We talk with Chris Evans, Sebastian Stan, and Hayley Atwell about their roles in the Captain America games and movies, and what being a gamer means to them.
Marvel's latest 3D super hero movie, Captain America: The First Avenger, is playing in a theater near you. That means there's a new Sega video game for fanboys (and girls) to jump into. Actor Chris Evans bridges the gap between the film's origin story and the original game's adventure, playing Steve Rogers in both incarnations.
"I did the voice for Captain America," said Evans, who previously played Marvel superhero the Human Torch in the Fantastic Four films. "I did the voice for the Fantastic Four once, too. It's pretty easy. You just go and you go in a studio and you just kind of read lines all day. It's boring, to be honest. You just kind of read lines off an endless amount of pages, but it ends up looking pretty cool."
Evans didn't have any time to be bored on the London set of the movie. The actor bulked up to fit into the famous red, white and blue suit and take on the Red Skull (played by Hugo Weaving). But even so, he still picked the Human Torch to beat Captain America if they were to engage in a superhero brawl like the ones in Capcom's Marvel vs. Capcom franchise.
"I mean I hate to say, but unfortunately the Human Torch might beat him," said Evans. "It's tough to beat fire."
Luckily, Captain America has an ally in the new movie (and game) in Bucky Barnes (played by Sebastian Stan). Stan joined Evans in Sega's video game, and unlike Evans, Stan logged many hours playing games.
"I've played Call of Duty and Medal of Honor and the games today are so real," said Stan. "I remember when I was growing up my big thing was just playing the NBA basketball video games. Then I got in to Warcraft and Warcraft II and all those war strategy games. They were beautiful but they were no way near what they're doing today. With games today, basically you're living a double life. I have a friend and I'll call him up and ask, 'Where have you been for the last week?' And he'll be like, 'Oh I've just been building this empire online.' So it's understandable how you can get lost in these game world."
Stan also found his first foray into game development an interesting challenge. "I actually thought it was really hard because as an actor you try to sound as real and natural as possible, but you can't do that with a video game," explained Stan. "You have to have the feeling of raising the stakes and make it a little bit more like you were in a 1925 movie. They walked me through it to make everything a heightened experience. I had never been a part of that; that was a neat experience."
Also along for the virtual ride was actress Hayley Atwell, who plays Peggy Carter in the film and game. "The script of the computer game is different from the script of the film, so it allowed me to see probably what Peggy was doing on a day-to-day basis and working with Steve on all these other adventures," said Atwell. "It gave a new life to her and lets you experience them going off and doing all these amazing wonderful things together. It was a great experience."
Atwell grew up in London playing Sega's Sonic the Hedgehog games on the Mega Drive and Ecco the Dolphin on Game Gear.
"I love platform games and then I got into things like Grim Fandango and The Pandora Directive on PC," said Atwell. "These days I'm playing Plants vs. Zombies on iPad and The Sims on Wii and I absolutely love those games. I've completed Angry Birds and Murielle the Magical Merchant on iPad as well, which was great fun."
For comic book fans, Captain America: Super Soldier from Sega and The First Avenger movie offer up World War II action. Marvel scribe Christos Gage wrote the game's original story, which expands beyond the scope of the film and introduces new action to the mix.
Evans is currently filming The Avengers, in which Captain America is in modern times, which posed an interesting change for the actor. "Captain America started in the '40s and it's a completely different world," explained Evans. "In modern day, everything's flash and impersonal and it's all videogames and technology. People don't really connect with each other. In the '40s there's more of a personal connection with people. There's a camaraderie. Captain America is probably used to people just hanging on the corner with a pack of Camels in their sleeve by their old hot rod. It's a different time."
Next summer, Evans may be teaming virtually with Chris Hemsworth, from Thor (both the movie and game), in an Avengers game. No word yet on whether Sega will be handling that game or if Disney Interactive Studios will. Disney purchased Marvel and is taking over all Marvel movies moving forward, which would open the door for Disney Interactive creating the new games.
Source: Daily News from GamePro.com
Saturday, July 23, 2011