At this point in his career, it's difficult to tell whether Sony Santa Monica creative director David Jaffe is better known for his great games or his brash behavior. The Twisted Metal series of car combat games would have been sufficient to secure Jaffe a place in the console pantheon. But upon the 2005 release of God of War , the side of Jaffe that many only saw privately--fiery, profane and uncompromising--burst into public view and never retreated into the shadows. It was as if the dark odyssey he'd survived to make his magnum opus had transformed him into his own title character; a comparison Jaffe encouraged when he drew parallels between Kratos' raging at the Gods over the Ares-induced murder of his family to the anger Jaffe himself harbored for having embarked on an insanely long and difficult development process that was keeping him away from his wife and child.

The Jaffe of 2007 continues to be outspoken and inflammatory, but he's a workaholic no more. While game director Cory Barlog, executive producer Shannon Studstill and others handle day-to-day development for the God of War series, with Jaffe in an creative oversight role, he has chosen to focus his own game directing efforts on smaller games ("pop songs," as he described them to us last year ) rather than the big-budget epics ("operas") that he's previously been identified with. As he and his team of developers at Incognito were winding down work on Jaffe's first ditty, the party game Calling All Cars, he took some time out of his schedule to answer our Team Assault questions about the extent of his involvement in God of War PSP and God of War III for PS3; why he cancelled the sure-to-have-been controversial PSP game Heartland; and the ongoing tension between his own desires as an artist to spread his wings and those of his fans who want him to keep making large-scale action games.

After completing the first God of War, you assumed the role of creative director for the entire Santa Monica studio. What does that entail? Does that cover the studio's games for Playstation Network like Blast Factor and flOw?

It does not cover every game. That was the original plan, but it took so much energy that there was no time left for me to direct a game. And that did not sit well with me, so I worked things out with SCEA [Sony Computer Entertainment America] where I don't need to oversee every game that comes through the Santa Monica pipe. That said, I still work with all the producers and the head of the studio to give my thoughts on what games we greenlight, which games we pass on. But there are games that I am very involved with and games that I'm just kind of cheering on from the sidelines. flOw is a game that I gave feedback on from time to time (sometimes they took it, other times they ignored it) but it did not fit under my creative director umbrella.

You've freely discussed your love of the "Star Wars" and "Indiana Jones" trilogies. It could be said that your move from director's chair to the creative director's throne is akin to shift between the George Lucas of Episodes I-IV to the George Lucas of Episodes V-VI and the Indiana Jones series. Was it difficult entrusting your newborn franchise to Cory Barlog? Were you ever concerned that, despite the great reviews for the first God of War, reviewers and gamers might declare God of War II the better game, much as "Star Wars" fans have universally proclaimed "The Empire Strikes Back" as the best movie in the series?

When I was younger--and more unproven--that would have bothered me a lot. But since then, I've become a 'let the chips fall where they may' sort of person. The God of War analogy that works best for me is "Alien" to "Aliens," but if it turns out to be something else, I can live with that. With God of War, I did the best I could--I gave it my all. Since God of War, I've found that life is much more fun when you compete only with yourself and stop trying to make sure you don't lose the "designer of the moment" crown, you know? As for giving the directing duties over to Cory, it was easy because a) I knew he understood and loved the vision of the series 100 percent and b) I sure as hell didn't want to direct the thing so I was thrilled when I found someone more than capable for the job. Sad thing is, that guy didn't accept the offer, so I had to hand it over to Cory, but still it worked out ok, yes? Just kidding Cory! :)

What was your role on God of War II? How will you be involved in God of War PSP and God of War III for PS3?

With God of War II, I worked a lot with Cory on the story and level designs at the very start. For a while, it just wasn’t quite clicking. But eventually Cory found his groove and just took off like a rocket. Once the core creative for the game had been locked and it was clear Cory was able to fly the plane on his own, I only got involved when I played builds and had issues with the play, or when I saw certain aspects of the game world and/or story that did not fit with the overall vision.

