Shack: 24 episodes is a large undertaking, especially relative to other developers focusing on episodic content. The first season of Telltale's Sam & Max only consisted of six episodes, which were then released across seven months. Valve opted for only three Half-Life 2 episodes, and it's looking like the second episode will be following the first by about a year and a half. What made you go for such a large number, right off the bat?

American McGee: Our goal is to build a "true" episodic game --meaning it mirrors the duration, packaging, and delivery schedule of traditional episodic content (a television series for instance)--and does so in a consistent fashion. I think audience knowledge of duration of play and delivery schedule is important because it allows people to fit playing a game into their hectic lives.

Each of our 24 episodes is being designed so an average player can complete it in thirty minutes. Again, I think this is important because it gives our audience an expectation of the amount of time they'll have to invest in each episode. I think video games have had a hard time competing with traditional media because it's more difficult to find a "time slot" for game playing. We're raised on television, so we tend to think in 30 minute and 1 hour time slots. Delivering games that fit into these slots might open them up to wider audiences--something we're seeing happen with casual games in general.

Ultimately, this is all uncharted territory. We, like the Telltale guys before us, are flying by the seat of our pants. But I think that's a good thing--something game development is often lacking these days. True innovation can only come from making interesting choices and taking risks. We'll see where these choices take us; hopefully somewhere fun.

Shack: What's the scope of each episode? Will each episode be a self-contained game like Telltale's work with Sam & Max, or will the new episodes expand the game world with new areas and quests?

American McGee: Episodes are completely self-contained. We considered this the Lost vs. South Park problem. With a show like Lost it's impossible to talk about an upcoming or previous episode with someone who isn't also into the show. With South Park you don't have to watch every episode to understand what's going on--and episodes stand on their own: there's the World of Warcraft episode, Osama bin Laden episode, etc. These are able to attract occasional viewers just on their unique premises.

Because we're drawing from classic fairy tales I think we'll end up with a "spiky" audience curve. Some people will be especially interested in our take on Red Riding Hood, and we want to make sure those people can play just that episode and still understand what's going on and have a good time.

Shack: Will you be distributing episodes of American McGee's Grimm through anything other than GameTap? Perhaps an online Spicy Horse store?

American McGee: Not that we can comment on at this time.

Shack: What are your thoughts on the Nintendo Wii? Have you considered developing games for it?

American McGee: American McGee plays with American McGee's Wii all the time! And yes. If I had to chose only two platforms to develop for right now, I'd say Wii & PC.

Shack: Is there any chance of Grimm appearing on consoles after those 24 episodes are complete?

American McGee: Also, nothing that we can comment on at this time.

Shack: Alice had that nice set of action figures and the soundtrack, and I know that a Bad Day LA movie, animated show and graphic novel were discussed at one time. Is there any Grimm-related merchandising on the way?

American McGee: I'm always interested in leveraging our properties across as many mediums as possible. Sometimes it works out--like with Alice--other times, not. I think Grimm is ideally suited for film, toy, and print versions. We'll announce this sort of thing in the future.

Shack: What happened to American McGee's Oz?

American McGee: Atari/Infogrammes happened. They financed initial production, ran into money trouble, then dropped a bunch of their developers. Oz got the ax and we were never able to revive the project. The film version is still in development.

Shack: Let's say you collaborate on a game with Sid Meier. Whose name would come first in the title and what kind of game would it be?

American McGee: What sort of game it is would depend on whose name came first...an American McGee's Sid Meier's Game would likely be a turn-based strategy game where the player was required to build an empire of Hot Topic stores on a lake of lava. Sid Meier's American McGee's Game would be a 3D shooter where the player killed enemies like Genghis Khan and Alexander by laying railroad track on their heads.

The first episodes of the Spicy Horse-developed American McGee's Grimm will begin appearing on GameTap in the spring of 2008.