KK2000 musically, has a hip-hop tone. Why was that decision made? And tell us about the rap artists involved with the project.

EA has some great contacts in the music industry, and Hollywood records provided a lot of music for us, including the original "In the Game" song by new artist "O". The song, and video, are in Knockout Kings 2000, and I'm happy to say the song is in the top ten on the rap charts. Randy Eckhardt, who works in the production group, also got us some other licensed and original music for the game. Randy even managed to get us an original tune "Knockout" by Mix Master Mike. As for direction, we all agreed that rap was a good direction as it felt was a good fit and the response has been good so far. A funny story about "O"; He came to one of our company meeting last week and I told him I'd heard his song so many times I had it memorized. He said "OK, hit me with it." So, I started rapping, and I use the term loosely, but he thought it was great and he started rapping along with me! It was pretty funny. Good thing no one got that on videotape!

Boxing is notorious for having some of the biggest egos in professional sports. Were there any particular boxers who were overly concerned about their digital representation and wanted hands-on-control? Did any one of the licensed boxers make any strange requests?

The boxers were actually a pleasure to work with. Most of them were really pumped to be in the game and be associated with EA SPORTS. For example, Shane Mosely wears the EA logo on his trunks during fights and Lennox Lewis showed up on the Tonight Show wearing a Knockout Kings 2000 jacket, just because they like the game and wanted too! Oh, and we do need to get Ali's sign-off for how he looks in our game, but he hasn't had any complaints yet.

High profile names like Mike Tyson, Prince Nasim and George Foreman aren't in the game. Please explain why they couldn't be included.

We went to great lengths to sign the very best boxers of yesterday and today. Time, money, and other influences affected who we did and didn't sign. I am pretty proud of the line-up, though. In addition to last year's fighters, we added Joe Frazier; the best boxer of all-time Sugar Ray Robinson; Julio Caesar Chavez; and more.