Once the team reached Alpha--and probably a good few months before that--I was a rare figure on the team, only interfacing with Cory and the producer and even then, not that often. Once Cory established a heart of the game that I was happy with, I really stepped away and let Cory run with the ball. I think at the start, some folks were worried I would not be able to let it go and would be bugging folks every day, and sort of ghost directing the game. This did not even come close to happening, much to everyone's health and happiness :)

In an interview with Geoff Keighley, you discussed for the first time some details of your now-cancelled PSP game Heartland, a game in which China had invaded the United States, and players could choose between joining the military to resist their Chinese occupiers or fleeing to Canada. What was going on in the world when you conceived Heartland? When it comes to social and political themes, the vast majority of commercial game publishers and developers are either reluctant to tackle them or simply indifferent to such subject matter. How difficult was it to convince your bosses, up to and including SCE worldwide studios president Phil Harrison, to greenlight the game?

The game was very much a liberal person's response to the Bush administration and the war in Iraq. When I was entertaining lofty thoughts, the idea was to create an experience that would try to make the players--whom I mostly assumed would be of the Western world--feel what it must be like to have their own homeland occupied by another country. SCEA and I went back and forth over if we would ever say it was CHINA vs. AMERICA as they were a bit worried about being so literal, but that fight had not yet occurred when we pulled the plug.

As for Phil, his biggest issue was thinking a game so epic should be on PS3. But I was always pushing for PSP, saying that Heartland should do for the PSP what Halo did for the Xbox. But as you know, Phil's a total supporter of innovation and games as art and so he was more than willing to see if I had anything worthy to say, as well as the talents to say it through the medium.

You've given several reasons for walking away from your PSP game Heartland. Among them: too many members of your team at Incognito being reassigned to Warhawk; your fear that Heartland's anti-Bush themes were both too polemical and insufficiently original; your declining interest in "games as art" and story-based games coupled with your preference for "pop songs" (shorter games like your forthcoming Calling All Cars) over "operas" (epic games like God of War); and insufficient compensation from Sony to justify spending long nights at work, away from your wife and daughter, as you had done on God of War. Which of those was the main reason that you stopped work on Heartland? Could you not have reconceived Heartland as a smaller downloadable game or episodic game built on the Calling All Cars engine--more of a political cartoon than an Oliver Stone movie--in order to marry your thematic content with your newfound preference for shorter games?

If the team would have been the right size, we would still be in production with Heartland today. That was the main reason we killed it, not enough folks to make the game. Granted, I would be 40 pounds overweight again, sad, depressed, and maybe even divorced, as it would have consumed me just like God of War did. But that aside, the main issue that made it clear that we could not continue was that WarHawk kept taking our team members as they were further along in production and were the top priority.

Scott (who heads up Incognito) and I didn't want to wait 18 months to make our game so we came up with one that could be done by the team size we currently had. But, the thing is, if I had really been ready to leap back into the hell that is epic game making (my personal opinion,) I could have worked with SCEA to try and hire more folks or found a team that was of the proper size to make it. I can be a tenacious *** when I want to be :) But my heart was just not in it. These days I feel like down the line, I may be ready to tackle a game like that again. But right now, not so much.

In other art forms, particularly music, there's often a tension between the desires of the longtime fans of a particular artist and the artist himself or herself. The fans usually want that artist to continue doing exactly what they believe he or she has been doing all along, but the artist may want to keep growing and evolving, sometimes in radically different directions. Similarly, there's a vocal contingent of your fanbase that has expressed its concern over your abandonment of operas for pop songs. Do you feel straitjacketed by their desire to keep you turning out new variations of the same thing? Do you ever long for a following like that of Nintendo general manager Shigeru Miyamoto who--perhaps because he rose to prominence during a time when it wasn't strange for game creators to come up with wildly differing concepts--seem willing to follow him wherever he may lead them?

Not really; SCEA has given me tons of freedom over the years and I am so grateful for that. I have never felt like I was forced to do a game that I was not in love with. And I know and appreciate how rare that is in any creative work, and certainly in the game business! As for fans of the stuff we do, again, I'm letting the chips fall where they may. I really hope people love the new stuff we are doing; it's such a great feeling to make people happy through your work. That said, I can't cling to the desire to hang onto whatever fans or fame (whatever that means in the video game biz!) I've gained so far. Because then you are serving the wrong master, you know?

That stuff--and it's fun, nice stuff, don't get me wrong--came to me in the past because I worked with very talented teams to make games that I felt strongly about in my gut. I see no reason to get off that path because it’s served me so well. And plus, I would rather be happy than famous and have fans, you know? And right now, if the criteria for having fame and fans is that I gotta do games that don't make me happy, then it's not a trade off I'm willing to make.

