New media

WARREN SPECTOR

GAME DESIGNER

For the last two decades, Warren Spector has been a celebrity in the geek world. After starting his career designing tabletop role playing games, he moved into video games, working on such titles as System Shock, Thief and Deus Ex, most of which were well regarded by devoted fans and critics but not Grand Theft Auto-sized blockbusters.

Many in the game industry were shocked when Spector’s Austin, Texas-based development studio, Junction Point, was acquired by the Walt Disney Co. in 2007. But the real surprise may be that the most conservative of big-media companies is letting him create the first major new piece of media in a decade starring its most valuable property: Mickey Mouse. And that the title he’s creating, a Wii game called Epic Mickey due out in the fall, brings out the normally goofy rodent’s mischievous side and brings him to scary places.

But hey, if Christopher Nolan can take over Batman on the big screen, maybe the same rules can apply to video games.

PROJECT NATAL

A NEW INTERFACE FROM MICROSOFT

The biggest changes in video games have always come on the screen: Better graphics, bigger worlds, more immersive story. Next year, Microsoft is hoping to revolutionize the other side of the equation: the controller.

Specifically, it’s getting rid of it. Project Natal, as the interface Microsoft unveiled at the E3 conference last summer is code-named, gets rid of the traditional buttons, thumb sticks and motion-sensing wands. Instead, it uses a camera and microphone to scan players’ movements and voices. Owners of Microsoft’s Xbox 360 video game console will be able to manipulate images with the swipe of a hand, punch an enemy with a real fist or have a conversation with a character on screen.

If it works as seamlessly as the demos -- always a big if, especially when it comes to Microsoft -- Natal could make the Xbox easy for anybody with a hand or mouth to use and better position Microsoft to dominate the digital living room.

LUCAS CRUIKSHANK, A.K.A. FRED FIGGLEHORN

WEB STAR

Fred is annoying. Fred is a superstar.

The high-pitched 6-year-old persona of 16-year-old Nebraska resident Lucas Cruikshank is one of the biggest entertainment sensations on the Web. Adults may not see his appeal, but kids go crazy for his misguided adventures wooing his kindergarten crush, running for class president and dealing with his alcoholic mother and father on death row.

Next year, Cruikshank will try to become the first Web celebrity to successfully take his act to the big screen. “Fred: the Movie” is reportedly in production and targeted for a 2010 release. Though plenty of actors, particularly comedians, have broken out on YouTube, they have usually adjusted their act when moving to bigger platforms. “Fred” will test not only whether that barrier can break but also whether old media can bring over an audience spending more and more of its time on the new.

RIO CARAEFF

CHIEF EXECUTIVE, VEVO

If music videos have a future, Rio Caraeff will have to create it.

As chief executive of the website owned by Universal Music, Sony Music and an Abu Dhabi investment fund, Caraeff has a simple mission: to create a Hulu for music videos. Just as that site represents a centralized, advertiser-supported destination for television shows on a medium in which they were once pirated, many in the record industry are hoping Vevo can apply a similar formula to videos.

Originally created to promote album sales on MTV, videos have since become a legitimate creative form in their own right and are hugely popular on YouTube, which is Vevo’s key distribution and technology partner.

At a time when record labels have seen $20 CDs replaced by 99-cent downloads -- for those who do pay -- every penny counts. If Caraeff can turn music videos into a real revenue generator, he might help revive an art form and an industry.

-- Ben Fritz