I still don't really understand why they announced it so early. Every other franchise they've announced has had SOME kind of attention given to it over the course of this year. Even Fable had a book signing thing or whatever at a Telltale booth somewhere, didn't they? Nothing on KQ beyond "we talked to Roberta". We had to find out from Mandel that they even talked to him, they didn't say it themselves. They're either not caring or they're being extremely cautious of fan reactions to news. Either way, it'd be nice to hear something other than it exists and we'll get more information as time goes on.
I still don't really understand why they announced it so early. Every other franchise they've announced has had SOME kind of attention given to it over the course of this year. Even Fable had a book signing thing or whatever at a Telltale booth somewhere, didn't they? Nothing on KQ beyond "we talked to Roberta". We had to find out from Mandel that they even talked to him, they didn't say it themselves. They're either not caring or they're being extremely cautious of fan reactions to news. Either way, it'd be nice to hear something other than it exists and we'll get more information as time goes on.
I think that it was worth announcing that they got rights to make a King's Quest game, it certainly made me happy. Game is probably still in it's early stages, so I don't know why they should tell more about it. I'm certain that once they have finished other games and when KQ is closer to release they will tell us more about it.
It's important to remember that Telltale stays pretty quiet about their games until they're really close to release. Hell, The Walking Dead is just a few months away and we've barely heard anything.
We probably won't hear anything about King's Quest until The Walking Dead finishes at the earliest.
Didn't The Walking Dead have a couple whole Telltale panels at various cons in the past few months?
Yes and no. The Walking Dead was technically featured at E3 and SDCC, but all we really got out of it is...
-Some concept art.
-A single screenshot.
-Being told about two of the new characters, Lee and Clementine.
-That the player's choices in early episodes will affect the outcome of the later ones.
-What might be music from the game's soundtrack.
Not a whole lot seeing how the game was announced months ago. We still haven't seen the game in action, or even been told how it'll play. (We know it's not going to be a conventional Sam and Max-style point-and-click.)
Again, TTG has enough projects that I'm not sure they'll get around to announcing anything about this for quite a while. Especially given that it was the last project on their list of upcoming games when it was first announced. Not that they have to start or finish each project in the exact order as on that list, but it certainly could be an indication of how long they may take before doing anything with the game.
Again, TTG has enough projects that I'm not sure they'll get around to announcing anything about this for quite a while. Especially given that it was the last project on their list of upcoming games when it was first announced. Not that they have to start or finish each project in the exact order as on that list, but it certainly could be an indication of how long they may take before doing anything with the game.
And I think that it's good that KQ is at the end of the list. With franchise like KQ it's better to take all the time you need and make a decent game, rather than make quickly a half-baked game, which would just annoy the fanboys and make them cry for murder.
I'd really love if TT released some little slice of information about their KQ game; a drawing, a screenshot; a little info about how it's a reboot if it is, or a sequel--Any little slice of info would be cool of them.
I'd really love if TT released some little slice of information about their KQ game; a drawing, a screenshot; a little info about how it's a reboot if it is, or a sequel--Any little slice of info would be cool of them.
I think it's because Telltale knows that they have bitten off more than they can chew with this game and its nitpicky asshole fan base (proud member, right here! ). They are scared shitless about this game.
I think it's because Telltale knows that they have bitten off more than they can chew with this game and its nitpicky asshole fan base (proud member, right here! ). They are scared shitless about this game.
I can't tell if you're serious or not! I'd say it's more due to the fact they tend to keep pretty quiet on the info front until they're actually gearing up for a release. There are a few things in the queue before KQ comes out.
I think it's because Telltale knows that they have bitten off more than they can chew with this game and its nitpicky asshole fan base (proud member, right here! ). They are scared shitless about this game.
I had a small chitchat with Kevin Bruner about this last time I met him. They understand that King's Quest fans are very set in what they want and they are reading what you guys post here.
This is, after all, the most active forums they have of an unreleased game.
I had a small chitchat with Kevin Bruner about this last time I met him. They understand that King's Quest fans are very set in what they want and they are reading what you guys post here.
