Gaming studios have a history of borrowing from established cartoon properties that first jumped from the funny page to the comic book to the silver screen and then on to Saturday morning cartoons to create instantly branded video games. Since its earliest days, game developers have turned to established cartoon characters that already share a history with the consumer.

A Gundam hero envisions himself emerging victoriously in the gaming outlets of America. © Bandai America, Inc

"Superman for the Atari 2600 was probably the first branded cartoon character turned video adventure game," says Jayson Hill, manager of public relations for Hasbro Interactive. "By the time of the cartridge's 1978 release, Superman had been in comic strips, books and in various cartoon incarnations for many years."

The present day animation bastion, The Cartoon Network has looked far East from its Atlanta home to Japan, importing anime programming for its after school Toonami time slot.

"Toonami combines the word cartoon with the Japanese word Tsunami, meaning tidal wave," explains Sean Akins, Senior Writer/Producer for Cartoon Networks Production Development. "Three years ago we started showing anime not to get on or start any bandwagon, but looking at all the shows that are out there, these were the shows that I thought had the best stories, looked the best, were the most interesting."

For 1999, the network reported being in nearly 60 million households with its all-animation programming being the second highest-rated basic cable channel. And it is packed with anime shows like Thundercats, Ronin Warriors and Dragonball Z.

A Gundam warrior aims for explosive success! © Bandai America, Inc

A Japanese Hit
The latest anime hit for the network has been Gundam Wing, a television series based on the extremely large, multi-layered Gundam Universe that is more than twenty years old. In Japan the universe includes eight television series, eight feature films, four direct to video releases, a toy and model line and numerous video game releases. The Cartoon Network is broadcasting the show as pure to its original Japanese showings as it can.

"Working with these shows is an honor and dream come true and I feel Gundam Wing is the first time that anyone has been able to take an imported anime show and really do it right," says Akins. "You read stories about the different anime properties that, while huge hits in Japan don't perform as well in the U.S. The reason is they get cut to pieces and they make the plot lines goofy. They underestimate the audience, the kids, who are sophisticated enough to follow a story with multiple characters and in-depth plot lines."