is there a way to determine if the guy is actually any good or not through gameplay? Don't let him choose "difficult" if he can't really handle it. The game will determine the skill level you'll begin with.

GP: Their vision sounds very precise.

DP: Yes. Do these directors have a clear idea of what they want to see in the game? Hell, yeah! They even send us clips of movie footage as examples of the types of colors and images they want to see.

GP: Clips from the Matrix or other movies?

DP: From other movies. For instance, they asked, "Can you do black and white on the PlayStation 2?" We're like, "Of course we can." But then they say, " Well, we don't want just any black and white, we want it to look like THIS black and white."

GP: And what film clip was that?

DP: Generally they were all just like clips from old, crusty, samurai master movies.

GP: The Wachowski's must have a wealth of cinema knowledge to draw from.

DP: It's interesting when you sit in a room with them. These two guys have watched every movie under the sun. They'll be referring to some film, and they'll go, "You know that scene where the guy is holding that thing. That's the way we want you to do it."

GP: Is it clear to you and your team what image they have in mind?

DP: Well, you'll go, "Really? You guys remember that one shot?" But they do. They've even read every comic book, too. But they know the look that they want, and it's great for our team to get such clear direction so that what we're doing is not ambiguous.

GP: Does one brother focus on one aspect while the other focuses on another?

DP: Imagine two guys that somehow went to every movie together. Probably one brother read a comic and then literally handed it to the other to read right after. Their relationship is such that they can finish each other's sentences. My God are they lucky to have each other! I'd love to have that symbiotic partner who you could brainstorm with and have twice the bandwidth.

GP: Are they gamers?

DP: They finished Halo before I had. They literally call me up to talk about games they've beaten recently or that they're currently playing. I don't think I would get into a relationship with a director who just doesn't have any idea what we're doing here. Where you're like explaining, "This is called a 'controller.'"

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