Shay, the spaceship boy, feels himself too mature for such things as his daily routine under his parents’ supervision, and ends up collaborating with the devil in wolf’s clothing, Marek, in order to spice up his life. Religion is depicted herein as a ridiculous lie that must be exposed and eliminated. It’s no surprise then that Broken Age emerged from this environment with such anti-Christian themes at its core (incidentally so did another Kickstarter darling, Pillars of Eternity). Who are you to say what kind of games get made and which don’t? We’ll go to Kickstarter, where we’ll prove you wrong and bring your kingdom toppling down. Oh, you publishers won’t help fund our adventure game? Well away with you then! We don’t need you anyway. There were many factors behind its success, chief among them being the “screw you” factor, i.e. And sure enough, it worked! The game was funded amid much rejoicing. Tired of hearing the perpetual “No” both in their meetings with publishers and in their heads, Double Fine took to Kickstarter to convince their fans to join them in their revolution against the traditional publishing model and popular taste. Of course, even if they could find a publisher that would allow such a film, none would fund this backwards slide into the past, because why would they? It’d be a waste of everyone’s time and money.īut what about all those people on the Internet who still remembered Day of the Tentacle or Grim Fandango? That’s where Kickstarter comes in. They simply wanted to film themselves making an old-fashioned adventure game. Given that kind of success, why would they risk it all for a project like the Double Fine Adventure? They’d never made a game like that before at the studio, and when it was pitched on Kickstarter, it wasn’t even clear what the game was going to be. It’s not like there was any burning desire to bring a specific vision to life, unlike with the studio’s first game, Psychonauts. Both of which Double Fine should be proud of since, in many respects, they accomplished what Schafer’s earlier games at LucasArts did - they left us with fond memories of worlds we may like to revisit some day. They were busy creating, despite whatever shortcomings they might have had, the utterly charming Psychonauts and Brütal Legend. Before Broken Age, Double Fine had been very busy. But until then, mediocrity is all we’ll find, with games so mediocre, that even adventure game developers themselves can’t be bothered to play them, as this quote from Cobbett suggests, “In interviews, I can also count on about one finger the number of adventure developers who can name a recent adventure they’ve enjoyed or even played, with the usual response being an awkward “Oh, well, uh, I’ve been very busy…” The door is wide open, and has been for some time, for any studio who’d dare to risk it all for a truly modern adventure game. Interestingly enough, this makes for an awesome opportunity today. It all comes down to a misguided and uncritical emulation which preserves the skeleton from past games, but leaves behind the heart and soul. Cobbett, an expert on the adventure game genre, elaborates further in the article from which the above quote is taken on why Kickstarter has consistently failed to produce high quality adventure games despite its success with other genres. The verbs were tools to facilitate our interactions, exciting primarily because nothing else came close.Īll of this quickly becomes a big problem for any adventure rooted in nostalgia. The big draw of wasn’t and never was the puzzles, but their ability to draw us into another world that actually worked like one – be it a fantasy world, a living story, a futuristic dystopia or whatever else.
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