Interview: X-Men Legends II - Rise of Apocalypse

Written by Charles Husemann on 9/22/2005 for

X-Men Legends was one of the best comic book video games ever put out. The action, role playing game was great not only because of the action on screen but how well it captured the tone and feel of the comic book series. Given how successful the game was it’s not a surprise that Activision green lit the sequel which is hitting store shelves this week.  We were lucky enough to get a few questions answered by someone on the team.

GamingNexus:  Can you introduce yourself and describe your role on the project?
My name is Chris Palmisano, I am a production coordinator on X-Men Legends II: Rise of Apocalypse. As a production coordinator I have a number of different responsibilities ranging from collecting screenshots for articles like this, creating test disks for the Quality Assurance team, coordinating the in-game music, to managing payments for the project.

GamingNexus: What is the plot behind the game?  What kind of menace gets the X-Men and the Brotherhood of Evil mutants together?  Were there any other X-men plotlines that you considered for the game?
Chris Palmisano: Following the events of X-Men Legends, Apocalypse sees the perfect opportunity to gain control of the world. With both the Brotherhood and the X-Men exhausted, it is the perfect time for this prolific mutant to launch an attack. As the events of the story unfold, the Brotherhood and X-Men realize that neither team is strong enough to defeat Apocalypse on their own, and these two great forces come together to take on a common enemy.

GamingNexus: What new mutants have been added to the roster?  In what ways did you tweak the characters from the first game?  How many total mutants will be available in the final version of the game?
Chris Palmisano: Unfortunately, I can't give away all the details of our character roster at this point, but I will say that there are a number of new playable characters as well as returning characters from Legends 1. All of the characters have been overhauled after the first game and now have new models, over double the powers, and enhanced voice components. It is hard to say how many characters there are in the game with the incredible roster of Non-Playable-Characters, Mini-Bosses, and Bosses. But, I can say there are 16 playable characters available from the beginning of the game, and there are also a number of unlockable playable characters as well as exclusive playable characters for our PSP and PC SKU's.

GamingNexus: Besides Apocalypse and the Four Horsemen, what other bad guys can we expect to see in the game?  Is there a final boss count yet? 
Chris Palmisano: The final Boss count is 19. From this list players will find a lot of surprises from both the X-men Comics as well as other Marvel storylines. It would be hard to talk about all of them, but my favorites are Mr. Sinister, Sugarman, and Arch Angel.

GamingNexus: What improvements have you made to the multiplayer portion of the game?  Will co-op multiplayer be limited to the Xbox?   Will you be able to save online multiplayer games and pick them up later or are we in store for a lot of late nights?
Chris Palmisano: Multiplayer has received a significant overhaul since X-Men Legends. The team at Raven knew that with the action based 4-player game play that this was a really exciting feature of the game, and from day one of the project the goal was to really over-deliver. That said the game features a robust online component on Xbox, PS2, PC, and PSP. The online features full Co-Op story mode from front to back, Skirmish mode, and Danger Room missions.

GamingNexus: How many levels are in the game?  About how long do you do you think it will take gamers to get through the game?
Chris Palmisano: There are actually over 70 levels in game, providing a very deep game play experience for fans that really want to get into the depth. We estimate that this translates to over forty hours of game play.

 GamingNexus: Do you have a favorite mutant in the game?  What are you most proud of in the game?
Chris Palmisano:  Honestly I have a few favorite characters depending on what part of the game I am playing, but if I had to narrow it down, I guess Iceman and Nightcrawler are my favorites. Nightcrawler and Iceman both bring a lot to the team. Nightcrawler's teleportation abilities and speed are amazing and Iceman's Iceslide as well as other attacks are devastating. I also really like Juggernaut. But on this topic one of the things I am most proud of in Legends II, is the incredible depth. All of the characters play incredibly well and are also very unique, we have so many different game play options, an incredible story, and more Marvel characters than any other title that I can think of.

We’d like to thank Chris for taking the time to answer our questions as well as Wiebke at 3-Step for hooking us up with the interview.