This is the thread for LucasArts alumni/DoubleFine/Telltale games: Psychonauts, Costume Quest, Brutal Legend, Deathspank, Sam and Max, etc.

TellTale Games are the folks who put out Grim Fandango and were working on the Sam & Max sequel before LucasArts execs killed it at 90% completion. They're working on an adventure game for Jeff Smith's Bone, with is like $20 and downloadable straight from the company. Apparently, they plan to put out installments of the game in episodes, instead of the usual 3-5 year lag time between full sequels.

also, since Steve Purcell has full control over his Sam & Max trademarks again, word has it that he's working on a completely new Sam & Max episodic sequel with the Telltale folks....

That Bone game looks wack as hell and makes me fear the Sam & Max sequel. I know I should be all supportive of small companies etc but the graphics look like The 7th Guest and the voice acting (in the trailer at least) is awful. I'd rather play an old-school 2D Scumm-system-style thing--use the old technology and focus the energy and money on good writing and puzzles.

Psychonauts isn't available for another month - I have to return the Xbox on about a week :(

worst case scenario is that you can also order it from their website

maybe I haven't given it enough of a chance though. Too much talking.

how far did you get? and you did know that they deliberately designed it to be as much as an adventure game as the genre contraints of a platformer would allow, right?

word has it that Majesco has massive, massive problems with distribution, both in the U.S. and elsewhere...

this is the downside of going from publisher to publisher, i guess. Yeah, they got the game out, but in such a fucked up way...

Worst case scenario is that they don't release a PAL version. Also, see my note about not having an Xbox when it comes out.

I played the PC demo for a bit, I got the impression that a console version would rule :)

...Don't get me wrong--I love my sea monkeys. I raised them from when they were just a little sack of powder. I remember how proud I was when I first stirred them into this world! But our relationship is just going nowhere. They swim and swim, and they are beautiful and majestic in their own tiny little way. (Except for when they have that weird, turgid, black pouch on their... abdomen? Do they have abdomens? Anyway, I was going to go in there with an X-Acto knife and a crochet hook and see I can't extract one of the pouches for dissection--just in case it's delicious monkey caviar--but then I chickened out when I realized they're probably just constipated, or unable to fully scrape off the remains of some sort of conjoined twin.) They have many mysteries, but the only one left that I want to discover is how these beautiful, majestic creatures die, and how I can make it happen...

Talking to the folks at Telltale Games. Covers the Bone games(and negative reaction to), the new Sam & Max, etc.

http://www.telltalegames.com/comics/samnmax

"hundreds of secrets about DoubleFine's New Game" is all i can make out, along with the kitty whose as big as a mouse

also, the news post containing the image above mainly consists of Tim bitching about a nose pimple.

Maybe it's just a really huge monitor?

But I wonder if the reason it didn't click is the protagonist. I never found Raz (was that his name?) that interesting. I liked the drama with his dad, and the way the final boss ties to his own neuroses more than some made-up external threat. They wrote some slick stuff in the story. But the noble boy with a heart of gold thing didn't do it for me. He's too Luke Skywalker, and maybe a maverick would've worked better?

That said, they got many things right - Peter McDonnell's music when you're wandering around the camp really sticks with me, and the camp's great - I took the time to find all 16 things in the scavenger hunt, just because it was so much fun to explore the place.

It doesn't really get impressive until you get through the semi-disguised training mode.

The game really kicks in beginning with Lungfishopolis.

What game protagonist is interesting? Leon from Resident Evil 4 is one of the least interesting characters in the history of video gaming. Most video game protagonists are relatively empty tough-guy vessels. I think Raz compares pretty explicitly with Jak from the original Jak & Daxter, or perhaps Ratchet from R&C -- two relatively-annoying cartoon characters who recede into the background in favor of the more entertaining Clank, or Daxter, or every other character in Psychonauts, or...

To take another example, in Dreamfall, I liked April Ryan but hated the new character, whazzername. The game got better for me every time it switched over to April's perspective. But again, you had to spend a lot of time alone with them, listening to them talk about stuff.

Tim Schafer's Double Fine Studios (originator of the double-plus awesome Psychonauts) has joined up with Vivendi to publish a title. The property, as yet unnamed, will be published under the Sierra Entertainment label.

From the article: "Said an atypically straight Tim Schafer, president and CEO of Double Fine Productions, 'The Sierra team has been awesome to work with. Everyone we've met brings experience from a small developer background, so they know where we're coming from and what we have to do to make a great game. Combine a developer-friendly attitude, support for innovation, major-publisher status with a worldwide scope and you have a perfect match for Double Fine.'"

http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=10802

now distro'd by Steam, and marked down for $10 for PC/PS2

I hate using the joystick for steering but I'll admit that's a personal choice. It does piss me off that every time I come out of saving I fuck up and go into my satchel! That habit will fade I hope.

I have completed the first training missions and was nearly finished the sharpshooter when, wouldn't you know it, I was killed at the very last minute! After that I thought "Well why not buy that arrowhead divining thingy and spend a few minutes doing that." Two hours people, two hours following vibrations and a piercing tone. That is how much I was enjoying the look and feel of this game!

