Josh Holmes: I was working at Electronic Arts with Daryl Anselmo, who’s one of the co-founders of our current studio, Midwinter Entertainment. Why don’t we come up with something that hip-hop will be in and actually bring it to life, and not just make a small game that people will just play for a couple of minutes, but something that people could engage with and actually tell a story and go through the whole process?” I sat down with the Electronic Arts - I didn’t go around to a lot of different people - and said, “Listen, let’s think of something bigger that we can do together. And when the gaming industry started putting music inside of games I was wondering, “We’re licensing all these songs to the game company - how come we’re not making games?” We had a lot of Madden wars - we would call them in the office - after work.
I grew up on everything from Atari to PlayStation to Xbox. Meanwhile, over in Canada, Josh Holmes, a video game producer, is about to see his ridiculous idea about a hip-hop wrestling game come to life. This leads to an idea - to create a Def Jam-branded game. And he’s noticing that music from recording artists is appearing more frequently in video games. In the early 2000s, Kevin Liles isn’t just Def Jam’s President - he’s an avid gamer. But this is the one that started it all and in honor of Vendetta, Okayplayer has talked with the development team and some of the rappers a part of creating the game to tell its secret history. A commercial and critical success, the game went on to have two sequels, Def Jam: Fight for NY and Def Jam: Icon, and recently Def Jam teased the possibility of another Vendetta game. Vendetta allowed hip-hop culture and music to be its centerpiece. The special moves range from the “Methalize” (where Method Man breaks an opponent’s back by body slamming him) to the “Ruff Ryders Anthem” (where DMX kicks his opponent, does a mid-air spin above them and throws them to the ground, and snaps his neck).Īs players win more matches they’re able to enhance their characters, preparing them for their final fight against the man behind the underground fighting league - undefeated boss D-Mob (voiced by Christopher Judge). As bones break from kicks, punches, and trap holds, characters also have the ability to pull off a special move when they’ve built up their power gauge. There are three ways to win - pin, submission, or KO - and anything goes once the fight begins. In the game, players must make their way through an underground fighting ring, taking on rappers like Ghostface Killah, Joe Budden, Redman, Ludacris, Scarface, and others in wrestling matches. But a video game dedicated to hip-hop culture - not just individual rappers or one rap collective but the fashion, music, and slang - still hadn’t been made. Instances such as these showed that rappers were engaging with - or at the very least contributing to - video games. Rappers were also making cameos in video games as playable characters, with Jermaine Dupri and Q-Tip appearing in Knockout Kings 2000, and Redman appearing in NBA 2K1.
Def jam game pro#
In the early 2000s, hip-hop began to soundtrack video game franchises like Madden NFL and Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater. Ultimately, both games served as a cautionary tale for future hip-hop video games. Four years later came the release of Wu-Tang Clan: Shaolin Style, a fighting game that received mixed reviews but was considered innovative at the time because it allowed up to four people to fight simultaneously. But the graphics made most of the rappers indistinguishable from each other, not to mention the game’s frustrating gameplay. 1995’s Rap Jam: Volume One allowed players to take the basketball court as LL Cool J, Flavor Flav, and other rappers. Prior to Vendetta, hip-hop culture and video game culture were brought together twice with varying results. Originally released in April 2003, Vendetta was a collaborative endeavor between Def Jam and EA Games. This is Def Jam Vendetta, where rappers handle battles not with a mic - but with their fists. People cheer from all sides as the pair pull out their best moves on one another, hoping to pin the other and be crowned the winner of the fight. Source: Def Jam/EA The creators and some of the rappers involved in the making of Def Jam Vendetta speak on the game’s legacy, with one even referring to it as the “first hip-hop video game in history.”įunkmaster Flex plays DMX‘s “Party Up” loudly as two animated versions of Ludacris and Method Man punch and kick the shit out of each other in a wrestling ring.