“Keita Takahashi, creator of Katamari Damacy and Noby Noby Boy, is more interested in art, life, and his dog, than the work of his creative peers. He’s more interested in going to the museum than going to the Game Developers Conference.

We decided that the best idea might be to inspire him ourselves — and we did that by bringing a packet of markers and a pad of drawing paper, settling down on the floor of the hotel suite Namco Bandai booked for the interview, and start drawing together. “We’re just trying to keep the interview from being boring, since they often are,” we said, by way of explanation.”

The second of the interviews at this year’s GDC that I helped Christian Nutt with, one good reason to read this one is to see the images we sketched with Takahashi. The Q&A is good (if I don’t say so myself) but I think it’s good because of the drawings.

Plus, I feel pretty honoured to say I’ve doodled with the creator of Katamari Damacy!

“This year’s blockbuster season seems to have dragged on interminably already, but it’s finally starting to look (tee hee) up, with the long-awaited release of Pixar’s latest, Up, today. Their first in 3D, we’ve wondered if they’ve chosen such a vertically minded project because the form of 3D projection used tends to look better when things are moving up and down rather than horizontally; not that that would make that much difference to the quality of the film.”

“It’s Terminator Salvation week! This year’s franchise reboot that we were most looking forward to (we’ve always just liked Terminator more than Star Trek), though when we say “looking forward to” we mean “trepidatious about any new film directed by that glossy hack, McG.” (Seriously—who calls themselves “McG”? And then expects people to call him that even when they know him personally, as heard in that famous Christian Bale tape?)”

“This week most of the cinematic excitement is kept for Cannes—after all, those lucky sods have already been able to see Pixar’s latest film, Up!—so there’s not very much that is likely to excite us otherwise (apart from the Inside Out festival, of course, as covered by our own Johnnie Walker).”

“Seems like the only release anyone cares about this week is the J.J. Abrams Star Trek reboot, a release notable simply for the number of people we know that have come out of the woodwork as massive Trekkies—possibly feeling that now it’s safe, as with a hot young cast (including the brilliant Simon Pegg, pictured above playing Scotty as a tramp) it may now finally be “cool” to like Star Trek. Or so they can be prepared to yell about how terrible the new film is for featuring a hot young cast. One or the other, probably.”

“At this year’s Game Developers Conference, Gamasutra once again had the chance to speak to Bullfrog and Lionhead co-founder, Populous, Black & White and Fable series designer, and iconoclast Peter Molyneux — on the eve of his presentation at the show.

With Fable II having been released via Lionhead parent company Microsoft late last year for Xbox 360 [NOTE: this interview contains some plot spoilers for the game], and no new project yet announced for his studio, Molyneux was chomping at the bit to discuss his next project — as the below text reveals.”

I helped Christian Nutt on a few more interviews at this year’s GDC (last year I worked with him on one with Ken Levine) and although my discussion in the interview is (unfortunately by its very nature) Fable II spoiler-packed, I think the whole interview is really great – Molyneux is a pleasure to interview.

“This week’s most eagerly hyped is X-Men Origins: Wolverine, which has famously been available as an illegal download for ages. So we could have seen it, if we weren’t completely uninterested in the idea of watching a work print of a film on our laptop… or really just the idea of a Wolverine film in general (though having said that, we do look forward to seeing how Ryan Reynolds manages as Deadpool).”

I’ve also begun coverage of Hot Docs on Torontoist this week.