I don't much enjoy the aiming and the floaty bear things freak me out (I was seriously knackered though which prob didn't help). The script is okay, was dead happy to hear Invader Zim again though (Richard Steven Horvitz) even without his wee robot buddy. I like the way that there is movement among the other characters and that they react differently at different points in the game. Tonight I have to go out (damn you social life) but I'll try to get some more in soon.

man, what a great game. it was one of those where i really had to go do something else (like sleep) but i just had to see what the next level looked like and once i got there, god DAMN it if i didn't have to play through it. wash rinse repeat.

aw shit, missed this

Tho the theatre / Napoleon levels are bumming me out slightly. Fuck a jumping puzzle. ESPECIALLY fuck a "must run max speed and jump at JUST THE RIGHT TIME else you fall to ground and must start over" puzzle.

http://www.telltalegames.com/samandmax

This drove me insane. It gets harder from there, but that one "jump from the tree to the roof and to the other roof" part of Napoleon really was the single most frustrating part of the game.

They should make games like that easier, for those of us who want to "appreciate" them.

Poor hand-eye coordination dur

Yeah, the circus tent was insane. But part of it was psychological. My first time to the top, I was so worried about screwing up that I kept freezing. Once I got to the top, I actually fell all the way back down again - and boy, THAT felt good - but on the way back up, it went by much more quickly. You've gotta relax. Be the ball.

SPOILER!!!

Does anyone have a hint for where I'm meant to go to when I reach the top of the asylum? There are two locked doors and stuff...

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v12/OniLink9000/003er0.jpg

about fuckin' time

http://www.doublefine.com/news.php/projects

hmmmmmmm

what could it mean? repromotion? a port to wii?

Double Fine President, CEO and Creative Freak Tim Schafer tells 1UP this is all a big misunderstanding. "It's crazy, isn't it? We just put that in there as a placeholder for the Psychonauts page we're eventually going to have. But we made it dark and people freaked out," he told us. "While I'm sorry people got their hopes up, I'm happy that people got excited about it. Who knows? Maybe some clever publisher will see how much excitement that dark little banner generated, and send us a few million dollars to make a new Psychonauts game! :)"

Whatever the next thing they have, they really need to work out a promo deal with Hot Topic. I mean, shit, if they had a stand-up of the chick w/ her fingerless gloves, you'd get a shitloada business.

http://bonusweb.idnes.cz/obrazek/psychonauts_lili.jpg

in other news:

A psychonaut (from the Greek ψυχοναύτης, meaning literally a sailor of the soul)

Dark Forces was my first FPS game

I got that Game Informer! Game looks fun, tho like any newest-gen game I know I will not be playing it for 5+ years.

http://www.playboy.com/magazine/features/video-game-blowout/video-game-blowout7.html

nice interview with Tim. Also in this series is an interview with the Gods of War guy, for those of you who favor the more bro-centric games, where the dude openly talks about their aim to design games with all flash, and just enough substance.

new Sam & Max game is out on Gametap now. It has some nice new features: Sam can RUN now by doubleclicking (outside only), you can steer the DeSoto with the arrow keys, adjustable hint levels, and it supports any resolution your monitor does.

Well, at least, I don't remember these features.

I can't find Maniac Mansion for OS 9> anywhere. *le sigh*

for download

Can you find Day of the Tentacle? It had MM built in.

Reading those Schafer and Jaffe interviews back to back was a trip.

From a neogaf thread I see there's an adventure game called A Vampyre Story made by some ex-Lucasarts employees I've never heard of.

Some of the other games look fantastic, many clearly inspired by Curse of Monkey Island (perhaps the game with my favorite graphics ever):

http://www.adrianwerner.x.pl/2008/Skull_Rock_1.jpg
http://www.adventuretipps.de/news/soblonde_05.jpg
http://img.hrej.cz/5a/c31be09259ed608690d9df8366133d.jpeg

The new Sam & Max game is also up on Gametap. I haven't played much of it but it looks like it's a parody of/tribute to a certain well-received 2007 game... :)

mister pokey looooooooope

I put ScummVM on my DS but I've never played any of these games and am not really sure where to start. Any tips?

Day of the Tentacle, all of the Monkey Island series(tho the last one is a bit of a drop off), Fate of Atlantis, Grim Fandango, Full Throttle, Sam & Max, etc

Seriously, all the Lucasarts/Lucasfilm Games adventure output from Monkey Island I up thru Grim Fandango is great. I've never tried it on a DS so i don't know how well it will work out.

I put Day of the Tentacle and Beneath a Steel Sky on there and they both run really well. The touch-screen is a really good fit for point and click too. Impressive.

Trying to figure out if I can run Grim Fandango on it. I doubt it.

Grim Fandango isn't SCUMM.

http://www.crockford.com/wrrrld/maniac.html

http://www.joystiq.com/2008/03/07/return-to-quest-quiz-tim-schafer/

Anyone been playing those Sam & Max titles? I really want to get into them, but I want to play the DOS one first, but I don't know where to get it! :(

http://www.vetusware.com/download/Sam%20&%20Max%20Hit%20the%20Road/?id=161

okay. lungfish. i have followed him underwater in the bathysphere. i did the thing where he chases me and i have to run in the air bubble, twice. i did the thing where i whack the boxes of pins and nails so they fly at him like missiles, twice. now he's in the airbubble with me, whacking me with a fiery talon, and i don't know what to do. shotting him does nae good. thumping him doesn't seem to do it. i have yet to try pyrotechnicising him or anything. i am a bit stumped; HELPS.

i don't remember this but a walkthough says to use the clams

Yeah, you have to hit the clams so they open up and get them to snap down on the lungfish's dangly lure thingy (iirc, it's been a while).

haha! that makes sense! thanks...

this game is AWESOME, btw. am so enchanted by the figments, the mental baggage, etc...

you're gonna like the "milkman" :)

and I LOVE the section you're doing right now after the lungfish chase

Yeah, the game didn't really grab me until after I beat the Lungfish, and then I was like "oh, this is the best".

lungfishopolis is just so so so much fun.

oh man just reading and remembering all this stuff makes me think i should go dig out my original copy of this and play through it again

i'm sort of bummed that i got it on xbla, because i totally want to lend it to my younger brother once i'm done...

i think i might reget this on xbla

So much news!

