With the help of our readers and EA, we had an opportunity to interview Kudo Tsunoda, Producer of
Def Jam: Icon.
Kudo Tsunoda: What up Operation Sports!! Love your site and always happy to get to talk games with you. Thanks for sending this along!!!
Operation Sports: Will we be able to play our own personal music tracks, in which the game responds to the beat and rhythm of it?
Kudo Tsunoda: In DEF JAM: ICON, music is a huge part of how the fighting works. One of the questions I get all the time is “Kudo, clearly DEF JAM: ICON is the most innovative and exciting fighting games to come out in years. But I am not a fan of hip hop, why should I buy this game?”. That is why we created the “My Soundtrack” feature. Already on the Xbox360 you are able to load up music and have them play over a game. In other titles, this music just plays in the background. DEF JAM: ICON is the first game that allows you to load up music that actually drives the main gameplay of the game. If you play your own song, the environment and all the environmental hazards will animate and bump to the beats of your song. One of the defining features of the gameplay is the role the environment plays in the fight. If you know the beats of the song animating the environment, you will do much better in the fights.