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QUEST OF THE DRAGON
Author: Patrick Vuong
If the key to immortality is first living a life worth remembering, then Bruce Lee will never die.
It’s been almost 30 years since he passed away on July 20, 1973, yet he has never been more popular or celebrated.
He revolutionized the fighting arts, single-handedly created the kung fu film genre and destroyed racial barriers in the moviemaking community. Because of those accomplishments, countless documentaries, tons of books and thousands of Web sites have been dedicated to him. The Bruce Lee phenomenon has spanned continents, and today there isn’t a souvenir shop on the planet that doesn’t sell a poster, magnet, calendar or action figure bearing his likeness.
But what aficionados of the “Little Dragon,” as he was known in Asia, have yet to see is a quality video game that utilizes cutting-edge computer technology to capture not just his likeness but also his essence.
Universal Interactive plans to change all that. When it releases Bruce Lee: Quest of the Dragon in July 2002, millions of fans will finally get a chance to grasp the martial artist’s spirit by simply picking up the controller of their Microsoft Xbox. The wild ride they will be in for is the most realistic and authentic Bruce Lee epic ever conceived and features the best graphics and game play that technology allows, according to Jeff Barnhart, the Universal Interactive producer who oversaw the project’s development.
DOING IT RIGHT
“As long as we were going all out and knowing that we had to give due justice justice to a Bruce Lee game, we chose to make it [an] Xbox exclusive,” Barnhart said. “That way, we could make sure the character modes and all the technology get pushed harder than ever before in any fighting game.”
Universal, which owns the licensing rights to Lee’s likeness, began work on Quest about two years ago. The company has maintained a good relationship with the late actor’s estate since the videogame adaptation of Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story was released for several systems, including Super Nintendo and Sega Genesis, in the mid-1990s. In 2000, with the approval of Lee’s widow, Linda Lee Cadwell, and his daughter, Shannon Lee Keasler, Universal set out to create a cinematic Bruce Lee experience for the next generation of game consoles.
The company chose to collaborate with Ronin Entertainment. “We selected them because they seemed to be the best developer at the time to do an Xbox exclusive game and really just devote all their resources to it,” Barnhart said. “Every guy that works there is into the martial arts and trains in one form or another. And of course they’re all huge Bruce Lee fans.”
Universal and Ronin focused their efforts on creating a title that offers an involving story that will satisfy gaming enthusiasts while appearing like a motion picture. “The idea that we came up with was to have this be like Lee’s next movie, but the player gets to control Bruce through it,” he said. “It’s a really cool story that is similar in style to the type of story you’d find in a Bruce Lee movie.”
PLOT TWISTS
Quest begins with a cinematic opening that depicts the martial arts legend training with his master in a monastery.
Several henchmen from the evil Black Lotus organization burst in and steal an ancient relic. Although Lee doesn’t understand its significance, he is sent to retrieve it. After he embarks on his perilous journey, his father is kidnapped, thus complicating the plot, creating more surprises and giving the Little Dragon plenty of opportunities to dispense his martial justice. To authenticate those trademark moves, Universal enlisted the aid of several jeet kune do experts, including Taky Kimura, Lee’s assistant instructor in Seattle, and Ted Wong, one of his last private students.
Wong joined a half-dozen of Lee’s original students in Ronin’s facilities in Novato, California. The Los Angelesbased JKD instructor said he enjoyed working with the motion-capture technology used by the game developers to ensure that his former master’s art would be depicted genuinely. Wong, who admitted he never plays video games, was strapped into a diving suitlike outfit with sensors attached to every joint and limb. He performed the JKD techniques like Lee would have while a camera captured the action.
The movements were then transferred into a computer and used to create a wire-frame version of him. “It was interesting, fun and eye-opening,” he said.
“It was really an experience. Because we were all taught by Bruce Lee, we simulated his movements. I just did the motions and the footwork, and they captured it into [the form of] a computer- imaging skeleton with no body, no face at all. Then they put Bruce’s body and face [on it].”