Monkey Island XBLA!
New Monkey Island from TellTale!
aaaaaand:

"The lawsuit claims Activision paid Double Fine about $15 million to develop "Brutal Legend," but the studio missed a key deadline last year. The suit claims Double Fine then said it would need another nine months and $7 million to complete the game.

"Hey, if Activision liked it, then they should have put a ring on it," Double Fine President Tim Schafer said. "Oh great, now Beyonce is going to sue me too."

Monkey Island remake = why not, I gess?

New Telltale Monkey Island looks surprisingly bad from the trailer, like as ugly as the last Monkey Island in 3D, but somehow worse.

The Activision lawsuit is totally ridiculous, they dropped the ball by ditching the game to begin with. Obviously this is BS, because if they really had it locked up legally, Double Fine never would have been able to shop it to EA after Activation bailed.

Activision - helping law firms get through these tough economic times.

isn't this like the whole brouhaha that surrounded the watchmen movie?

which should i play first?

psychonauts?

or beyond good and evil?

love both these games so much.
psychonauts is more platformy and has optional collectathons like a rare n64 game.
bg&e switches up its gameplay a lot, one section might be a stealth game, the next you're playing a time trial racing game etc etc.
if you're buying from steam be warned that both of these have some issues running.

i've got the PS2 versions

Psychonauts all the way. You may not be impressed with the gameplay at first (though the writing is aces from the opning cutscene on) but once you reach the asylum it gets really great, really fast.

I'd actually do BG&E first. They're both good, but I found BG&E's gameplay (especially the photo snapping) to be generally more fun than Psychonaut's mediocre platforming, though the latter has superior writing (to almost all games), so it's better to follow up with that one. Also the end of Psychonauts is so annoying (jumping-wise) it might kill your desire to play another game of the same type so quickly.

surprised the new monkey island game hasn't been mentioned on here http://www.telltalegames.com/monkeyisland
has anyone played it yet? i'm looking forward to it but half expecting to be disappointed. it has had some decent reviews, mind

(brief mention on ILE)

I kinda want to? Afraid it's going to be a disappointment.

I'm really looking forward. Will probably play it early next week.

Trailer was pretty underwhelming. Also, it basically looked to be the same graphical level as Escape from a decade ago! I'm not expecting ultra-realism from an indie developer, but damn...

But it's Monkey Island!

Okay, is anybody playing Lucidity? Should I get it?
And how about Sam and Max for XBLA?

well the demo sure made me want nothing to do with it

re: lucidity btw

I wonder if Brutal Legend will ever come out on PC.

Telltale announced they're making adventures based on Jurassic Park and Back To The Future.

MARTY?! That sounds great. I really should pick up some of Telltale's games, but the response to them seems to be generally kind of lukewarm. Not sure if this is because they're mediocre or because nobody really cares about the adventure game genre anymore, though.

bttf one sounds interesting, i would try that one

reeeeeeally interested in costume quest; a little scared of being disappointed but...
http://www.costumequestgame.com/

Got it and played it for about two hours... loads of fun! Total RPG for dummies and total fun! The decision to use text and no voices is SO WELCOME. These lines can be funny but not when they're spoken. Really recommended.

is this on XBLA yet?

today; PS3 was yesterday.
I just beat the second (of i think four?) levels; this game is a total hoot.
it's only occasionally lightly challenging but it has all the fun of a solid old NES rpg; totally on rails but you feel like you're in control of the progress. tons of great writing and very very little repeat text. Cool animations, fun qte combat, amazing character design, awesome music... basically if Brutal Legend had played like this it woulda been a GOTY contender. Going back to basics is a good look for them. I haven't even beat this yet and i'm already looking forward to the DLC.
YAY!

ABBOTT: Get this. It is made for you.

fun qte combat

This is both an oxymoron and a game killer for me. QTEs are the worst "innovation" in gaming ever.

Oh man, forks, you had me sold even before you put my name in all caps like that. Maybe if I'm lucky Santa will bring me a PS3. I didn't even get a PS2 until 2007.

it's minor, it's minor.
basically you boost your attack if you hit x when it asks you to, that sort of thing. really, it just holds your attention through what would otherwise be YOU HIT SLIME FOR 2 POINTS DAMAGE

xp

Okay. As long as it isn't a requirement to advance past something I'm cool.

you collect creepy candy cards! bobbing for apple minigames!
when i fought one of the monsters, before he attacked he cried out "You remind me of my parents... from whom I am horribly ESTRANGED!"

storyline is simple: monsters are stealing all the candy on halloween and they've also kidnapped your sister/brother (whichever one you choose not to play). now you've got to get him/her back and save the candy and the holiday.

the basic play mechanic to clear a board is that you have to trick or treat at all the individual level's houses/stores (sample store names: "Why Not Flip Flops?" "Rocks: For Her", a video game joint run by a pirate called "The Arrrrrr-cade"). Each time you trickortreat it's 50/50 that you get an adult who gives you candy (gp + xp) or a monster who you have to fight. In the meantime there's minigames and collect-em-all's and hunt for secrets and text storyline fun to be had.

