Earthworm Jim creator Doug Tennapel is the sort of man I admire, while I simultaneously fear the possibility that I will end up like him. He goes into detail about this duality in a new interview over on Gamasutra.

They're spending so much that now they're making $30 million games. Big business is big business, and I think some of the smaller mom-and-pop shops got closed down or bought out, and again, I think it was kind of because the gamers weren't even in it for the art of gaming. They wanted to sell their company and make big stocks to swell up the company to 70 people and try to unload a bunch of cash.

Just look at his portrait over there. If that is not a man who is deadly talented and pays dearly for it, I dunno who is. Jim is this vague spectre from my childhood, a standout amongst a milling herd of forgettable platformers. What's sad is that so many of these cartoonists end up mushing along at Nickelodeon, pumping art and comedy into properties that are largely ignored, or at least pigeonholed into the "children's entertainment" heading. Eliza Gauger

More on Earthworm Jim for the PSP, art in video games, and an assertive jadedness in the complete interview. [Gamasutra]

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