Attendees at SXSW 2011 in Austin got a special preview of new downloadable content from The Boondock Saints that could be added to the new Yoostar 2: In the Movies game. The just-released movie karaoke game for PlayStation 3 and Kinect for Xbox 360 from developer Blitz Games allows movie fans to interact with Hollywood actors in 80 scenes from films like Scarface, The Godfather, Gladiator, King Kong, The Wizard of Oz, and The Matrix.
While The Boondock Saints is currently not available for the game, the game maker was on hand with Troy Duffy, the director of both Boondock movies, and actor David Della Rocco, who played Rocco in the two films. Fans were able to partake in one of two short scenes from the original movie alongside Della Rocco, while Duffy directed them on the Kinect version of the game.
“There’s the bartender scene where it’s explained that the Russians are buying up all the buildings, so they have to shut down the bar and there’s the scene in the front seat of the brothers’ car when Rocco first learns he’s part of the Boondock Saints,” said Ben Friedberg, assistant vice president, operations and original content development, Yoostar.
“The response to these scenes at SXSW has been overwhelming and I don’t see any reason why they wouldn’t be in a future DLC pack.”
Friedberg said the company will release a downloadable pack of five new scenes each week beginning in early April for the new game.
Yoostar 2 is just one of a growing number of games that are tapping into the crowds that flock to Austin every year for the festival. Duffy said it’s part of the connection that has always existed between games and Hollywood.
“Video games make more money than movies today,” said Duffy. “Video games have an obvious connection with films and comic books. It’s almost all becoming incestuous and related all over the place.”
Video games are also attracting a much broader audience today than ever before with the average age of a gamer currently 33, according to the Entertainment Software Association. Della Rocca didn’t grow up playing games, but he enjoyed interacting with fans and play Yoostar 2 for the first time.
“This game is interesting because you get it to improvise and experience classic scenes from so many films,” said Della Rocco. “Just the idea that you can bad mouth Brando in The Godfather, it’s a great crowd pleaser.”
Duffy sees this Yoostar 2 game as the next evolution of karaoke.
“A lot of people have that desire to be in movies and this lets them fulfill that wish,” said Duffy. “Some kid is going to put together a bunch of funny scenes from this game and stick it on YouTube and then everybody is going to have to have it.”
Yoostar recently expanded this game franchise with a free Facebook game called Yoostar Playground, which allows players to mash up scenes that players of the console games have created and then share these creations with their friends.
Duffy said he’d like to get involved in video games and is considering bringing The Boondock Saints to game platforms to give fans a chance to explore these characters further.
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About the Author
John Gaudiosi
Editor-in-Chief
John Gaudiosi has been covering videogames for the past 20 years for outlets like The Washington Post, CNET, Wired Magazine and CBS.com. He has focused on the convergence of entertainment and videogames for outlets like Video Business, Home Media Magazine, Entertainment Weekly, The Hollywood Reporter and Variety. He currently serves as Editor-in-Chief of Gamerlive.TV and is also a freelance game columnist for Reuters and writes for outlets like Forbes.com, NVISION, Official PlayStation Magazine, EGM Now, Geek Monthly, PrimaGames.com, and Yahoo! Games. John also serves as the video game expert for NBC in Washington D.C. and has produced videogame documentaries for The History Channel and Starz Entertainment. John was named one of the Top 50 Game Journalists in the world by Next-Gen.biz in 2007. He is the co-author of Scholastic Books' How to Get into Videogames, Prima Publishing's Madden: Twenty Years of Videogame Football and Electronic Arts: The Official History.