You find costume design sheets and then have to find the three pieces that make up the costume on the board. then you can equip the costume on you and party members and each costume has unique attack and exploration properties: knight costume has an exploratory shield quality and a combat defense, the statue of liberty heals in combat, the ninja suit cloaks both in exploring and in combat. it's quite clever.

I wish I had more game-playing time atm, because this sounds amazing and I can't wait to play it. But it'll have to wait until after New Vegas.

btw, i love this story from Tim Schafer about how he got his first job at LucasArts:

I called David Fox right away and scribbled all the notes you see while I was talking to him. I told him how much I wanted to work at Lucasfilm, not because of Star Wars, but because I loved, “Ball Blaster.”
“Ball Blaster, eh?” he said.
“Yeah! I love Ball Blaster!” I said. It was true. I had broken a joystick playing that game on my Atari 800.
“Well, the name of the game is Ball Blazer.” Mr. Fox said, curtly. “It was only called Ball Blaster in the pirated version.”
Gulp.
Totally busted. It was true—I had played the pirated version. There, I said it. Now, if you’ve ever pirated one of my games you don’t need to feel bad, because I did it to Lucasfilm Games when I was in high school. Of course, if you’ve pirated two or more of my games, that’s a different story.

also: http://www.lucasforums.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=195492

Okay, I just beat Costume Quest and knocked out 100% of the trophies; it's actually three worlds, not four. It's a very likely one-sitting game, so be aware that you're plunking down 15 bucks for a short, sweet adventure that's wonderfully done but is NOT going to keep you busy even through halloween.

Along with Limbo though, this is another case of quality making up for quantity. It's totally worth fifteen bucks.

at best, you're looking at about five to six hours, max.

http://www.girlgamer.com/zine/article/1015/

don't mind me i'm gonna keep talking to myself until someone else plays this game, BUT:
in retrospect, it seems pretty obvious that there was a fourth level that got cut on this game. at the end of the 2nd level, you've amassed about half of the badges, costumes and bonuses. Then, near the end of the third level, you get a pile of superfluous badges, three costumes RIGHT at the end of the game and one additional costume following a lengthy maze board that you use ONCE and then never again. the final boss is well positioned to escape after a fight and instead she sorta huddles over and waits for a follow up fight. I think they cut the final level for whatever reason. It's a shame and it throws off the balance for the last half hour or so, but it's not a game breaker. Just wish I could've played that final level.

I played the demo. Very cute. Don't know if I want to drop 15 bones on it right now tho.

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2010-10-21-costume-quest-review
^pretty much dead on

Loving this!

me too. its a *LITTLE bit repetitive, but so amiable and fun i don't care. although i do sometimes wish that the speech bubbles were larger/stayed onscreen longer. and given how great the voice actors were on psychonauts, i kind of wish there were voice actors on this too. but otherwise, its a blast...

via joystiq

Double Fine's earnest candy collection adventure, Costume Quest, is set to receive a new downloadable add-on in December for Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. "Grubbins on Ice" sees the rascals entering Repugia, the snow-dusted realm of the Grubbins. Though the turn-based combat remains the same, Grubbins on Ice will introduce new costumes and patterns, along with several enhancements for the original game.

An accompanying patch will address Costume Quest's save system (you'll now be able to save at phone posts within the neighborhood) and allow you to pause during cutscenes. Grubbins on Ice will also adjust the speed of the dialogue textsoyoucanfinishreadi-

I liked the text speed, I spend most games wishing it was quicker!

Stacking coming out Feb 8 and FREE for Playstation Plus users, which is me!

damn, this looks awesome
http://blog.us.playstation.com/2011/02/03/coming-to-playstation-plus-free-day-one-download-of-stacking-and-exclusive-demos-for-killzone-3-and-yakuza-4/

Double Fine has a podcast now, which is Tim hanging out with a couple staffers in a conference room. Only two eps so far, but pretty good.

Stacking looks great; only barely got to play last night. Love the silent movie Dickensian conceit

Wait, what? Stacking is already out?

Last night!

I know what I'm doing during my winter break now!

whoa wait is stacking a ps3 exclusive?

*shakes fists at skies, rends garments*

wait, what? i thought it was on 360 too???

dont panic, i was actually just asking

the internet says its on both, i just didnt see it on xbox arcade or whatever when i checked

*lowers hands, hems tshirt*

although to be honest this is kinda my last straw with them, i am sure it will look good and be funny, but i am wondering if they have rediscovered the ability to make games actually also fun and playable - brutal legend left a lot to answer for

This game is very ugly-looking.

costume quest was pretty fun + playable!

I thought it was gorgeous personally. But it hits a sweet spot.
xp Jjjusten: you didn't like costume quest?

I thought it was gorgeous personally. But it hits a sweet spot.

Stacking?

I think my main problem is how they do lighting, honestly. Everything is lit so poorly.

Costume Quest being the notable exception.

i never played costume quest because i heard it was about 20 minutes long

yeah, i thought stacking was gorgeous. i only played for like ten minutes last night but i love the bizarre dynamic and the silent movie feel. You start out in a dingy train station so of course it's gonna be dim; presuming it'll open up.

i never played costume quest because i heard it was about 20 minutes long

It's plenty long for an arcade title.

more like six, seven hours

Found the Stacking demo pretty boring, though delightfully weird.

ha yeah i played the demo, and thought it was cute but might get really old - but hey, burps and farts for the kids!

also it was like endless cutscene central, and as charming as the cutscenes were, i was def doing more watching than playing.

