(Wii) (EA/Hasbro)
Original game based on Hasbro's NERF N-Strike series of toy blasters. First shoot-em-up designed for a pre-teen audience. Game included a real NERF blaster that doubled as a holder for the Wiimote.
At the time I became involved, the game was around 6 months from its target finish date; it had already been in development for around a year and there was no way it was going to get completed in time for it’s Christmas/holiday period release; it was an overly ambitious FPS that had you shooting inside a shopping mall and a school, of all places. Apparently Hasbro and EA exec loved the concept, thinking they needed “Call of Duty for 8-year old boys”, but to this day I think that would have been a disaster for the brand, EA and Hasbro. What was good, was the concept for a NERF blaster packed out in the game, which doubled as a holder for the Wiimote - Paul Teall’s idea - and it was brilliant combination of the brand. And, EA had millions of dollars tied up in plastic in a huge order at Hasbro, so this was a game that simply had to ship!
So much to the unhappiness of the game team and Hasbro I scrapped the original project and started something less ambitious - a literal shooting gallery in a NERF world. The team worked long and hard to realize this project against the odds, but they did it. It became one of the big holiday hits of 2008 for EA - it was the #1 Wii title from an internal EA studio for all of CY08.
