We didn’t have a proper thread with proper title, so here it is
And look, it seems they will release it soon
https://twitter.com/TimOfLegend/status/421700482688499712
Haven’t shipped a game of my own in 4.5 years, an adventure game in 16, a point-n-click in almost 20. Next Tuesday is going to be exciting!
Trailer
More footage
It comes out next week?
I should probably know this, but what non-point-and-click adventure game did Tim ship 16 years ago?
Edit: Hm, Grim Fandango was 16 years ago. I guess that’s not point and click?
Was GF not point-and-click? I sure thought it was, but that was 16 (good lord) years ago.
I think Grim Fandango was keyboard controlled. You would move Manny around the world with the arrow keys and he would turn his head towards objects of interest. The UI was kinda like Far Cry 2 in that everything was in the world and there were no hud elements. Weren’t your inventory items cycled through Manny’s jacket? It was pretty neat at the time. I absolutely loved that game!
I can’t wait for Broken Age. I’ve loved every game Tim Schafer’s directed.
Edit:
Vesper, Part 1 releases for backers-only on the 14th. They’ll announce the date for everyone else in their mega update next week. The second half is scheduled for April/May 2014.
Whoops! Accidental double post.
I’m a backer, guess I should read recent updates. :)
And yes, tomorrow!
This is actually before when I expected them to get something out, heh.
I’m a little sad (and hope that I’m not breaking the NDA, but I don’t think this fact is included) because they say that going forward, new documentary episodes will assume knowledge of “Part 1” plot points. I was hoping to play the entire game when it was actually finished as opposed to the current half-game that’s about to come out, but I also really enjoy watching the documentary and wouldn’t want to miss it for the next 3-6 months.
I know, I know, first world problems :(
… seriously?
Broken Age developer Double Fine will get the game’s first-act into the hands of Kickstarter backers today, but there’s a catch: backers with blogs or who are members of the press can’t write about it until two weeks after launch.
In a Kickstarter update sent to VG247 today, Double Fine wrote, “Right now we’re working on a press release that will go out tomorrow morning. This will announce the public ship date of the game and a new trailer showing off Vella, the female protagonist!”
That date is today, January 14. Broken Age’s first act will release exclusively for backers, but the press and gamers have been placed under embargo until January 27. It’s an odd situation.
The post continues, “We’re also preparing to send out review codes to press, who will be under review embargo until January 27. This embargo also applies to any of you backers who are in the press or have blogs—we are requiring all formal reviews be held until January 27 at 10am Pacific time (6pm GMT). The same time limit applies to the press as to backers; everyone is in the same boat! We’re trying to be as fair as possible given that backers will have access to the game before everyone else.”
Yeah, good luck with that. Sure the press will respect those wishes, but there will be no shortage of backers that won’t read the info, or abide by it even if they do. The horse will have bolted as soon as those backer keys go out.
I guess Double Fine’s contention is that backers–as a reward for backing–are getting access to the game early, as if they were reviewers. In other words, the game isn’t “released” today, despite what the story at VG247.com says. A version for sale to the general public who didn’t back the project is planned for later in the month, hence the embargo. If you backed, you were told you’d get to play the game before anyone else. Here that is.
As far as I can tell by reading the forum post, we can talk about the game all we like in forums, we just can’t post reviews or blog about it if we have blogs, presumably especially aimed at folks who are metacritic or gamerankings reporters.
Doesn’t seem like that big a deal to me, but then I’m not a professional game reviewer or proprietor of a game site.
They ask you kindly to not reveal content after a certain point in the game from what I read.
Well, mostly to say “Please be respectful about not revealing spoilers” which is pretty standard from adventure game developers. Gone Home, for instance.
I’m not seeing on what grounds this embargo would be? They offered the game through Kickstarter and, for a far longer time, through their own webseite. You could buy it without signing any kind of NDA/embargo deal. The “embargo business” usually works in a way that a company will grant you free/early access to a game if you agree on certain conditions - and if you don’t, no access will be granted. As far as I’m concerned, DF, at this point, can ask nicely. But talking about stuff they require and how all that automatically retroactively applies to press people who backed the game… er… no?
Feel free to write it up on your gaming blog, JD. I honestly don’t care. It didn’t seem like an unreasonable request to me. Like I said, there’s nothing that they say that restricts folks from talking about the game on a forum setting, and that’s really the only thing that applies to me.
Doesn’t seem like that big a deal to me, but then I’m not a professional game reviewer or proprietor of a game site.
Well, it’s basically for the benefit of those sites - otherwise they’d be subject to the embargo while backers were posting reviews all over the place. I think it’s a pretty forlorn embargo, in the same way that they wanted people to hold off on other stuff revealed in the backer email, which is now all over the internet, but the main beneficiaries are going to be the likes of Eurogamer, or indeed QT3.
I’m not seeing on what grounds this embargo would be? They offered the game through Kickstarter and, for a far longer time, through their own webseite.
They did not offer the game through Kickstarter. They offered people the opportunity to back the game, with early access as one of the rewards. Kickstarter is not a store.
Er… doesn’t change the thing. People could “acquire early access” through KS without agreeing to any kind of embargo date.
Oh, I agree with you Ginger Yellow. I hope folks do mostly honor the embargo, even while understanding how that it’s fairly unrealistic. I think their early access promise never envisaged 87,000 backers, but kudos to them for trying to stick to it.
I’m happy they’re doing what they’re doing. They could’ve made the game reviewer only for a week, then backer-only for a week…and folks would be worked up about that, too. As Chet once sagely observed on this forum, if you handed some gamers a $100 bill, there’s a not-insignificant percentage of them who’d complain about it being green and wrinkled.
I think what JD is simply saying is that their request to backers to not review the game is not legally binding, and he’s probably right. It’s just them asking politely.