DoubleFine is the most overrated developer working today imo, but I always end up with their stuff anyway since my share group <3s them

in b4 sb

Decided to go back and finally finish Costume Quest before playing Stacking, discovered that the update introduced a bug meaning that anyone who had a save file before the third world at the time can no longer finish the game. YAY. Particularly annoying as even though it's short the barebones combat would make playing it over again really tiresome.

They talked about that in the podcast. Apparently, it's a question of money, and the rigamarole of testing/publishing/promoting of a patch which only took 5 mins to re-code.

how have game developers still not learnt that long unskippable cut scenes in the beginning of their games are poison?

and the control is TERRIBLE

to their credit tho, it has some really compelling stuff in it

This is not the schnitzel museum!

i have to admit that after the initial rush i wasn't able to get into Stacking, though the online reviews suggest it opens up at level 2

stacking demo gave me motion sickness.

http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/6295/capturing_the_spirit_of_sesame_.php

how have game developers still not learnt that long unskippable cut scenes in the beginning of their games are poison?

― Mordy, Monday, February 14, 2011 5:32 PM (1 week ago)

THIS THIS THIS

i had to quit the demo of stacking halfway through and everytime i think about going back to it i think ah fuck do i really want to see the dad coal mining intro again and the answer is always no

the cut scenes are skippable, just jam on all the buttons

just hit the french fry costume bug in costume quest. and so now... the game is broken?

don't think i'll be buying any further doublefine games, tbh. this is bullshit.

What bug is that? I was quite enjoying costume quest (though I wish there was more to the combat; it's _this_ close to my beloved Super Mario RPG, only less so) and now you've got me nervous.

Any thoughts on the newly announced "manly, manly, manly" game Trenched? WW2 build-your-own mech/Trench Defense weirdness? The trailer makes it look quite enticing, but it's xbox exclusive, which sucks.

If you have a save game you started before doing the update and haven't got to the third world yet, you will get stuck almost as soon as you get to it.

I wonder if that could be avoided by deleting the update and not logging on to xblive? Sucks to have to use a workaround but it's better than losing your progress.

yeah, that's what i read on some website somewhere. maybe i'll give it a go later, but right now, i can't be arsed, and i can't believe they aren't going to fix the bug they just introduced into the game.

STACKING

so great, what a bunch of crybabies on this thread

agreed on the opening cutscene though, it is just astounding that designers capable of crafting such a beautiful game with hints placed at exactly the right points can't see how preferable it would be to have a 5-second cut scene and then plonk you into the action

After the success of Costume Quest, Doublefine aims for the toddler market:

http://www.ign.com/videos/2011/10/10/sesame-street-once-upon-a-monster-video-preview

CQ now on Steam

I think Schafer & co. should just write jokes for other, better games at this point

tough but fair

@notch Markus Persson
@TimOfLegend Let's make Psychonauts 2 happen.

http://i301.photobucket.com/albums/nn51/Gunmonkey36/notchquote-2.png

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2012-02-07-doublefine-tim-and-markus-are-talking-about-psychonauts-2

Cracked open Brutal Legend this weekend. Man, it's sad, because you can see them trying so hard with the game, trying to fit together these different gameplay ideas - really wonderfully going all the way with the metal theme - but it takes all the bad bits of Psychonauts and does an even worse job. I'm basically forcing myself through the game to get to the dialogue and cutscenes, which are really funny, but man, I feel like I'm back in the mid-'90s. I mean, who makes an open world game without a compass or onscreen map? Why did this need to be open world at all? Or RTS??

brutal legend sucked unfortunately.
stacked was not fun.
I missed trenched
but goddamn i will buy psychonauts 2 DAY ONE if that comes out. top ten game for me.

unless it's called PSYCHO 2: MEAT CIRCUS

especially if it's called PSYCHO 2: MEAT CIRCUS

brutal legend rts aspects were its doom for sure

I really enjoyed the shit out of trenched. exactly what you'd want from an xbl arcade game..

yeah, i should likely give it a shot. is it on steam?

I assume so.. they also renamed it iron brigade I think.

Only Doublefine games on Steam are Psychonauts and Costume Quest, I think. Everything else is Xbox/ps3.

Iron Brigade/Trenched was rumored to go to Steam a few months ago, but it hasn't appeared yet

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/66710809/double-fine-adventure

This is something: Tim & Ron Gilbert want to make a new point & click adventure game, but since no publisher will fund it, they went to Kickstarter to raise the 400 large they're going to need.

They've already made more than half the required funding in less than 48 hours.

Basic game/contrib is $15, which gets you the final product, access to the public beta, etc.

They even made a little video pitch for you:

http://kck.st/A9k3jH

They are over one million. Their goal was 400k.

some way of the future shit there

Cave, Touhou & Treasure should fund their shooters this way, crazy fanbases would raise crazy money
but they don't even know Steam exists (;.;)

http://p.twimg.com/AlQErziCIAIw6zN.jpg

Tim Schafer @TimOfLegend
Someone at Double Fine tweet me a picture of you guys celebrating!

aw

did they hijack savewalterwhite.com so something

or something?

http://www.doublefine.com/news/comments/stacking_coming_to_pc/

Awesome. Stacking is coming to Steam this spring.

