I-Wei In The Spotlight
Posted on November 18, 2012 by Anthony
Reiche remembers his first interview with Huang as not what he expected. "What I remember was thinking, 'Boy this guy is really quiet and seemingly mild-mannered for the furious creative genius that I've been told he is — because normally creative geniuses are kind of wild.'"
- Matt Leone, "Inside the Skylanders Toy Workshop", Polygon.com
Polygon released an in-depth interview of I-Wei Huang and Paul Reiche and how they mixed games, electronics and toys to create the Skylanders franchise.
The video is followed by a lengthy text article, which mentions how I-Wei met Paul Reiche through Greg Johnson, creator of ToeJam & Earl:
Unfortunately for Huang, after Toe Jam & Earl 3 shipped, the development team struggled to stay together, but a chance friendship between TJ&E3 creative director Greg Johnson and Reiche landed Huang a follow-up interview with Toys for Bob. "I was fortunate that my friend Greg Johnson ... had found I-Wei from I think a school in San Francisco," says Reiche. "And he said, 'Hey, you know, we don't have a project now, but I-Wei's the best guy you'll ever see.' And I really didn't know what to expect — that's pretty high praise." Reiche remembers his first interview with Huang as not what he expected. "What I remember was thinking, 'Boy this guy is really quiet and seemingly mild-mannered for the furious creative genius that I've been told he is — because normally creative geniuses are kind of wild.'" Toys for Bob signed up Huang and put him to work, doing art and animation for licensed games like Disney's Extreme Skate Adventure and Madagascar.
Do you think Skylanders 3 is next?
