Interview:MediEvil Boards, November 2013

Two interviews with Jason Wilson posted on the MediEvil Boards on November 3, 2013.

First interview

MediEvil Boards, November 2013
Interviewee(s)	Jason Wilson
Interviewer(s)	Winston1
Interview Subject	MediEvil 2
Language	English
URL available?	Yes

Transcript

I just emailed Jason Wilson again, asking for some info on the original concept for MediEvil 2. Here's the conversation;

Me

I'd like to ask if it would be alright if I could ask you about a concept for MediEvil 2 which wound up not being used: You mentioned that the original idea for MediEvil 2 involved Zarok being kept prisoner in the Tower of London and Dan had to free him, after which they would then work together in an uneasy alliance. 

I'd like to ask if there is anything more that you can describe about this concept and, if alright, why it wasn't used. About how different was this vision from the way the game actually turned out?

Jason Wilson

Chris came up with the original wonderful idea of setting Med' 2 in Victorian London. I believe at this point that the hero wasn't even Dan Fortisque but an ascendant of Dan's - a rather dapper skeleton in a top and tails (I forget his name). This revision might have been too similar to Jack Skellington but we ran with the idea for a while. The final design of this character did end up in Med' 2 as the Victorian outfit that Dan gets to wear.

Chris was busy ramping up the pre-production on Primal and was looking into technology for an engine to run on the then unreleased PS2. I was left with Med' 2 on my own for a while so I went away and knocked around a few ideas to embellish Chris's overall brief (which was how we had worked on Med' 1).

I came up with the British Museum and the exhibits coming to life as well as the Vampires in London amongst other things. At that point we had Zarok imprisoned in the Tower of London. His spell book which is held in a secure location was stolen and used by an evil cult to resurrect the dead. At some point in this early design spec the player had to team up with Zarok, who was an untrustworthy ally to save the day.

There was an idea that Dan could take out his eye ball and pop into area he had no access to so that he could spy. This was later replaced by Chris with the fabulous Dan-hand idea.

Chris also had the idea of Queen Victoria being possessed and turned into a giant monster version of Queen Victoria and stomping about London like Godzilla.

After I worked on this design spec a new project director became involved with Med' 2 - James Shepherd. James kept some of the ideas that Chris and I had specced up but also replaced some ideas with his own, such as replacing Zarok with the Palethorn gangster character and the boxing section. In terms of art design, I decided that if Zarok was thin and fey then Palethorn would be wide, square and gruff. I liked the contrast between the two villains.

I liked a lot of James' ideas and approved of the main character still being Dan Fortesque. He also added the romantic sub plot which was a great idea.

The only mis-steps was that I felt that the boxing match section was misplaced and the level designs were rather flat after the joyous undulations of the original (after a lot of level design work on Med' 1 I had little to do with level design on Med 2 as I was dealing 100% of my time on art direction and concepts). I would have loved to have seen the monstrous Queen Victoria in the final game.

I still have the original design doc for Med' 2 before James came on board. It would be interesting to look back at it and see how it evolved. All in all, MediEvil 2 was a polished game that was a good mix of ideas from Chris, James and myself, that took the game in a fresh new direction.

I went on to enjoy working with James on Ghosthunter where we continued some of the themes of MediEvil 2. Sadly I never worked on another game with Chris again. I have a good deal of respect for both chaps.

Hope that helps.

J

PS - if any of you chaps want a preview of my current project then you can 'like' my Jay Gunn Facebook page. Jay Gunn is my graphic novel writing pseudonym. I'm working on a 'science fiction fantasy horror' comic book series - "Surface Tension." There are some crazy ideas in the story and art and if you liked the art or the games that the Cambridge Studio developed then you'll probably like this story too! :) It'll be released in 2014 by Titan Books.

I had a feeling that Sir Henry's outfit ended becoming the Victorian costume. If I might say so myself, the original concept sounds a lot more interesting than the MediEvil 2 we ultimately got (which I still enjoyed, by the way).

Special thanks to Jason and Chris for the info they've provided on this.

Second interview

MediEvil Boards, November 2013
Interviewee(s)	Jason Wilson
Interviewer(s)	Winston1
Interview Subject	MediEvil 2
Language	English
URL available?	Yes

Transcript

Here's one more thing that I just asked Jason about on the Parliament level. I know that Julian Rex already answered this, but it's good to at least get clarification from another person on the development team;

Me

Actually, if it's still alright, there's one other question I have regarding a cut level in MediEvil 2: someone on the MediEvil Boards found mention of a file called "Parliament" and I've heard that this was intended to be a level in the game. Is this true? If so, what would it have been like?

Jason Wilson

"Parliament" was the level intended as the battle ground for fighting the Queen Victoria monster. It got changed to a different level design when the Queen was dropped for the big demon that replaced her.

I do not think that much work was done on the parliament level.