$1.63M now, 30 days to go.

jesus, they're gonna make three million on this aren't they
if they had known, there's no way they would've blown it on a small project.

They won't make three million, but they might break two.

Maybe it will make it easier for them to do a Psychonauts sequel? Or does every cent have to go into the adventure project?

I'm planning on kicking in the $15 before the deadline's up. Aside from the fact that I looooooove Monkey Island, I think the reason why I'm a) gonna give them my money, and b) am incredibly happy for them, is that their pitch was very very good: it explained clearly what they would do with the money, why they chose kickstarter, what the products you would get were. As opposed to that music magazine kickstarter, where the whole pitch was meaningless dribble.

These guys aren't even promising a mac version (which is what I use) yet they've convinced me to pay in. They bloody better do one now they've got all this cocking money, though.

just ~makes you think~ what other ideas companies could get finance for that they're otherwise sitting on due to lack of funding

Notch's Psychonauts 2 news is apparently unrelated to this, and he now considers his idea slightly ill-timed.

Also, they've explicitly said that extra funding will allow them to port the game over to mac & ios platforms. We'll see, I guess.

i've been meaning to get a kickstarter account to donate, guess i will before this goes down.

http://26.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lz5g9jalYh1qhbud5o1_500.jpg

lol, yeah

I've never heard of this ArkH Project thing - and maybe it's even interesting and worth paying attention to, but I don't think it's any surprise that a developer with a track record of excellent games that many people have greatly enjoyed would get funded before someone ppl have never heard of and have no history in the industry (afaik?).

lol no justice, no peace

maybe this is why they are having trouble raising money?
http://ardeb.tumblr.com/post/16890249680/okay-ive-been-wanting-to-make-this-post-for-a

I think it is completely amazing that they raised 5k.

"The goal is an action RPG, meaning that you have to be good at hitting buttons at the right times to kill monsters."
new board description imo

Hey wait a min, I run this thing and I can't even change the description. Oh well.

I don't think it's any surprise that a developer with a track record of excellent games that many people have greatly enjoyed would get funded before someone ppl have never heard of and have no history in the industry (afaik?).

Yeah, that's the thing. What, dude is butthurt b/c some guys who have long had cult/popular followings hit upon a method for severely frustrated fans to both show appreciation and directly fund more projects that made them fans in the first place?

Has this dude put anything else out? Is it good? compelling? worth stealing? worth paying for?

And did it even represent people of all creeds, colors, and orientations equally?

I imagining the passive aggressive heroes of the Half-Life 3 Call for Communication (do we have a thread for that? couldn't find one) raising a million and sending it to Valve, and Valve neatly stacking it with their other millions.

I donated to kickstarter then realized I dont have a fucking pc. better raise some mo' money to get ports to iphone and/or mac.

They've raised 4x the base amount. Pretty likely that mac/ios ports is coming.

also:

And did it even represent people of all creeds, colors, and orientations equally?

hell, at this point, just as long as something good is out.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TFKwplDBmgg

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/66710809/double-fine-adventure/posts

19 hours left, within spittin' distance of $3Million

shoot! good reminder.

3.3 million

hey guys I'm two years late on this but <3 COSTUME QUEST <3

right?

I finished the main quest, got distracted and put the game down for the expansion.

still really bummed about the bug that essentially made my costume quest save game USELESS.

While we're talking Telltale adventure games, gf and I have been having fun playing the Back to The Future games. It's very easy, but has so much charm and quality coming from the voice acting that it's a real pleasure to play.

http://www.humblebundle.com/double-fine

Bundle of Amnesia Fortnight prototypes available for the next few hours

did we not talk about the walking dead on this thread because O_O

it is awesome. just finished up episode 2 - want to beat the whole thing before i discuss it further

it's a great game to space out, too, since each episode is a little longer than roughly movie-length

I wish I had spaced it out sort of... ended up beating all 5 eps this past weekend.

tbf, i think i would've gone mad if i had to wait 2-3 whole months between episodes as opposed to a week. but that's a testament to how strongly they pulled off the episodic nature of it

I was thinking the same thing as I steamrolled through them. The "Previously on the Walking Dead" wrapups between games are a nice touch though.

I was getting kind of bored with Ep2 but just hit the big reveal (unscrewing latch), pretty sure I guessed the situation correctly now.

Ep2 had the most roadblocks for me. Everything after that was pretty smooth sailing and I gotta say, I think 3-5 are really the best eps.

downloaded middle manager of justice last night and its kind of boring.. anyone dabbled?

It's okay for a while

that's about where I'm at.

i found it pretty boring too

Oh, damn.
SPOILERS

Carley getting capped in Ep3 is brutal. I guess you can save her, but apparently the one you save dies anyway later on?

