Older than the target range? Tell us what you think!

WillWill Telltale Alumni
edited July 2010 in Back to the Future
Some people were noticing that they were outside of the target range of the survey, but wanted to give feedback anyway. So do it right here! I'll make sure it gets seen by the design team.

Comments

  • edited July 2010
    Consider using the Space Race / NASA / etc as a theme in one of your episodes!

    Please read and consider this example:

    While on a journey back in time, you accidentally hit some poor bloke with a car and knock him out cold (to borrow a scene from Episode 1). After checking to see if he's OK, you return to the present and find the world drastically different. Unsure of what happened but certain it had to do with the individual you "interacted" with, you return to the past a bit before the accident, hide behind the bushes ("something inconspicuous!"), observe the accident from afar, and after the original Marty/Doc leave, you approach the man again to find out who he is --- "Great Scott!!", it's a space science / rocketry pioneer (Werner von Braun or Robert H. Goddard, for example) and you notice he's lost some of his memory. Doc is naturally devastated to have damaged one of Science's great pioneers, and Marty must keep a level head and help fix the situation, while dealing with a very depressed Doc (some comedic potential there). You travel into the past to help gather their old papers/equations/etc so he can remember and continue his contributions to Science.
  • edited July 2010
    Not sure why you had a target age range for the survey in the first place. I hope the survey gives you statistics of how many people gave an invalid age, so you'll be able to gauge interest from people the survey-setter-upper didn't think would matter.

    For those of us with invalid ages, it didn't even display the questions, so it would be helpful if you re-post them here, so we'll know what you care about.

    Thanks.
  • edited July 2010
    With respect to open-ended suggestions, I think the key point played out in the movies is that the present doesn't have to get back to exactly the way it was before, after you messed it up. Sometimes it winds up better, instead.
  • edited July 2010
    WarpSpeed wrote: »
    For those of us with invalid ages, it didn't even display the questions, so it would be helpful if you re-post them here, so we'll know what you care about.
    What was the target range anyway, and where was it stated? (Not on the blog page, that's for sure...)

    I'm 33 and I certainly could answer all questions...

    np: Glitterbug - Blast (Privilege (Disc 1))
  • edited July 2010
    Looks like 40 is the cutoff. Ha, squeezed in by 2 years...
  • edited July 2010
    I'm 41. I'm younger than Marty. I was 16 when BTTF came out.

    If you don't understand the target audience of a licensed property, then maybe you shouldn't license it.
  • edited July 2010
    Maybe it's a function of the survey software? I'm pretty sure Telltale understand their audience.
  • edited July 2010
    It could also be they just assume 40+ year old gamers will buy it and they are looking to expand their audience. Just a guess.
  • edited July 2010
    I am also outside the target range, but not sure what "feedback" I could give here as I did not get to see any questions or plot ideas. I think an adventure game based on Back to the Future is a cool idea, it certainly would be possible to create some fantastic and complicated puzzles involving time travel.
  • edited July 2010
    For those that wish to see them, this article quotes all of the open-ended text-box questions from the survey.

    The other questions were all lists of things asking you to pick your top three or top five. These questions included the following: Which characters would you want to play as? Which characters do you want to see or interact with in the game? Which props and set pieces from the series do you feel to be most iconic? Which jokes and story elements do you feel to be most iconic? Which action sequence from the movies was your favorite? What do you feel are the most important themes from the movies? What are some of your other favorite movie franchises? What are your favorite book franchises? What are your favorite genres of music?

    That's everything I can remember off the top of my head. I hope it helps. :)
  • edited July 2010
    alexr wrote: »
    I'm 41. I'm younger than Marty. I was 16 when BTTF came out.

    If you don't understand the target audience of a licensed property, then maybe you shouldn't license it.

    This is the best first post I've ever seen. :rolleyes:
  • edited July 2010
    Marty needs to retain his hatred of being called "chicken". Oh, and Detective Biff is a brilliant idea, and I know two people besides myself who said if that was in the game it would be an instant buy for them.
  • edited July 2010
    Marty needs to retain his hatred of being called "chicken".

    But didn't he overcome that in the movies?
    At the end of BTTF 3?
  • edited July 2010
    If its a sequel/after the movies, then it should be gone yeah. But if its an alternate retelling/not a sequel, then he should have it.
  • edited July 2010
    Just to let you know I'm 41 (42 next munf) and have bought the whole catalog of TT Games (except CSI and Puzzle Agent) ...
  • edited July 2010
    I don't know if I was too old, but am definitely disappointed to have missed the survey so I'll chime in. I've seen some of the questions reprinted elsewhere and will use them as a guide.

    For starters, I think that the BTTF universe is perfect fodder for essentially "GTA: Hill Valley". Telltale probably isn't going to be doing that, but the more elements you can take from that (and what it implies) the better. Free-roaming, traveling between time periods at will, driving and needing enough road to get up to 88 (until you get the flight conversion), hoverboards, skateboards, etc.

    I'm 29, male, live in the U.S., have seen the first movie probably over 30 times, the second around 20 times, the 3rd around 15 times.

