Interviews
Sig Hansen Talks Up Deadliest Catch: Alaskan Storm
July 24, 2008
Sig Hansen skippers the Northwestern on Discovery Channel’s hit reality series, World’s Deadliest Catch, which is the summer’s top cable hit. During the past two years, when not risking his life and that of his crew hunting for crab in the Bering Sea, he’s been working on a video game that simulates that experience.
Hansen co-founded a development studio to create the game. Das Gamer caught up with the captain, who enters the fourth season of the show this winter (the series airs during the warm summer months Hansen is off), to talk about his new venture and basically figure out why anyone would make a video game about pulling bugs out of a deadly body of water to fuel the needs of Red Lobster-loving Americans. Guess it can’t be any weirder than Big Buck Hunter. Hit the jump for the full interview.
Das Gamer: Of all things, how’d do you couple crab fishing with video games?
Sig Hansen: Well, basically we started a website for shits and giggles a few years back and we sold some shirts and things like that. Then the fans just kept asking what’s it like being a captain. My wife and I were sitting around talking and I though if they had a video game they could do it themselves. We’ve had so many requests from people trying to come on the boat to get that experience and I thought a video game would give everyone a similar experience. And that’s how it started really.
How did you convince Microsoft to greenlight an Xbox 360 game?
Sig Hansen: We were at a bar and having a beer in our neighborhood here and I was talking to another fisherman friend of mine and one thing led to another. His brother-in-law knew some people at Microsoft and he had been in game development before. He led me to a team, which is now at Liquid Dragon. They happened to really be into water effects and all of that. It started out as just a PC game and after that we decided to do an Xbox 360 version, as well.
Besides starting the publisher, how involved were you with the game?
Sig Hansen: I’m not a super hardcore gamer. My brother Edgar is a lot more into games, but our input was to make the boat as nuts-on as we could with the pitch and roll. We actually had the team come up to Alaska and we took them out for a spin and showed them how to steer the boat and what it feels like to maneuver it in the water and how to dock it. Of course, we took the team out for a while and they got sicker then dogs. But they understood how the boat felt. I think they got it right. In the game, when you control the boat, the controls are pretty realistic. The throttle, the jog stick for the rudder, it’s all there.
What’s the experience of fishing in the game like?
Sig Hansen: We played with that quite a bit. As far as gameplay, I wanted to make sure it was something that a guy’s not going to catch crab all the time. You have to follow the schools of crab and stay on the meat. That was important to me, so that there is not always a reward. Fishing is a lot of luck and it’s just using your gut and that was important. The schools move so you have to stay on them.
What else were you able to get into the game?
Sig Hansen: The crew has to break ice to keep the boat safe. Fuel is a big part of the strategy. Stability is important. Not enough fuel or too much can sink the boat, depending on how many pots you have on board. All of that’s in there.
You captains work your crew hard on the show. How does the game simulate the human toll on the crew?
Sig Hansen: That is kind of up to the guy running the boat. If he wants to keep the crew up, well, then go ahead, but you still gotta let them rest. It’s like any realistic scenario. As far as the crew interaction that is in there because you are the captain so your controlling how they are going to perform.. that is like what a captain does. Not only do you drive, you have to find the crab and keep your crew motivated and their spirits’ up. You are part therapist, part teacher…that’s all part of being the captain.
Can a crew revolt on you?
Sig Hansen: Can a crew member get pissed off and do his own thing? Sure, but we can make it even better with the next game. We are gonna get feedback from what’s going on and take the information you can keep it fishing but like you just asked.
What’d you learn about game development?
Sig Hansen: That games are a bitch to make. You gotta understand, I’ve been at sea all my life. That is all we’d ever done before this game came along, so now I got to see how the other side lives doing the 9 to 5. And doing a game like this is overwhelming, so it was a learning experience for me. But now, if we do another game or something, I can take what we’ve done and tweak it.
So is making a video game harder than your day job?
Sig Hansen: It will be nice to get on the boat and take a vacation. After what I have been through this year…getting that game on the shelf. You got radio interviews and people and it all adds up, man. Trying to spend time with your family at home, while juggling seven balls in the air is challenging. At least, when you are fishing you are in charge of your destiny. You’re the boss. And here it’s like your calendar is the boss and it’s a new life.
Did you ever play games growing up?
Sig Hansen: The thing is with me I’m out at sea. Even when we were kids, we were gone eight, nine up to 11 months out of the year. So when we came home we weren’t sitting behind a Nintendo, we were drinking heavily. Come on, you missed out on all the parties and the fun. We went nuts when we were kids in our teens and in our 20s. A lot of my friends that went to school, I think I was 19, maybe 20, and had been gone for like six months and they are sitting there playing their videogames. I’d try to get them to go have a drink or go to a nightclub – you could get into those back then. And they wanted to sit at home and play video games. I just couldn’t understand it. I was like, “I am out of here man. I’m gonna go find some girls. I’m not gonna do this. The things that most people take for granted, I didn’t. Even now, as an adult, if you drive your kids to school in the morning and you pick them up, most people look at that as a chore or a task. I don’t
You’re probably used to seeing yourself on TV after three seasons, but what’s it like to see yourself virtually in this new game?
Sig Hansen: It freaks me out. We got a lot of video feed in this game, so that was pretty cool. We worked so hard on this game. We managed to distribute the game ourselves. We not only put it together, but we got it into Wal-Mart and all over. It’s a lot of fucking work. So pretty soon you don’t even know what it is anymore, you just know that you are spending all this time trying to create something. Then it just sort of hit me when we were at the last Gamestop event there were like 150 to 200 people at this thing and they all got the game and they all wanted me to sign it. That’s when it hit me, this is for real.
I saw you sell a lot of different things on your website fvnorthwestern.com.
Sig Hansen: We have so much going on. We have a coffee brand, beer and clothing line with Helly Hansen. We are trying to accomplish so much, but this game is our baby. This is the biggie.
When it comes to aspiring crab fisherman, would you recommend playing this game before applying for a job with your crew?
Sig Hansen: It would be kind of funny to see if guys would spend a few hours on the game. Hopefully, they spend an all-nighter. That would be like a win for me. If they spend an all-nighter and they want to go to bed but they try another one and then decide to come up there. But play it in a freaking freezer for all I care and then tell me you want to come up there.
Order your copy of Deadliest Catch: Alaskan Storm.
–John Gaudiosi
