John Wick HEX

October 2019

Edge

An unprecedented collaborative effort produces a movie tie-in like no other

What makes John Wick John Wick? If you answered ‘Keanu Reeves’, then good guess – but you’re only halfright. Wick combines skill, careful planning, improvisation and a little bit of luck to pull off incredible feats of gun-fu. And, fittingly, that’s exactly how John Wick Hex came to be.

Mike Bithell, creator of Thomas Was Alone and known action film buff, was leaving the cinema one weekend with his friend Ben Andac. “I’m pretending I don’t remember the film – I absolutely remember the film, because we were having a conversation about how much it sucked compared to John Wick,” Bithell laughs. While they were on the subject, Andac asked Bithell what his version of a John Wick game would look like. “I was like, ‘Well, the obvious thing would be to do a shooter or action game, but the problem with that is in order to capture the strategy and tactics of being John Wick, that’s not going to work. So actually I would probably make some kind of interesting strategy game that felt a bit action-y’. I thought I was in a conversation with my friend,” Bithell laughs again. “I was interviewing!”