ILG would do well to have a spoilers tag that makes the text almost the same color as the bg

i mean i already saw that but yeah it is hard not to read those things.

and re: oh damn, YEAH that was an OH DAMN moment for sure. completely didn't see it coming, so without pomp or "meaning", just horrible

you know what? new thread because ALL THIS GAME IS is spoilers

Yeah that's an especially shitty one because people had moved on from talking about TWD and were talking about middle manager of justice, which I didn't care about reading spoilers for...but no, you were spoiling a game I'm currently in the middle of playing.

yeah... damn. goddamnit. sigh.

if it makes you feel better:
http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2011/08/spoilers-dont-spoil-anything/

as spoilers go at least that wasn't a BRUTAL one.

btw if you don't want spoilers DONT GOOGLE ANYTHING, i read like 2 spoilers in autofill while trying to find names of fucking VOICE ACTORS

Just go to imdb for the voice actors. Every game nowadays lists on there.

i was on my phone & not thinknig -- just typed "walking dead telltale (character name)" hoping to type "voice actor" after and it autocorrected with "...(character name) (FATE)" GUHHH STUPID

the cave comes out next week

anybody wanna rep for the cave? looks maybe good?
http://www.gametrailers.com/reviews/3ntmd6/the-cave-review

reviews have been pretty tepid, unfortunately

i want the cave to be good, but i want to play a demo first. after the non-longevity of stacking i need some proof of concept

good review here: http://multiplayerblog.mtv.com/2013/01/24/the-cave-review/

i started playing this (with my gf) last night! really enjoyable so far, but i haven't gotten too deep, so to speak (just entered the cave proper after the introductory puzzle).

doing the time traveler + the twins + scientist.

this was charming and fun, if easy and short (the latter isn't a bad thing in my book though). fun enough to play through one more time with a different set of characters.

Enjoying Brutal Legend, but damn if it doesn't have a coupla bugs on Steam.

I guess Tim Schafer and Brad Muir are going on Giant Bomb's TNT tomorrow night.

http://www.giantbomb.com/chat/

On now

The Doublefine Kicktstarter game is finally revealed:

http://www.brokenagegame.com/

Disney closes LucasArts
http://www.gameinformer.com/b/news/archive/2013/04/03/disney-closes-game-publisher-lucasarts.aspx

oof
"The last game published by LucasArts as a company is the sub-par Kinect Star Wars"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x_xJqkzngBI

RIP totally me-formative games company that I haven't bought anything by in years

if that sounds glib then this sucks and also I read this news 5 minutes before I got to the Iain Banks thread, it's been a bad 5 minutes

RIP LucasArts, for real

yeah i know their best days were behind them but man those were the best days

it seems to me like this might be good news? they weren't doing anything w/ most of their adventure IPs, or making any great adventure games - so why not license some of that stuff out? maybe telltale will get to develop more properties? or do i misunderstand how this works?

That could be something good to come out of this, if Disney allows third-party licensing of their non-Star Wars properties. I think it's more symbolic, though. I don't think Sierra On-Line really got a proper burial, even as it continued to live on.

RIP best games ever but yeah the last amazing game was over 15 years ago.

curse of monkey island was so good that it may have killed the computer adventure game genre -- one reason warcraft adventures was canceled was because it didn't compare.

kind of interesting that Steve Purcell started at Lucasfilm Games and ended up at Pixar, and now they're both owned by Disney.

I like that Steve Purcell is still out there, still posting amusing drawings to his Facebook.

Also, Raven Software released the sourcecode to Jedi Outcast and Jedi Academy.

kind of interesting that Steve Purcell started at Lucasfilm Games and ended up at Pixar, and now they're both owned by Disney.

started at Fishwrap iirc, Moncuse popped up w/ new FP in Dark Horse Presents last month

Pay what you want DoubleFine humble bundle on now. So tempted to shell out the $35 and get the new adventure, but I'm far too skint. I might be really fuckin' cheap and pay a ha'penny for Costume Quest and Stacking instead. http://www.humblebundle.com/

Pay a buck just so you can get the Steam keys

http://multiplayerblog.mtv.com/2013/08/20/fables-preview/

high hopes for that one; i own the first ten books of Fables. Should translate well.

he's not as bad as Orson Scott Card but...

telltale announced a game of thrones adventure game. anyone played the fables one yet?

i have. it's pretty lackluster. all the human elements that drove walking dead are sapped with the fairytale stuff. maybe i'm just too familiar with the comic but the exposition is tiresome

i would kinda like to try it but... eh, fuck bill willingham

weirder announcement is definitely the Borderlands game

Note, Broken Age Act 1 keys are available if you kickstarted - should be in your email and redeemable via Humble Bundle store.

Isn't released until the 28th, though. Darnit!

I keep forgetting my steam password

Finally bothered to try Costume Quest in the spirit of the season; SO CHARM.

Need to try the sequel

i loved the first one... and that was the last double fine game i was into
in seeing this thread I remembered a dream i had a few nights ago where i was part of a military caravan going up a road surrounded by a vinery - some sort of mix of the vegetable garden hill climb from the film "Letter to Momo" and the storming of Normandy - and no one knew where we were going when it occurred to me that I had to explain to everyone we were going to DOUBLE FINE HEADQUARTERS
don't remember how that played out

heavy hints that GOG are going to announce LucasArts PC games in a couple of days time

whoo!

whoo x2
lol forks

As expected GOG are going to have LucasArts games - 30 of them apparently! 6 tomorrow, rest to come later.

the first six

Star Wars X-Wing Special Edition
Star Wars TIE Fighter Special Edition
Sam & Max Hit the Road
The Secret of Monkey Island Special Edition
Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis
Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic

hi dere my high school life

Much more excited than I expected to be about X Wing and Tie Fighter.