This is, after all, the most active forums they have of an unreleased game.
Just what I thought! They want to see what we expect from the game, and they may change their plans according to it. Perhaps they will even release polls in the future.
Much like BTTF! I hope they'd give more choices than simply about story approach and design and pose questions about actual gameplay.
I doubt it. Telltale has already proven that they don't think their customers are capable of complex thoughts. Why would they put any stock in their customers' ideas about gameplay?
All that is important for King's Quest is that they take their time to tell a good story. I would prefer a little drawn out, longer, more complex story even if they keep the difficulty the same as / simpler than they always have. King's Quest always felt more about the adventure, so I hope they focus on a good story for it. Something a la KQ5 or KQ6. If they do that I would be happy.
I doubt it. Telltale has already proven that they don't think their customers are capable of complex thoughts. Why would they put any stock in their customers' ideas about gameplay?
However, it is this formula what has made them stay successfully afloat in a market where every other commercial adventure company has horribly failed in the 2000s.
At the end of the day, they've found a balance that has allowed them to SURVIVE, and produce what can be considered the best adventure games of this generation, with a constant flux of releases, while reviving old gems that we hold dear.
We HAVE to get over the 90s, really. That was a great time, we got our gems, there will never be anything produced that can (or should try to) replace them. No matter how close they aim for it, it will be a game for this generation. And it has to be in order for Telltale to continue to be successful. And we can kick and cry and want KQ4, 5 or 6, and we'll be disappointed and whine. me thinks we should just enjoy it. Some of the things we are asking, we KNOW already we are not going to get, and that has nothing with Telltale wanting or not to listen, it has to do with making games that make back as much money as they put into them. And KQ5, in this generation, will not do it.
Name ONE company that does adventure games, and that comes as close as Telltale's success in how they've been able to grow in the way they have, that can have better and better production values with every new series. There's none. None. It doesn't work anymore. Blame today's economy, blame bloated salaries, blame the longer to produce technology, the days of Sierra and LucasArts models of adventure games are gone and they will stay gone until the technology changes enough that allows them to become popular again. And until that happens, I'm not going to hold my breath.
I'll just be happy to return to Daventry once more, done with the better technology that it's ever going to get up to this point.
But if you are unhappy, go and play Black Mirror 3, Memento Mori, The Whispered World. Those are true adventures like those of the 90s. Sans the production values. And developers and publishers struggle and struggle to keep afloat. And in the meanwhile, Telltale continues to grow.
Really, are we truly thinking that a company will risk so much? I for one, don't really want them to. I have a lot of friends there I'd hate to see get laid off because of a title failing to perform as well as it could because of not being accessible to the masses. And, at the end of the day, they find ways to balance accessibility and fans, which shows they care and listen within the model that works for them. Tales of Monkey Island is the perfect example of that.
Bottom line is that adventure mechanics of the 80/90s and production values of the current decade are mutually exclusive --at least for a profitable successful formula within the current market. Asking Telltale to do that is like complaining to Ubisoft because Assassins Creed is nowhere as hard, nor as unforgiving as the original Prince of Persia.
Bottom line is that adventure mechanics of the 80/90s and production values of the current decade are mutually exclusive --at least for a profitable successful formula within the current market. Asking Telltale to do that is like complaining to Ubisoft because Assassins Creed is nowhere as hard, nor as unforgiving as the original Prince of Persia.
