The Hollywood Byte #59: TMNT's Kevin Munroe
Mar 23, 2007
The man behind the new revival of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles--this time in full CGI glory--is familiar to gamers. Kevin Munroe spent years developing videogames like Shiny Entertainment's Earthworm Jim, MDK, and Wild 9 and Midway Games' Freaky Flyers before going to Hollywood. He also worked with Ubisoft on the new TMNT videogame, which is available for Xbox 360, Wii, PlayStation 2, GameCube, PSP, Nintendo DS and Game Boy Advance.
"On the videogame side, I wish I could have been more involved," said Munroe. "We supplied them with all of the assets. We gave them the environments, characters, script and sound bites. We had a meeting very early on about what I thought the movie was about, which is family and teamwork, which ended up working really well with the game engine. Other than that, I got so swamped with the movie. All of the plans about getting more involved with the game and kicking ideas back and forth all went out the window."
Ubisoft did send Munroe an Xbox 360 dev kit, which has allowed him and his kids to play through the game. He said although he doesn't benefit from plugging the game, both he and his kids think it's a lot of fun to play.
"When you play the TMNT it's like playing the movie," said Munroe. "I mean it still looks like a game and it will probably be a while before you can really get away from that, but I think it'd be so much fun to have the tools they have at their disposal today and to work in games again. I love that you can create a believable world today in videogames and make it more immersive then it ever has been."
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Munroe believes fans of the comics, the original movies and his new CGI update, which features the voicework of actors Laurence Fishburne, Sarah Michelle Gellar, and Patrick Stewart, will enjoy the exploration of the world through the Ubisoft videogame.
"We go all over the place in the movie and it feels like you actually service a lot of areas," said Munroe. "But the idea of seeing what it would be like as a character to jump through the jungle. It takes that sort of visceral experience a step further. My kids were freaking out about it. It was cool to see them feel like they were playing the movie. It's a trite thing to say, but I could feel it when I was playing the game. It's the first time I ever felt like that promise was carried through."
Munroe said that his background in videogames actually helped him during the CGI film's 28-month creation, especially when it came to budgeting for polygons.
"With videogame levels, you have a polygon budget and you have to figure out how to cheat, scope and scale into your world and not take a huge hit and keep polygons where they mattered," said Munroe. "When I started at Shiny it was around the same time that Tomb Raider was in development and it was just as 3D was starting to kick in. My foray into CGI was videogames. When we first started in games we had six joints on a 300-poly character and we were pushing the limits."
In many ways, the Konami TMNT videogames have allowed the Turtles to find new fans over the past decade, filling in the void left when the Hollywood films stopped.
"The Konami videogames really kept the Turtles alive for all of those years," said Munroe. "I don't see much of a correlation between this new Ubisoft game and the Konami stuff. The Ubisoft game looks and plays the way I think all Turtles games should play. The Prince of Persia mechanic just feels so right on the Turtles. In the original NES game, you played different levels as different characters. Now it's all about teamwork and family, which are the themes of the new film."
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After spending so many hours working on the CGI movie, Munroe is just now getting to his list of games that he wants to play.
"I love the Wii," said Munroe. "I can't get enough of Wii Sports. That demo disc that came with the Wii gets the most play in our house. Picking up that controller gives me the same feeling as the first time I played Pong or Space Invaders. There's something about it. Graphically, there's nothing to write home about. At the same time, there's that brilliant simplicity that Nintendo does that sells it to me. I'm playing Zelda on Wii right now."
Munroe said he also has a PS2 at home, as well as a PSP and Nintendo DS. He said he has access to a PS3 at work.
"There wasn't a lot to write home about," said Munroe. "It didn't feel that special to me that I had to drop $600 on it."
When you factor in that his kids have broken just about every game system he's brought into his home, it's not likely that PS3 will be coming home any time soon. Munroe joked that his kids play Wii with the Remotes taped to their hands so they don't get tossed around the room.
As for more TMNT movies, Munroe said as long as the fans make this movie a success he's game for more CGI adventures, as well as more videogames. In true videogame form, he said he should be able to shave about nine months off the development time of a movie sequel by sharing assets and taking advantages of new technology.
"It was a blast working on this movie," said Munroe. "I was a huge fan of the Turtles. I found an issue one in a comic been in 1986 a year after they first came out. I fell in love with the dark tone of action with that sense of humor. I really was impressed with the first movie. I was blown away by it."
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Munroe said that he took that first comic along for his job interview for the TMNT movie, so that at the very least, he'd walk away with a comic signed by creator Peter Laird.
"In the car on the drive back I opened it up and it was a drawing of Raphael and it said, 'Dear Kevin, make a good movie or else. Peter Laird.' And that's how I found out I got the job," said Munroe.
The Hollywood Byte makes a weekly visit to the converging world of video games and traditional media.