In my Vs. Mode exchange with MTV News reporter Stephen Totilo, we both cited one section of the first God of War--the part where Kratos must protect his wife and son from an army of his own doppelgangers--as a brilliant merging of gameplay, narrative, theme and metaphor. Where did that idea originally come from, and how did that portion of the game evolve from concept to completion? Even though you as a game director have moved on to smaller games where story is not a focus, do you think that the aforementioned blend of elements--which I've begun to refer to as "gametelling"--should be more widely adopted in action-adventure videogames?

Loved that write up by the way--a great read. I hope to see more game journalism like that. I emailed Stephen and said you guys should do that for like 8-12 more games, then compile them with art and screenshots and put out a book. It would be required reading for college game classes, I'm sure!

As for that idea, I wanted the end boss to steer away from the epic bosses we had done earlier in the game and be more of a story boss. So the idea of it being Kratos fighting himself and it being a more touching moment was mine. I think Cory or Medhi Yussef (one of our senior animators and the lead animator on God of War II) came up with the hug idea itself. But yes, gametelling is huge in story based games....it makes the story and game mesh as one and I think it's key to making story based games feel like experiences.

I think Cory and the team took it to the next level with God of War II and you can expect to see more if it in the series as Cory and I are both passionate about it (we both feel Out of this World is one of the first and still best games to do it and that game does not get enough credit for being the pioneer that it is)....in many ways, it's why we hired Cory as director for God of War II, because he got the whole "gametelling" idea and wanted to take it even further.

You get to speak your mind publicly in interviews such as these, and you also have a blog where you can express yourself freely. Why then do you like to jump into message boards such as NeoGAF, where your strong opinions and liberal use of profanity makes you a target for the vitriol of a particular contingent of posters? Even though you perceive the views you share publicly--whether in interviews or on Internet forums--as no different from what you'd say to a friend, last year your own wife pointed out that your stature as a public figure makes it impossible for you to be taken as just one of the guys. Yet you continue to court and name check the very same NeoGAF-ers whom you can never completely win over in that fashion. Why?

Mainly I am stubborn I suppose :) Maybe I'm like Luke [Skywalker] and some of the--bleeps--on the net are my Darth Vaders, you know? I know there is good in them :) I can turn them back to the light!!!....ahem. But also, the thing is, I don't go trolling for fights. But when I see something that bugs me on a forum--be it wrong information or insults or what have you--if I have the time, I will jump into the fray. It's just my nature, I guess. I don't expect to ever win over the Jaffe haters. I wish they didn't hate me, truth be told. I like to consider myself a nice guy and hell, I can use all the friends I can get. But that doesn't mean I'm willing to keep quiet when someone is talking BS just so I appear more likable.

Do you already know what your next PSN game will be after Calling All Cars? What have you learned during the making of Calling All Cars--as your first PS3 game, your first smaller game, your first day-one networked game and your first downloadable game--that you plan to apply to your next title?

Yes. I learned tons on Calling All Cars. In some ways, it's my best game and my worst game at the same time. I love its spirit and it's heart, but I feel the gameplay is inconsistent. There are moments of sheer joy and then moments of boredom. Granted, this is a problem that plagues most party multiplayer games but it still bugs me that we did not solve it with Calling All Cars. The problem is, sometimes you play it and it's a balls to the wall, trash talking blast. And some times it is just meh.

It all depends on all these factors that, when you toss 4-players into the mix (oftentimes of different skill levels), you really have no clue how it's going to go. What pick up will come up when, where a criminal will spawn, etc. And all those little musical notes determine how the song will play. And sometimes you get a pop song by the Beatles and yes, sometimes you a get a clunker by Ms. Ashley Simposon :) And we have code in there that tries to make sure the most fun notes come up at the right time, but it's not perfect--it's a new skill I am learning.

So I'm working on that, and I'm working on the struggle that usually 8 months into production, I'm just figuring out the game and I have 15-24 more months to re-make the game once I figure out what the hell it is! With these small games, by the time you understand your game, the production is coming to a close. So Calling All Cars suffered from that as well in that some of the level designs were done before we really knew what the game was going to be. So next time, I'll design more with those 8-12 months in mind, versus bringing a bigger game mentality to the process and then getting burned in the end. All that said though, when Calling All Cars works, it's a blast and I am so proud of it and think folks who download it will have a great time.