That's not really a good comparison at all. Assassin's Creed is significantly more complex in its mechanics than the original Prince of Persia--not LESS. We're talking about Telltale actively making its games less playable, less interactive, less explorable, and ultimately MUCH less engaging than ever before. Not only are they sounding the death knell of adventure games as they have traditionally been known, they are actively removing the GAME portion of their games, to the point where calling them games starts to become something of a stretch. And I think it's complete BS to act like Telltale's approach is the "wave of the future" or something, because it's not new. Games like Dragon's Lair and Space Ace did the same thing 25 years ago, minus the punishing timing-based sections. And those games are now little more than novelties relegated to the figurative dust bin of gaming history. Time will tell if this approach to games will fail as badly as I hope it does. BttF proved that this methodology can, and often does, produce terrible games. Jurassic Park will be the real test though--it goes much farther than BttF in terms of the way it deviates from traditional gameplay. Its own developers have admitted that they were going for "interactive movie" over "graphic adventure game," so we'll see how it goes. If it does bomb, though, I hope they will rethink their strategy--I do agree that some of their earlier games have been excellent. And I also agree that Tales of Monkey Island has, so far, been their crowning achievement. We'll see if they can reach those heights again...so far it has been a steady downhill slope.
And then there's something like Heavy Rain, which manages to be more of a "movie" than BttF, and remove all and any challenge from a game, and manages to sell millions of copies.
I don't think that Telltale games are killing the adventure genre. They were already dead. If anything, they are bringing them back to the mainstream. Regardless of the reason, BttF has been their most successful game yet in terms of sales.
The mechanics of AC have been expanded, yes, but they have also been incredibly dumbed down. You were talking about complexity of puzzles and that was what I was responding to: the fact that things have become easier in our generation. Apparently, nobody wants to become frustrated by having to think in a game. Exploration, that's another topic and I agree that AC has evolved the gameplay of PoP into a vast and very interesting open world. But, again, we were talking about difficulty.
Regardless of the reason, BttF has been their most successful game yet in terms of sales.
The mechanics of AC have been expanded, yes, but they have also been incredibly dumbed down. You were talking about complexity of puzzles and that was what I was responding to: the fact that things have become easier in our generation. Apparently, nobody wants to become frustrated by having to think in a game. Exploration, that's another topic and I agree that AC has evolved the gameplay of PoP into a vast and very interesting open world. But, again, we were talking about difficulty.
On BttF--I have to wonder how much of the "success" in terms of sales is purely due to the game carrying the BttF license and billing itself as the next installment in the classic series, rather than on the merits of the product as a game itself. I wonder how many of those sales actually finished all episodes of the game after spending that initial $29.99 on the season. I know I didn't. I stopped after episode 3 and have absolutely no intention of going back to it. I just have to wonder how the statistics would change if we were talking about customer satisfaction after playing through the completed final product. People were willing to take a leap of faith with BttF, mostly because Telltale hadn't yet released anything so utterly terrible before--many made the mistake of assuming it would be up to the same level of quality as their previous games. I know I sure did, and I regret it.
On adventure games in general--I certainly was talking about more than puzzle difficulty. BttF wasn't JUST bad because of easy puzzles--it was bad because you couldn't do shit in it. The entire game was set in an invisible hallway, with only a handful of side rooms and only the slightest amount of photographs hanging on the wall, metaphorically speaking, of course. By that, I mean that it completely and utterly lacked any sense of exploration and interaction, beyond the handful of interactions necessary to solve the "puzzles."
That's where a game like Assassin's Creed shines, despite the lack of any really punishing difficulty.
Personally, I don't think high difficulty is a requirement for a good adventure game. But I absolutely DO think that the ability to explore and interact with the world, beyond the meager interactions necessary to simply advance the core plot, is indispensable. And that's where Telltale has failed--miserably.
I'm not wishing we were back in the 90s. That has nothing to do with it. I know times have to move on. I'm not pressuring Telltale to adopt a 5-icon interface or anything. I just want King's Quest to be at LEAST as good Tales of Monkey Island was. But not with TMI's game design elements, because those were purely Monkey Island inspired. No, it must have King's Quest's game design elements (not 90s adventure design elements).
Yes, Heavy Rain sold well but it wasn't a continuation on a beloved franchise and it wasn't an adventure game. If they turn King's Quest into an "interactive movie" I will not buy it. I won't even give it a chance.
King's Quest is an interesting animal, and unlike anything Telltale has tried to tackle before.
