Carmen Sandiego: The Secret of the Stolen Drums - Official Website
Just before dying, the last descendant from a line of African Kings reveals the secret that he kept for so many years. He recounts an old tale about the gathering of ancient kings from around the world who brought the knowledge of their people to be buried and sealed in a secret cave deep in the jungle. Each king received a drum showing a section of the path that leads to the secret den. Each drum had a specific sound and was protected by spirits. Only the power of all the drums and their corresponding mask precisely positioned in a circle (the place that each King once held) can open the entrance to the long lost treasure.
Centuries of wars and pillaging have now scattered the drums all over the world. But, as if protected by a mysterious power, the drums passed through time without any harm.
Carmen Sandiego knows the legend is real. A few days after the old man dies, the news reports a series of robberies of African relics in museums and art galleries around the city. The A.C.M.E. team recognizes Carmen Sandiego’s familiar methods. She’s up to something, something big. Carmen wants to pinpoint the location of the den and reveal the lost treasure before anyone else. Once again, it’s up to A.C.M.E. agents to stop her, and this time young Cole Gannon is on the case.
Playing as the best special agent ever trained at A.C.M.E., our athletic hero has studied the psychological profile of Carmen and is prepared to pick up her trail and keep one step ahead of her. Supervised by A.C.M.E. agents, Jules and Shadow, Cole Gannon is on a mission to capture the infamous thief once and for all!
Key Features:
- Travel through nine different locations on five continents
- Use stealth maneuver tactics including: ninja-style stealth walk, crouched walk, tightrope walk, diving rolls, climbing, shimmying on ledges and more
- Encounter five classes of enemies including element spirits (air, water, fire, etc.), animals, robots and more-- each with a different awareness of the player’s “stealth” maneuvers
- Use the high-tech telescopic staff to pole vault over fences or use it as a Blowgun to shoot pellets, hit switches, distract enemies and more
- Utilize your extensive gears and gadgets arsenal including the multi-functional staff, blowgun and goo cannons
- Encounter and thwart security devices including motion sensors, laser beams, sound sensors and more
- Use Cole’s multi-purpose personal computer to save important clues, keep an inventory database, download maps, access codes with the “Code Breaker” or use the Universal Language Translator.
Game Chronicles goes inside this exciting new game with an exclusive interview by John Carswell.
| GCM: | Please get us rolling by introducing yourself and telling us about the team behind Carmen Sandiego: The Secret of the Stolen Drums. |
| Chris Lucich: | Hi, I’m Chris Lucich, and I’m the Producer for Carmen Sandiego at BAM! Entertainment. I’ve been in the game industry for over a decade and I’ve been with BAM! for just over a year. Our development team comes from A2M, located in Montreal. They’re a very experienced group when it comes to licensed games, and they have a real passion for console gaming. They also have rock-solid technology, which has allowed us to simultaneously develop the game for the PS2, GameCube, and Xbox. |
| GCM: | How was it decided to bring back Carmen Sandiego at this time? |
| Chris Lucich: | Well, just about everyone has heard of Carmen Sandiego and that franchise has a really good reputation. The Carmen Sandiego games revolve around the ACME Detective Agency and their pursuit of the world’s greatest thief, Carmen Sandiego. As players chase Carmen around the world, they learn about geography. We decided that it was time to renovate the brand by preserving the main theme – chasing a master thief around the world – and adding a whole lot of action. That’s right… ACTION! |
| GCM: | For those of us who grew up with Carmen Sandiego, what of original formula has been reworked and may surprise us? |
| Chris Lucich: | All, I gotta say is… this ain’t your daddy’s Carmen Sandiego. The game has evolved from a simple puzzle game on the PC into a full-blown Action / Adventure Game for the Next Generation Consoles. In the past, the user would navigate through static screens and complete simple puzzles to gain clues to Carmen’s whereabouts. Now the user plays a young detective named Cole Gannon, who is experienced in martial arts, extreme sports, and computer science. Cole must use stealth, acrobatics, martial arts, and some high tech gadgets to chase Carmen through the perilous levels to find clues. |
| GCM: | Will there still be some “edutainment” elements present and, if so, what will they be and how large of a role will they play in the game as a whole? |
| Chris Lucich: | Fans of the old Carmen Sandiego won’t be disappointed. Each time Cole unlocks a new geographic location, he gets to see a brief slideshow via the ACME World Atlas. The slideshow is composed of a series of photographs taken from that geographic region, with some fun facts accompanying each one. The idea behind the ACME World Atlas is not to give a heavy-handed history lesson, but to give the player an appreciation of the part of the world they are visiting. |
