The Kanohi Dragon has roared! Those watching the live 810NICLE Day presentation today will have seen the spectacular announcements in our “Roar of the Kanohi Dragon” segment. Another article will cover the latest Vision of the Great Beings news, but here we will explore the latest interviews with Peter Mack and Cathy Hapka!

As part of the M&L project I’ve the privilege to chat with some of BIONICLE’s most prominent storytellers. This year, on the twentieth anniversary of the BIONICLE Chronicles and MNOG II, I am thrilled to share two I conducted with Cathy Hapka and Peter Mack.

Cathy Hapka

Twenty years ago, in the summer of 2003, Mark of MaskOfDestiny did the first and only interview with her promoting the launch of the first books. Two decades later, MaskOfDestiny is excited to publish the second-ever interview with her. She’s an incredibly sweet lady, and such a joy to talk to. Although she had no new insights into BIONICLE per se, she revealed a great deal about her writing process and her experiences as a writer. Her answers are immensely fascinating to read!

Check out our interview with Cathy Hapka below!

Peter Mack

Nor is this the first interview with Peter Mack that Mask Of Destiny has done. In the BIONICLE 20th Anniversary Contributors Panel hosted in 8/10 2021, Peter was featured with a handful of other Templar and Saffire game developers, as well as other early contributors. The BIONICLE community inundated the hosts with questions for him, only a few of which were asked, with the rest kept to follow up with him later. Now, two years later we have our answers to them. And what answers we have!

After he sent this, I asked one immediate follow-up question, to which I received the below answer. (My name is also Peter.)

Peter also shared the two original MNOG II files that were deleted, rendering the game unplayable. Our own Biomedia Project and Mask of Destiny administrator JrModelMasterBuilder meticulously constructed replacements in the years afterward, but for the first time since the game’s launch, the missing files are finally restored… including all of Nokama’s dialogue!

Now… for those familiar with the cast of MNOG II, you will know that each village has a cast of roughly twelve Matoran–the exception being Ta-Koro which has Takua as the thirteenth.

The marked exception to this rule was Le-Koro, which only featured six Matoran. On top of these six, the names of five more were referenced by Kongu–Gukko pilots who were out on patrol and away from the village when Hahli visits. These five are Boreas, Taiki, Vira, Shu and Orkan. But what do these Matoran look like? And is there a phantom twelfth Le-Matoran, whose existence we only suspect?

Well, we had some suspicions about Vira, who inexplicably appeared in the Metru Nui CD-ROMs. Surely his appearance here meant he had a design in mind for MNOG II?

Thanks to Peter, we now know our suspicions were correct. For the first time in the twenty long years since the game released, we finally have the missing Le-Matoran! They are:

Boreas, Second Commander of the Gukko Force:

Vira, pilot:

Taiki, pilot:

Shu, pilot:

Orkan (aka Orkahm), pilot:

And the name and appearance of the heretofore theoretical Le-Matoran…

Afa, pilot:

Because he never appeared in MNOG II, we were worried that he might be doomed to be a noncanon trivia point like Nobua. But these fears were allayed when we realized he does appear in MNOG! His character can be considered canon after all!

Credit goes to community user Toaskello for mastering the Templar design codes and getting these character images. Toaskello was responsible for most of the standard character models in Templar media that are used on BS01, standardizing and replacing many of the older images. And now our MNOG II Matoran cast is complete.

Peter also touched on a number of other subjects, such as how:

• The spelling of “Ahkmou” was indeed “Akmuo” before it was changed
• Following the Kolhii Tournament, the villages and Kolhii fields would be replaced with “ravaged village squares and battlefields” where the mechanics of Kolhii would be adapted into fights with the Rahkshi. The crystals would aid her in her fight, and she would seek out the Matoran of each village and lead them to Kini-Nui.
• Missing files were preserved. We have full access to the original Nokama Dialogue which includes a number of major lore details. Who knew that Nokama gazed into “Sacred Waters” in the same way Vakama had his “Sacred Fire?”

As mentioned before, all of this information, including both full interviews, can be seen on the Mask Of Destiny site right now. Additionally, BiomediaProject has officially been updated to include the newly recovered versions of Nixie’s Library and Nokama’s Dialogue. The game has also been revised to fix a number of glitches and make progression more accessible, so be sure to check that out!

That’s not all, however! Also live on BiomediaProject are optional patches to Le-Wahi to feature all six missing Le-Matoran! Drop them in your copy of MNOG II and head to Le-Koro to check them out! We’ve asked Peter if he would be interested in writing dialogue for these characters–we’ll get back to you with his response…

Additionally, now that we know how Hahli’s adventure was supposed to play out, Myths and Legacy will soon release a Mask of Light companion adventure continuing her adventure in MNOG II as it was originally supposed to play out according to the details Peter Mack has disclosed. Stay tuned to our news feeds for more details on that story.

We can’t thank Cathy and Peter enough for their answers, and we couldn’t wait to share what we’d learned. Know that we are continuing to pick Peter Mack’s brain about his work, so stay tuned to MOD for a follow-up to our interview with him!

Stay tuned to our Twitter and our Discord for more updates!