“Wong was able to provide a lot of insight and really helped us nail the little details of the motions Bruce created,” Barnhart said. That resulted in the game fighter possessing a vast portion of the real McCoy’s arsenal, and he uses it to combat the hordes of virtual thugs he has to face.
“In the regular combinations, we’ve got well over 100 moves,” Barnhart said, noting that most other games have only 80. “And the combinations are trademark Bruce Lee-type moves.” To help you stay abreast of all that technical ability, the game offers access to a list of offensive and defensive moves whenever the pause button is pressed. And there is a training mode in which Lee spars with his master so he—and you— can practice those skills.
Wong said the game will include many other fighting styles, but most fans will appreciate the JKD action because its real-life progressive nature has been retained. “Bruce Lee’s jeet kune do is evolving, so you can expect to see some infighting, like trapping, and later on a lot of kicking and punching,” Wong said. You can also perform crouching, jumping and indefensible attacks, as well as utilize throws, counters and weapons like the nunchaku, Barnhart added.
HIGH TECH
Universal claims Quest will have several groundbreaking features, such as game play at blistering frame rates that are possible only on the Xbox and more than 30 different enemies, each with a complex artificial intelligence that allows him to adapt to Lee’s most commonly used combinations. There is also a unique targeting lock-on system that allows Lee to direct his assault to other enemies in mid-attack. “In a typical game, when you’re locked onto a guy, all your attacks will go straight forward to him,” Barnhart said. “In Bruce Lee, if a guy sneaks up behind you, you can send a fist backward and knock the guy back.
[Lee] won’t even turn his head. It’s awesome because it looks like it’s straight out of a movie. And you can do the same thing with kicks.”
In addition to the realistic fighting, Quest features more than 40 rendered locales spanning the globe from Kong to San Francisco to London. The game play is a mix of the fighting and adventure genres, sort of like a combination of the Tekken series and Onimusha: Warlords. You can roam freely in the 3-D environments, fighting off multiple opponents in all directions.
When you reach a boss at the end of a level, it turns into a one-on-one confrontation like those encountered in Tekken.
SPITTING IMAGE
Aside from accurately depicting the Little Dragon’s martial art, Universal and Ronin split hairs to ensure that Lee’s likeness was captured as closely as possible. Assistance from the Lee estate made that goal a reality, Barnhart said. “They’ve had a hand in helping us with a lot of stuff. We’ve got pictures from throughout his life that I think nobody’s ever seen before.”
Game developers were also given access to page after page of Lee’s documents, essays and philosophical writings, Barnhart said. As a player, you will be able to see some of those personal effects if you can unlock the secret galleries in which they are virtually cached.
Access to the mold that was used to make the mask Lee wore on The Green Hornet television series also helped the game’s producers increase the level of realism of Quest. “We used a scanning technology that allowed us to have a real 3-D model of Lee’s face,” Barnhart said.
“When we started building our model based on that, it looked amazing.”
To complete the look of the Little Dragon, he was provided with four familiar outfits: a traditional Chinese kung fu uniform, a pants and tank-top attire, a jumpsuit and, of course, a muscle-revealing shirtless look.
NAYSAYERS
Skeptics who fear that Quest will be exploitative and inaccurate need not worry, for the Lee estate approved every aspect of the project and actually embraced the making of it. “They were pretty excited about the idea in the beginning, and they’ve been continually surprised with [the progress],” Barnhart said. “We surprised them every few months with a bunch of cool new stuff.” Wong agreed that Quest manages to capture the essence of the JKD founder.
“When I saw some of the footage, at first I thought it was Bruce Lee there,” Wong said. “Then I looked closely and it was all digital imaging. It’s so incredible. They did a really good job. With the technology and resources they have, I believe it will be very successful.” But what would Bruce Lee think if he were around to see Quest of the Dragon? “I think he would like it, definitely,” Wong said. In Game of Death, Bruce Lee appeared in his infamous yellow jumpsuit. ...
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