Flint Dille Q & A- Superman Returns: The Videogame

Flint Dille has built a career out of his passion for bringing popular characters from the world of toys to television, movies, and videogames. He's written for TV ( The Transformers , G.I. Joe , and more), film, comics, graphic novels, and videogames. In the following interview, Dille talks about Superman and what it was like to work on Superman Returns: The Videogame.

Why do you think Superman (as a character) has resonated so well with so many audiences over the years?

He basic and he's classic. He's a good guy, primary colors--in every way--and is now a fourth generation property. Kids know him, their older brothers and sisters know him, their parents know him, their grandparents know him ? everybody knows him. Everybody knows what he stands for. He crosses time at that level. He's real strong, bulletproof, and flies. What's not to like?

What aspects of working on the game did you find most interesting?

It's always fun to work with the guys at D.C. and WBIE. You don't get better (and certainly not more successful) developers than Tiburon, and EA really took the time to get this one right. Another company might have slopped this one out before it was ready. These guys waited and got it right. That's good for everybody. I thought the design came from an interesting premise. The game isn't about Superman dying, it's about him saving people and protecting people. It's true to the franchise and it's true to the character. It feels great when you can do that. The movie integration was great, too. Bryan Singer and his team were very forthcoming and helpful. They had a lot of ideas and suggestions that made the game better.

What was most challenging about adapting a comic and movie character to a videogame?

Superman is deceptively difficult to write. Thank God Marv [co-writer Marv Wolfman] was on the project. In fact, in the Superman world he's kind of a God. The thing that's tricky about Superman is that he's pure. Batman is full of vengeance and angst and his lines effortlessly ? well, not effortlessly ? but they fly out. Superman is a character of surprisingly few words. He knows he's better than everybody. No point in an argument. He looks on the puny humans with great compassion, more like a shepherd or something rather than another human. It's tough to hit that kind of note in a medium that's as innately garish as a videogame or a comic book.

The game makers went through great pains to build Metropolis from scratch for the game, and there's even a health meter for Metropolis. In comics, how important is the city to the superhero?

I could probably write a book about this. In fact, I just did, but in quick terms, g ames are very much about ?World.' While linear mediums tend to be about characters (this isn't to say that world isn't important), in a game you traverse geography (at least this type of game); you have to care about that world. Part of a world is its denizens. You want to have some relationship with a world. The easy thing to do in games is create a world that needs some serious destroying and let players have at it. Superman has a different challenge and a more difficult one. With Superman, we have a world which we have to love and want to protect. Ideally, it is like a piece of crockery. We don't want it broken and everything that comes to Metropolis is trying to break it (or at least is indifferent to that). As I said before, this game isn't about saving Superman, it's about Superman saving his world, and therefore the world is important. Also, Superman, like many people in the real Metropolis, is an immigrant. Metropolis is the promised land. It is here that Superman is making his stand. You get the feeling that if Metropolis falls, the rest of the world will sink into chaos.

The game is now in stores nationwide. Check out additional info on EA.com.