How Respawn Made Mad Maggie, Apex Legends’ Kick-Ass Kiwi
Apex Legends: Defiance sees the popular shooter kick off Season 12, and heralds the arrival of a new Legend - Mad Maggie. A fast-talking, quick-to-hit warlord, with a distinctly Kiwi cadence, Maggie has been a labour of love for Respawn. The team sees Maggie as not just a gameplay opportunity, but a chance to bring an authentically realised Māori character into the game.
“It became apparent very early on that we had an opportunity and responsibility to make the character not Pākehā like me,” says Sam Gill, Narrative Lead on Apex Legends and New Zealander abroad. “Not some white European, we've covered that. To expose multiple cultures to the world at large, that's a really big deal for us. We've got a user base in excess of a hundred million, to have ‘Kia ora’ and ‘Kia kaha’ be heard around the world contextually, so people understand what these phrases mean, is a career highlight for me.”
To ensure they got it right, Respawn partnered with Maui Studios, a New Zealand-based creative and digital studio focused on Māori representation. As the team developed Maggie, Maui Studios was there every step of the way.
“They provided input and offered suggestions on all of Maggie’s dialogue, as well as held workshops with our animators to act out facial expressions and hand gestures and body movement styles that would fit Mad Maggie, and be recognisable to New Zealanders,” Gill says. Throughout development the team would hold weekly presentations, inviting Maui Studios to offer advice and feedback on the progress being made. According to Gill it was all done “to make her as excitingly and authentically Māori as possible.”
The fruitful relationship even led to the team at Maui Studios, led by Vincent Egan, creating a haka just for
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