| GCM: | Please tell us about Carmen Sandiego: The Secret of the Stolen Drums plot. |
| Chris Lucich: | Our story revolves around an Ancient Curse and a Magical Diamond that contains the knowledge of all nations. The map to the Diamond is sketched onto the skins of eight African Drums. When these drums start disappearing out of museums, the ACME Detective Agency realizes it’s the work of Carmen Sandiego. However, the experienced detectives follow a false clue and get stranded in Siberia. Now it’s up to the newest ACME recruit, Cole Gannon to try and track down Carmen. Cole’s adventure takes him from the streets of New York, to the volcanoes of New Zealand, to the ancient ruins of Machu Picchu, and that’s just the beginning. There is also a pretty good series of story arcs, involving Cole, Carmen Sandiego, and the other ACME Agents. This isn’t just a story about chasing a thief, it’s a story about determination, taking responsibility for your actions, and working as part of a team. |
| GCM: | What sort of moves will Cole be able to pull off and can you give us a few examples of their uses that may seem contradictory to previous Carmen Sandiego titles. |
| Chris Lucich: | Well, the previous Carmen Sandiego titles showed you these beautiful environments, but you really couldn’t interact with them. Now you are free to run around and explore them. We’ve added Stealth Elements, Acrobatics, and Martial Arts. Cole can perform flips, diving rolls, hang from ledges, slide down zip lines, tightrope walk, attack with a staff, pole-vault, and that’s just the beginning. Like I said, we’ve added ACTION! |
| GCM: | Please tell us a bit about the environments and levels found in Carmen Sandiego: The Secret of the Stolen Drums. |
| Chris Lucich: | The game takes place in 9 different locations in the world, and there are a total of 37 different levels. When designing levels for Carmen Sandiego, we tried to be as accurate as possible, while creating great gameplay. For example, when the designers and artists were creating the Louvre in Paris, it was modeled after the real building. You can look it up on the web. It’s accurate. Then it was a matter of placing robotic guards, security cameras, and motion detectors to create great gameplay! The types of levels in the game vary, depending on what gameplay mechanics we are trying to teach the user. Some levels are very stealth intensive, some are puzzle oriented, and some are full of combat and action. We also have some pretty cool bosses in the game as well. |
| GCM: | What sort of challenges and enemies will the player be up against and how difficult was it to introduce these elements to a series characterized by anything but action? |
| Chris Lucich: |
That is a really good question. We wanted to get as much action and combat in the game as possible, while still maintaining the integrity of the brand. We decided that we could have combat as long as the main character didn’t hurt anyone. I know that this sounds like a contradiction, but it’s not. There are two basic types of enemies in the game: Robots and Spirit Guardians. The Robots are armed with a variety of sonic and energy weapons and are primarily used to guard doors and patrol specific areas. One good hit from Cole’s Staff will disable them. Here’s the catch. They must be hit in the back. If Cole tries to attack them head-on, they raise a force field. In order to take them out, the user must use stealth. We have a wide variety of Spirits in the game as well. The Spirits have a wide range of close range and projectile attacks and can emerge from anywhere at anytime. Earth Spirits rise from the ground, Water Spirits ambush Cole near water, and Air and Fire Sprits can materialize out of thin air. In order to defeat them, Cole must dodge the enemy attacks, while counterattacking with his staff. The Spirits all have different Hit Points, Attributes, and AI. When a Spirit is defeated, its energy dissipates. So, we’ve got action, stealth, projectile attacks, melee combat, ambushes, and nobody gets hurt |
| GCM: | Finally, what can you tell us about the graphics in Carmen Sandiego: The Secret of the Stolen Drums? |
| Chris Lucich: | Artistically, the game looks like a smoothly animated cartoon, with environments closely resembling their real life counterparts. When we were creating this game, we paid a lot of attention to detail. The buildings and architecture in New York, New Orleans, Tibet, and Thailand all have a unique look and feel to them. The game runs at 60fps, so the animations look really smooth. We also had a great time creating and animating the Spirits, too. |
| GCM: | Thank you for your time! Do you have any final thoughts or impressions that you’d like to leave our readers with? |
| Chris Lucich: |
Actually, I have two:
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