    I read the novelization for part 1 back in the day (this actually had a very adventure game-y added scene in it involving Marty escaping from detention), owned them all on VHS and also owned all 3 soundtracks. I will likely purchase the Blu-Rays.

    First thing that comes to mind when I think of BTTF is the '80s.

    Favorite scene is probably the hoverboard chase.

    Don't like the 1938 scenario unless Doc and the gold-digger met because of actions by a mischievous Tannen or something. It doesn't make sense. If somehow Doc and Marty's actions in 1885 caused a chain reaction up to 1938 that makes Doc and the woman meet, I actually do like that quite a bit. In general I like any idea that would have to do with correcting mistakes/loose ends caused by the movie trilogy's events.

    1986 scenario: I love the idea of the game's "home base" being 1986 rather than 1985 or the present. This specific plot doesn't make all that much sense to me though, and I don't like the idea of so many people time-traveling beyond the Brown family, Marty, and a Tannen or two.

    2010 scenario: I'd rather there not be time police; I prefer time travel to still be a relative secret.

    1968 scenario could be promising...anything to do with the time vehicle being destroyed and Marty/Doc being stuck in the past/future is fine by me. I'd prefer if the vehicle was a DeLorean though.
  • edited July 2010
    To all those who are bitter about being too old to participate in the survey, I really wouldn't worry about it. From a business standpoint, every IP has to have a key demographic market. The demographic of the BTTF game looks to have been people below 40 years old, and the survey was obviously designed, to some degree, with that in mind. That doesn't mean that they don't want to sell games to people over 40, it just means that they're trying to tailor the game to a specific audience.

    I'd be understanding, for example, if I was denied a part in a survey for one of the kid's cartoons I watch totally never watch ever. Just because they're kid's cartoons, though, doesn't mean the creators don't expect a certain amount of attention from older viewers.
  • edited July 2010
    Hold on a second here, why are you asking us what we would like to see in the game? Bit like the BBC asking England about what would be in Eastenders.... Or am I missing the point somewhere?
  • edited July 2010
    Funny enough. I felt the same bit of "left out" when I noticed that all the Indiana Jones movie souveniors were all geared towards kids. They didn't even make adult-sizes of them. (And this was long before Crystal Skull came out). I felt like they made the collectables for everybody *BUT* the people who watched the movies and were big fans.

    Anyway, it's probably too late, but I'll entertain the questions with answers, as well, since I've seen the survey.

    1. Seen Back to the Future between 10-15 times. The same for Back to the Future 2. I saw the 3rd one maybe about 5 times.

    2. As far as Back to the Future products. I really only seen the movies, got the VHS tapes, and enjoyed the ride at Universal Studio theme park in Florida. I plan on getting the trilogy on DVD or BlueRay. Blueray if it is available.

    3. The first thing that comes to mind, when it comes to the Back to the Future movies, is probably the time-travelling delorean. And that's just my initial gut thought. A bunch of things soon follow.

    4. Tough to pick my favorite scene as many have some memorable moments, including some premonitions of things that actually came true. I think one of the most (edge of your seat) moments, for me, was when Marty looked like he would be stuck in the past and it took a timely use of the energy of a lightning bolt to send him back. So much pressure and complications were dealt with only to leave that as a major setback. By that time, you were already rooting for Marty so having something so fortunate go his way, by that time, was just the victory moment I was waiting for. (Christopher Lloyd's reaction to that event was priceless)

    5. One thing that stood out for me was the complications of time travel. So many details (some rather minute) were altered and changed based on events in the past. Some of them, the result of a glance impact or maybe a small remark. There were sure to be certain plotholes, but they concentrated on so many of them that one could be quite satisfied if not impressed with the work.

    6. A bit strange. I would more easily believe that Doc would not turn away from science naturally. Someone else would need to mess up time for that to happen. Otherwise, the natural course of events should keep things running to the way things are in our current time. Ever since the first movie, all the events happened the way they should have until Marty went back and ran into his parents, even though Marty had the idea to use time travel to change a present catastrophy.

    The second scenario isn't bad, though it really comes down to execution.

    The third scenario I would rather have the car. I'd like to think of what they did in the 3rd movie, as sort of a one-timer. It made sense given the lack of other technology. The Tannen thing is pretty inventive, to say the least. Could be a great way to expand the character line, as well. Of course, purists might have some issues with the introduction of something that might push the series in an even more sci-fi direction. Where as, up to now, the time thing seems an exclusive Doc Brown thing in which we're seeing the first people to stumble onto time travel. But, perhaps a little alteration (addition like that) could be something that works. Though, I would imagine that the entire division would know of Doc Brown as he'd probably be in the history books. If not, a mildly forgotten legend.

    The last scenario is pretty nifty and, in a way, does jive with some of the better complications of a BTTF story. Now we're dealing with our story weaving around some particularly historical events like the Vietnam War. (It also brings back a reference that was made in the 2nd Movie about Vietnam, and makes it look like this was a *planned* sequel that was hinted at in Back to the Future 2). Just a kind of delicate balance which could easily be toppled by a time traveller. Not to mention all the known figureheads, of the time. So many scenarios of the mess made if any of those are compromised, I think it could do fairly well.
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