MAKE THOSE GAMES COME ON MY XBOX YE MIGHTY

Hopefully they DOSBox the '93/'94 versions for Mac - that had the better iMuse soundtrack anyway

tie fighter is prob in my top 3 all time

Gog lets you choose versions of XW and TF

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OW8W42FXze8

That has really got the feel of Psychonauts. The music definitely helps.

yeah, Peter McConnell always gonna have a place in my heart from the LucasArts days

Broken Age has finally been released. Remember that kickstarter? that seemed to have huge backer money, before Exploding Uno came along? The documentary is probably more notable than the game. It shows how Schafer never makes budget or time concessions, hoping that the game will be a perrennial seller that revolutionizes gaming business.

http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLIhLvue17Sd7F6pU2ByRRb0igiI-WKk3D

Didn't realize the Maniac Mansion thread was in ILM. I guess this is next most appropriate thread:

So the remastered Day Of The Tentacle is out for PC, PS4 and Vita now. Which is supposed to be great but which I've never played, so I'm mostly just excited about playing the embedded Maniac Mansion for the first time in ages.

― I am very inteligent and dicipline boy (Old Lunch), Friday, April 1, 2016 11:44 AM (2 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Haven't played the remaster but the original DOTT was basically my favourite adventure game, probably my favourite game. I replayed it again recentlyish and I admit the whole point+click adventure thing is a little more frustratingly hunt-the-pixel/trial-and-"I don't wanna" than I'm used to these days but it still stands up pretty well once you get over that, I think. Have fun!

(I may have said this about some other Lucasarts adventure in my ILXing time because Grim Fandango and Monkey Island are up there too)

Any other Thimbleweed Park backers on here?

― a passing spacecadet, Friday, April 1, 2016 1:39 PM (11 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

DOTT is a wonderful game.

I like to root for Psychonauts as a cult classic in the making, even though I didn't enjoy it quite as much as I wanted to. I also read so many people who say, "I know this is a classic, I'll play it someday" - and then they don't.
― save the robot (save the robot), Friday, 8 September 2006 17:21 (9 years ago)

Hmm, this is me! I loved Lucasarts, loved the sound of this game, kept saying I would play it - and I still haven't. I even got it cheap in some bundle a while ago and it still sits unplayed in my Steam queue.

Also, re DotT, still after all these years it will strike me from time to time that I am walking in a slightly Laverne-like manner, or making a Laverne-like face, and I'll crack up. <3 Laverne

...OK, Psychonauts downloaded, I'm going in!

i should play it too. i actually have it installed and i still haven't touched it. i'll try to remedy that.

In the same boat re: Psychonauts. We should all play together!

psychonauts advice: don't watch the intro movie right away. it's like half an hour long and not that good. play past the warzone area at least, then start a new game to watch the intro.

some of the early levels are kinda nbd, but the mid to late levels are so awesome

it's really a rare example where it really IS worth slogging through the mediocre 5-hour tutorial to get to the wackadoo stuff in the second half of the game

I'm having fun but I don't think I've ever had the 3d-jumping-puzzle skills required for this game

the design and characterisation is lovely tho and yes I missed the voice of Invader Zim too

This is such a wonderful game in its writing and art direction and level design (even with pretty mediocre platforming mechanics), but the meat circus has to be one of the most frustrating final levels I can think of.

they fixed that one annoying jump in computer versions.

Yeah, I played it with those pc revisions, but I still found that level pretty thoroughly irritating. I'm not that invested in 3d platformers, though, and was mostly posting through this for the writing and level design, so that probably informed my frustration.

*playing through this, I mean

still in Basic Braining. hating the rotating log tunnel. resorted to watching a youtube in case there was one crazy trick, guy playing just breezed on through like it ain't no thing :(

tbf I am mainly playing (at least this level) with just the arrow keys as I'm on a laptop and touchpadding is too slow, but I'm also p. uncoordinated at all two-handed games so it's prob not going to go much better even if I hook a mouse/controller up

psychonauts is 100% a pad game, definitely get one. besides the analog control you'll later use more buttons for the different powers you get

I still haven't beaten the goddamned Meat Circus :( On the PS2, it was That Jump; on subsequent playthroughs I either trailed off before getting that far (the asylum tower is pretty tiresome) or, latest attempt, got stuck on the horrible Little Oly/save-the-bunny section of the Meat Circus.

I never got past the save the bunny thing either. Still think it might be my favorite game.

about to get started on thimbleweed park!

please let us know what you think, very curious about this game

I'm about two hours in and really enjoying it. I'm not a big gamer anymore, and was a huge Lucasarts fan as a kid, so I'm probably not best placed to critique this. But so far it's a lot of fun. Certainly way more enjoyable than Broken Age.

i spent most of the weekend playing thru it, just finished. it was pretty good but not nearly as good as it could have been with more focused writing imo, it kind of just abandons the twin peaks/x-files premise after the first act and becomes pretty slapdash by the end.

Psychonauts is free today on Humble Store:

https://www.humblebundle.com/store/psychonauts

As mentioned elsewhere, Grim Fandango(my personal fave Lucasarts game) is free today at GOG:

Is that a...
❄️G❄️I❄️V❄️E❄️A❄️W❄️A❄️Y❄️?!

The legendary and ridiculously delightful GRIM FANDANGO is FREE
Still pretty much the best adventure game you'll play in 2017

Just hit "Get It Free" on the front page, you can keep it where your heart used to be... 💀 pic.twitter.com/3SxSmfagY7

— ❄️GOG.com❄️ (@GOGcom) December 13, 2017

Double Fine bought by Microsoft.

Glad they have stability that they probably need. A little sad that the indie dream has died

being bought or funded by one of the big pubs IS the indie dream in 2019

all too true