Old School Gamer Magazine chats with Wonder Boy and the Cursed Kingdom co-producer Philipp Döschl, who details the origin and creative process behind the newest original game based in the world of the cult-classic retro adventure RPG. With the blessing of original Wonder Boy creator Ryuichi Nishizawa, it’s easily one of the most anticipated upcoming retro remakes.
Old School Gamer Magazine: Why do you think The Wonder Boy games have made such a huge comeback?
Philipp Döschl: Because they’re well designed, fun games. The spirit of the series is very positive and many people of my generation (aged 35+) and older ones have fond memories of these games, either at home or in the arcades. The series had a performed a great evolution from the first Wonder Boy to the last Monster World release. We’re taking this evolution one step further to the next level.
Also, we all love to get back to our roots, what we used to play, watch, eat, experience or whatever when we were kids. This is also a reason why the Mini-NES and Mini-SNES are so tremendously successful.
OSGM: What makes this game different and special?
Döschl: Monster Boy and the Cursed Kingdom is not a remaster. It’s an original game which hasn’t been there before in any way. Monster Boy draws it’s inspiration from the original series and adds a lot of fresh ideas. I don’t want to spoil the fun of discovering all of this. What I can tell you know for example is that you’ll meet characters from the old series, such as Pepelogoo, as well as cameos and other surprises. Of course, there are tons of new features, locations, characters, NPCs, game mechanics and more that haven’t been in the series before.
Patrick Hickey Jr. is a full-time Assistant Professor of Communication & Performing Arts and Director of the Journalism program at Kingsborough Community College and is the chairman of the City University of New York Journalism Council. He is the Founder and Editor-In-Chief of ReviewFix.com. He's also a former News Editor at NBC Local Integrated Media and National Video Games Writer at Examiner.com where his work was mentioned in National Ad campaigns by Disney, Nintendo and EA Sports.
Hickey was also the Editor-In-Chief of two College Newspapers before he received his BA in Journalism from Brooklyn College. Hickey's work has been published in The New York Daily News, The New York Times, Complex, The Hockey Writers, Yahoo!, Broadway World, Examiner, NYSportScene Magazine, ProHockeyNews.com, GothamBaseball.com, The Syracuse Post-Standard, Scout.com and the official sites of the Brooklyn Aces and New York Islanders.
His first book, The Minds Behind the Games: Interviews With Cult And Classic Video Game Developers was released in April 2018 and is chock full of interviews with legendary developers. His second book in the series, The Minds Behind Adventures Games, was released in December 2019. His third book, The Minds Behind Sports Games, was released in September 2020. His fourth book, The Minds Behind Shooter Games, was released in March 2021. The Minds Behind Sega Genesis Games and The Minds Behind PlayStation Games were released in 2022 and The Minds Behind PlayStation 2 was published in January 2023.
Hickey is also a contracted comic book writer, currently penning his original series, "Condrey," as well as "The Job," "Brooklyn Bleeds" "Dem Gulls" and "KROOM" for Legacy Comix, where he serves as founder, owner and Editor-in-Chief.
Hickey Jr. is also a voice actor, having starred in the 2018 indie hit and 2019 Switch, PS4 and Xbox One release, The Padre (also serving as English language Story Editor), from Shotgun With Glitters. The sequel, The Padre: One Shell Straight to Hell was released in February 2021- Hickey also served as a Story Editor and Lead Voiceover performer. He has also done narration and trailers for several other titles including The Kaiju Offensive, Relentless Rex and Roniu’s Tale.
Hickey is also the lead voiceover performer on Mega Cat Studios’ upcoming title WrestleQuest, responsible for nearly 90 characters in the game, as well as Skybound's Renfield: Bring Your Own Blood, where he voices both Dracula and Renfield, as well as several other characters. He also stars in Ziggurat Interactive’s World Championship Boxing Manager 2, where he performs the VO of nearly every male character in the game. He also worked on the Atari VCS’s BPM Boy.
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