How to Play With Your Food - A Look at Rare's Character Creation

One of the great things about Rare's Kinect Sports is the mascots. It would have been too easy to dish out a cheap Wii Sports knock-off, but Rare proved once again that they still ooze charm and care for their work. And it paid off -- Kinect Sports is the most successful Kinect game to date, having sold over 3 million units. Thanks to their blog, we now have a bit of insight into the creation of the mascots. Specifically 3 of the 6 new mascots created for their Calorie Challenge DLC.

How do you give calories a personality?
.
A question I'm sure few developers ever have to ponder, but one the Kinect Sports team had to deal with. Chunky Chocolate, pictured right, went through 11 different iterations before becoming the character found in the final game. Peppy pizza? Well sure, he looks cool with a pointy head, but turning it upside down makes him easier to animate thanks to a pair of comfortably placed arms (and Rare don't take awkward
arm placement lightly).

Steady Celery, well, he almost didn't make it into the game. And he started off as the most sinister vegetable imaginable. Can you picture a world without Steady Celery's jubilant smile? No, we can't either.

You can take a look at Ben Talbot's full post on Rare's blog here. Kinect Sports Calorie Challenge is available for to download now via Xbox Live for 320 Microsoft Points.

Twitter Delicious Facebook Digg Stumbleupon Favorites More