Super Meat Boy Creator's Personal Approach to Game Design — Humans Who Make Games Episode 1 'I'm always referencing my childhood experiences and the designers that inspired me.' Waiting on the next Super Meat Boy?Well then, keep waiting, because the two talented dudes that make up Team Meat aren't looking into a sequel. In a recent interview, co-creators Edmund McMillen.
The game creator behind Super Meat Boy, The Binding of Isaac, and The End is Nigh, Edmund McMillen is renowned for his Flash game and unique characters he makes. Born in 1980 in Santa Cruz, California, McMillen has remained there even after he achieved fame. He attended Soquel High School and has shown a penchant for drawing monsters even then. He was mostly raised by his grandmother, who supported his artistic endeavors and always encouraged him to pursue his talent.
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His career as a game designer started with Gish, a game developed by Cryptic Studio. He later used one of his earlier comic heroes, Meat Boy, to create his own game based on it, called Super Meat Boy. It was released on October 2010 and became an instant success. More than a million copies have been sold, making it one of the most successful indie games ever. The main character is a cube-shaped character, who is trying to save his girlfriend from evil Dr. Fetus. It is a classic platform adventure with more than 300 levels divided into chapters.
Looky what I got in the mail!!! Amazing fan made figures by Tom ( sorry your twitter name wasn’t on the letter inside ) pic.twitter.com/r8IkOyLr9L
— 🜏 Edmund McMillen 🜏 (@edmundmcmillen) March 15, 2019
His next game came out in 2011. The Bindings of Isaac is a roguelike title, based on Legends of Zelda. McMillen felt that with the success of Super Meat Boy behind him, he can take significantly greater risks in his art, leading to a somewhat controversial status of the game. He was even considering that the game may be career suicide, due to the quirky and often dark humor it conveyed. It took him one week to make it, together with Florian Himsl.
McMillen fears turned out to be unfounded and by January 2012, the game sold 450,000 copies. At one point, Nintendo reached out to him, trying to get the game for their 3DS system, but backed out due to the religious nature of it, trying to avoid any controversy. The success of the game led Edmund to start working on a sequel, The Bindings of Isaac: Rebirth.
McMillen’s latest project came out in 2018. It is a platforming adventure video game called The End is Nigh. He developed the game with Tyler Glaiel.
Just doing some tests for the legend of bum-bo trailer… pic.twitter.com/DBklSCgpWn
— 🜏 Edmund McMillen 🜏 (@edmundmcmillen) April 2, 2019
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Although details about Edmund McMillen’s net worth aren’t available, we estimate that it is at least 7 figures. Both super Meat Boy and The Bindings of Isaac sold a huge number of copies (Super Meat Boy sold over a million, at $15 each) and although not all of that money went to Edmund, a large portion of it did.
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Edmund McMillen and Tommy Refenes, also known as Team Meat, creators of the indie game Super Meat Boy, were contacted by a Film Producer looking to make a movie based on the 2010 platformer. They recorded the conversation and uploaded it for our viewing pleasure.
The unnamed producer didn’t beat about the bush and quickly brought up the money side of things, requesting $4000 upfront and a further $8000 during the ‘2nd stage’ of development with a promise of a $8000 return should a script be finalized.
Team Meat were obviously suspicious of this guy (especially after calling the game ‘Super Meat Head’), and it soon became clear this guy had no clue what he was talking about particularly when it comes to the gaming industry. Claiming to have ties with big names in the movie industry such as the writer of Gremlins, the 2 indie devs smelled a con in the making. He even went so far to request to see a receipt from Microsoft showing up-to-date sales of Super Meat Boy. Instead of cutting him loose straight away however the guys decide to string him along for almost an hour of complete trolling.
During the 50 minute drilling Edmund & Tommy told lies which any person with any shred of interest in the gaming world would instantly see through.
When asked what kind of film they would like to see Meat Boy starring in, Tommy suggests a “gaming moviewith controllers, make the audience believe it’s actually working, but it’s really not, it’s just an illusion, it’s a huge scam.“
Cameron Diaz got requested to play the lead role too.
Edmund takes it even further when the subject changes to the Xbox One
Super Meat Boy Creators
Kinect watches you. The military won’t allow soldiers to own the Xbox One because of possible spying. It broadcasts livestreams to Twitch instantly, we’re not developing for it cos it’s evil. It goes into child pornography realm… seriously.
The producers’ ignorance becomes even more apparent when the lads convince him that Steam is small time, Direct2Drive was the driving force behind Super Meat Boy and that D2D is in fact owned by Rubert Murdoch.
Other trolling treasures during the recorded conversation includes Mario being modelled on Mario Von Swinson, Art backwards is Car and Gremlins is like Roger Rabbit, oh and that their manager was, in fact, in Abba.
The phone call ends with the Producer still convinced that the film is on track and that follow-up emails will get the ball rolling.
Watch the full, comical conversation in the embedded video below.