[i]"Presto Studios has been developing games since 1991, but the company met its demise this week, with chief executive Michel Kripalani announcing that they are shutting down. By way of explanation, Kripalani said that the video game industry is changing. Presto used to fund its own products, but now games cost millions of dollars to make. Companies that can afford to produce them often hesitate to spend big money on untested ideas. The innovative ideas in which Presto specialize were therefore viewed as risky.
The announcement was made to the 21 staff working at Presto Studios late last month. Only days after that, the office was empty. Kripalani also stated that they handed out severance packages and began trying to line up work for everyone. Employees will also continue to get royalties from game sales as well. Presto Studios was known for their top-selling Myst III: Exile, which sold over 1 million copies in 12 months, and for their upcoming Xbox title Whacked!"
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I bought the second Journyman Project game(along with Under a Killing Moon), to try out my first CDROM drive. I remember putting the headphones on, turning out the lights and listening to the music as I explored Leonardo’s workshop among other places.
You know, I was thinking adventure games should go the fps route… meaning they should do it with like first person Q3 graphics. That way they might get the action fans to try em out.
I’ve been saying that for years. Someday, someone is going to realize that you can make a game with one of these engines that doesn’t revolve around shooting things. When you think about it, it’s odd that nobody has figured that out already–it sees pretty obvious.
You could argue that the System Shock games are adventure, just like they’re RPG and action games too. I think those and Thief are the closest to adventure anyone’s attempted yet.
Thief comes even closer, I think, since System Shock still focuses on shooting things to a large degree (whereas Thief is all about NOT shooting things). But both are still reflex games–action games, basically. I’m thinking of games more like a traditional adventure but with an open, 3D environment.
Gabriel Knight 3 did it, but they used a mediocre engine with terrible controls, and then compounded the problem by making a mediocre adventure game with it. But I think the concept is sound. RealMyst is an example of a 3D adventure done right, but the problem there is that everyone that wants to play Myst has already played it at this point, so the game had limited appeal.
Yeah, I’m with you Ben. I agree that it’s feasible and should be done. Playing Grim Fandango in the first person would be just as enjoyable as it was in third person. Fundamentally, you’ve got to give the player the means to “talk” to other characters and you wouldn’t want to rip them out of body for conversation either. So there’s a shift in how the games would have to play, but there’s nothing wrong with that.
Heck, Fallout’s talking heads with text replies would work just fine but instead of a head, you get to stand in an environment and converse. Give the player various stances and expressions and have the other characters react to them. Let the player “act” out the scene…
The biggest hurdle is the action. I think you need SOME action to make adventure games more compelling. If handled in such a way that it’s easy, but keep people from seeing through how easy it really is, you can make some compelling drama.
Is the new Sam & Max game going to be third person? I imagine it will be given the strength of the characters. The best way to do adventure in first-person 3D would be to start a new franchise and come up with a compelling setting. Edit: More importantly, the setting should be compact…like a space station…so that travel is minimal when you’ve got people needing information or items. You don’t want people walking around for an extended period just to get to the guy they have to talk to. Keep it tight…
well, with lucasarts making full throttle 2 and sam and max 2, we’ll see just how adventure games translate to 3D. I loved Grim Fandango and thought it worked really well, but didn’t enjoy Monkey 4 as much as the previous games. I didn’t enjoy the puzzles or dialogue as much.
i think if the dev team is good and knows what they are doing, the game will be good, whether its 3D or 2D.
personally, i’m a big fan of tim schafer so i’m looking forward to psychonauts.
Just about a month ago I had to have Presto mail me a replacement CD for Journeyman Project 2, which shipped with a defective CD in many copies of the Journeyman 1-3 boxed set (so many that there was a note on their website offering a free replacement). I had just bought an unopened copy off of eBay, and so had just run into this.
Weird sigh of relief: glad I got that taken care of before the axe fell, I guess.
Sorry to hear 'em go, though…
Did anyone play that Gundam game they did with live action actors? I’ve never seen it.
Yeah Jason, they announced it (but dinna show it) at E3.
LucasArts is on a “recapture our old glory and rep” kick right now. I hope it lasts, they used to be one hell of a great studio.
I’m a little worried that the Lucasarts press release for SAM & MAX 2 mentioned no involvement by Steve Purcell, the guy who created the characters and the source of their particular brand of absurdist/slapstick humor.
Anyone know if he’s involved in the sequel? He was heavily involved in the first one.
Yeah, I was looking at the screenies for FT2… and pretty much decided that the cell-animation look was far better. Hrm… if ever a 3D game needed to be fully cell-shaded, it’s this one. The 3D models just lack the charm of the first game I guess.
Anybody remember “Realms of the Haunting”? That was a great FPS style adventure game. I certainly wouldn’t mind a remake of something like that with modern graphics… considering it was from the Doom era.
About FT2, I agree that a cel shaded look would have been more appropriate considering its roots. For example, comparing Curse of Monkey Island and Escape from Monkey Island, I enjoyed the 2-D game better because the artwork was cleaner and the environments contained more detail.
Oh, and I vaguely seem to recall that Purcell will be personally involved in Sam 'n Max 2, but I might be misremembering it.
Syberia’s pretty good for an artsy-fartsy Euro adventure game in the vein of The Longest Journey, minus all the long-winded politically correct expository.
