Rampage director Brad Peyton has told RTÉ Entertainment that there are just enough Easter eggs in his new action adventure to make sure "fans of the game would get what they wanted".
Speaking to RTÉ Entertainment, the 39-year-old filmmaker, who is teaming up with Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson for a third time after working together on San Andreas and Journey 2: The Mysterious Island, reveals there are plenty of tributes paid to the vintage arcade game in the movie.
"The girl in the red dress, to me, that was the ultimate Easter egg. Playing the game and smashing a building and seeing her, and then someone eating her - I knew that was the one I had to do.
"I didn’t want to do too many that it got overwhelmingly like ‘why are they doing this’ which it could have easily become.
"But there’s that one and one that’s in Brett [Jake Lacy] and Claire’s [Malin Åkerman] office, that if you’re a fan of the game you’ll notice.
"I think if you are a fan of the game, you’re going to get just enough to think this is cool and know that they got it and understand the game, and I did I played it as a kid," Peyton added.
Peyton said he made sure to play the original game over and over just to make sure he wasn't letting fans down.
"When I went back into prep I went and got the game for my Xbox. I have a serious addiction to my Xbox. I literally have one that travels with me.
"I just had to make sure that I wasn’t overlooking anything and fans of the game would get what they wanted."
Peyton, a self-confessed gamer, says it wasn't too challenging constructing a narrative around the 1980s video game
"Luckily, the video game is not so complex because in a video game you are usually playing those characters. I’m a big gamer so like when I play Mad Max for example, I’m Mad Max, which is awesome."
"With Rampage, there wasn’t so much of that mythology, so there was a lot of room to be creative."
"I was like ‘let’s do the three creatures, let’s do destruction, let’s do the girl in the red dress, let’s do enough of the game that you get that vibe and you have fun. But ultimately, there was so much creative freedom, that’s what got me really inspired.
"Also, the opportunity to work with Dwyane [Johnson] again and then the biggest thing was probably the relationship between Dwayne and George."
Read our review of Rampage and check out more of our interviews with the cast here
