Okay, this is a little obscure, but I thought it worth posting anyway.

Mumbo Jumbo is a company that does so-called “casual games”. Mobile phone games, Flash games, puzzle games, game show conversions, card games. Some of it’s on Xbox Live Arcade. However, the name “Mumbo Jumbo” wasn’t always associated with such games. At one point, they were chosen by Take Two, who used to own 19.9% of Bungie Software, to develop Myth 3: The Wolf Age, the sequel to Bungie’s accolade-adorned series of real-time strategy (or real-time tactics, for purists) games on the Mac and PC. When Microsoft bought Bungie, Take Two got the Myth and Oni franchises as part of the compensation; Microsoft and Bungie held on to Marathon and Halo.

Oni, it seems, has been left on the shelf. Mumbo Jumbo tapped members of the active Myth development community to make their game, and updated the Myth 2 engine to use fully 3D models. However, the game was received poorly by the Bungie faithful, and shortly after release, the team that developed it was let go. Today, Bungie’s earlier Myth games are still more popular and better-supported than the orphaned Myth 3.

It was after this that Mumbo Jumbo, now just a name, became associated with casual gaming. Still, it’s interesting to note that MJ has now acquired Ritual Entertainment, developer of shooters. Mumbo Jumbo itself was founded by a Ritual alum, and was formed by employees split off from 3D Realms. They developed mission packs for Quake, and most recently worked on SiN Episodes.

In 2001, Mumbo Jumbo split off from Ritual, at the same time announcing that their first title would be Myth 3.

MJ’s website contains no reference whatsoever to Myth 3, or to its prior incarnation before the focus on casual and mobile gaming.

The Escapist is calling Bungie a great artist in their piece on how the gaming industry shamelessly pillages the film industry, especially in the area of science fiction. The concept of the article: to make a list of movies so influential on the games industry that, if they had not ever existed, the gaming industry itself would be unrecognizable.

Halo, of course, warrants a mention:

While Halo quietly took some pieces from Iain M. Banks’ Culture novels, its more celluloid-inspired riffs were more obvious.

So obvious, of course, that the author doesn’t even bother to mention Aliens at that point, but it does make the list:

The movie’s Colonial Marines provide the backbone for everything from Halo to Command & Conquer’s view of the future. Where in even the dirtiest parts of the Star Wars universe are elements of romance, the Colonial Marines take their own visual cues from a post-Vietnam military with its array of firepower, gung-ho slogans and omnipresent wise-cracks. The Colonial Marine’s weaponry provides the backbone of most shooters.

Which is to say that, with the exception of the missing grenade launcher, Halo’s assault rifle is the automatic weapon wielded by Aliens’ colonial marines. The Pelican is Aliens’ dropship with a few altered contours, and Sarge is… well, Sarge. Not that we love him any less for it.

When we heard whispers to expect something “soon” from Wideload, I’m sure nobody had this in mind. Translator Dmitri “Goblin” Puchkov, responsible for many of the best quality dubs of Western movies and television programs into Russian, including some hilarious spoof dubs of films like Star Wars Episode One and Shmatrica, a parody of The Matrix, has turned his eyes to Stubbs the Zombie. In Goblin’s version, Stubbs the Zombie: Revenge of the King, the protagonist of the game is none other than Michael Jackson, who died of too many plastic surgeries and returns from the grave for revenge.

The Russian website Buka Entertainment (English version) has an entry for the game, which is scheduled for release on February 8, 2007. Below is a translation:

Goblin studio presents:
Brought to death by his endless plastic surgeries and silicone injections into his brain, Michael Jackson has been raised from the dead to revenge himself on money-grubbing plastic surgeons, and in particularly, an ex-citizen of Russia that is the leading silicone oligarch. In pursuit of this goal he wreaks havoc, rips off arms and hands, eats brains and attacks the clinic. The American people all unite to protect silicon boobs and the other achievements of democracy! Military, police and even militia are standing in furious Michael’s way; but nothing can stop the wrathful king of pop! All the guilty will be devoured to death, and the innocent will be punished cruelly!

Project details:

• Get under a zombie’s skin! The original name of the game is Stubbs the Zombie. Now the funny translation by Goblin has truly brought new life to it.
• Bloody vengeance takes place amidst astonishingly original surroundings.
• A rare opportunity to fight for the dead in the epic battle against life and its vivid embodiment: silicon boobs.
• Original fighting system. Believe us: you will have all kinds of opportunities for revenge.

Many of Goblin’s works reside in a legal grey area, and limited access to and knowledge of the Russian legal system makes it difficult, if not impossible, for foreign intellectual property owners to enforce their rights there. It is not known whether this version is sanctioned by Wideload or Aspyr.

However, Goblin and his parodies are also very popular, and if this one takes off, Wideload’s maiden effort might achieve something no Bungie title has so far: gain notoriety in the former Soviet Union. While the region is awash with pirated PC games, Macintosh computers are rare and Xbox consoles are virtually non-existent, as Microsoft chose never to launch it or the Xbox Live service there, despite the phenomenal growth of the economy, due to questions about piracy. While the Halo franchise might be big in the US and Europe, in Russia it’s virtually unknown, whereas PC games like Counter-Strike and the Half-Life series are well-known and available in localized versions, whether official or unofficial.

Goblin’s own website has additional information on his other projects. However unknown Halo might be, it does seem as if Bungie’s earlier PC and PlayStation offering, Oni, is not unknown. Oni’s protagonist, Konoko, has been adopted for promotional purposes by the Russian gaming site OGL.

Kudos to my wife, a fan of Goblin’s translations, for finding (and translating) this item.

UPDATE: Since the machinations of the industry that produce localized versions of games for publication in far-off lands are many, varied, and complex, sometimes things happen that even surprise those who originally made a game.

So it is perhaps not surprising that Wideload itself isn’t sure if this is the real deal or not. Apparently a Russian translation has been mentioned by publisher Aspyr, but Matt Soell of Wideload reckons that Goblin’s “Return of the King” version of Stubbs is unofficial.