One the one hand, it really IS synonymous with 90s adventure game design elements. Trying to separate the two completely would be a mistake. On the other hand, there are certainly ways to update and modernize those elements (WITHOUT DUMBING DOWN THE EXPERIENCE--listen closely, Telltale!) that really could bring the franchise into line with today's gaming standards.
Another thing that makes King's Quest unique is that each installment in the franchise is quite a bit different, either in terms of game design, interface, story, etc. So which installment do they try to emulate? KQ5 or 6--generally considered to be the pinnacles of the series? KQ7--with its horrid interface and chapter setup that is closer to the traditional Telltale format? KQ8 with its action elements? Some amalgam of all of the above? It's hard to say.
One thing all KQ games have in common is a sense of nonlinear exploration. This is an element that is almost entirely absent from Telltale's games, and one that I think will be crucial to figure out and capture, if they want to mimic the style & tone of King's Quest.
I strongly disagree that KQ games have been or should be primarily about story--I'm sure Telltale could expand on the usual bare bones KQ storylines successfully--story is one of their strong points--but it shouldn't be the SOLE focus of the experience, as it has been in most Telltale games.
I'm interested to see how/if Telltale will pull that off, but that's another thing you are asking that may be something that Telltale cannot deliver: a vast world to explore. They may do a big forest where they can reuse environments, a-la jungle in Monkey Island, but again, a vast explorable world, especially highly expandable upon each episode, I find it nearly impossible for Telltale to pull off knowing how their production model works.
So, again, you cannot expect something that the genre can't offer. You may get something similar, but never the worlds of the 90s. Those, these days, belong to games like Skyrim or AC or Dragon Age. or maybe even something like Heavy Rain. But, a point and click adventure?
And thus is why Telltale tries to modernize the genre so that they can draw masses in again, so they can offer bigger worlds eventually... or I'd guess that'd make sense.
Everything you've said seems to kind of prove many people's whole point on the whole issue. And that is that it shouldn't be attempted. Many would say it would be better if it stayed in the 90s than to be tarnished into something unrecognizable.
I'm interested to see how/if Telltale will pull that off, but that's another thing you are asking that may be something that Telltale cannot deliver: a vast world to explore. They may do a big forest where they can reuse environments, a-la jungle in Monkey Island, but again, a vast explorable world, especially highly expandable upon each episode, I find it nearly impossible for Telltale to pull off knowing how their production model works.
So, again, you cannot expect something that the genre can't offer. You may get something similar, but never the worlds of the 90s. Those, these days, belong to games like Skyrim or AC or Dragon Age. or maybe even something like Heavy Rain. But, a point and click adventure?
And thus is why Telltale tries to modernize the genre so that they can draw masses in again, so they can offer bigger worlds eventually... or I'd guess that'd make sense.
Sigh...:rolleyes: I'm not talking about a world the size of Assassin's Creed II or Skyrim. Clearly, nobody expects that. I'm talking about a world that SEEMS large and expansive.
KQ5 and 6 had worlds that SEEMED large an expansive without actually being so. It was all a cleverly veiled illusion.
To put it another way, it's not the SIZE of the world, but how INTERACTIVE it is. If players have the ability to comb through every background object (at least to the degree of KQ5 or 6), the world doesn't actually need to be that LARGE. It just has to be fleshed out. The object is to make the player FEEL like they have a greater latitude to explore as they see fit. Even KQ5, arguably the most expansive FEELING of the series, has fairly confined areas. KQ7 also feels large and explorable (though to a lesser degree thanks to the crap interface), and it is even broken into episodes! What I'm talking about is absolutely possible. All they need to do is make fleshed out areas with lots of extraneous interactions, and create a list of tasks that do not necessarily have to be completed in a specific order. Those smaller tasks can be part of a larger puzzle that unlocks the next area (or ends the episode.)
Seriously, I can't believe you of all people are arguing that this is impossible. TSL pretty much has done it already!
Sigh...:rolleyes: I'm not talking about a world the size of Assassin's Creed II or Skyrim. Clearly, nobody expects that. I'm talking about a world that SEEMS large and expansive.
KQ5 and 6 had worlds that SEEMED large an expansive without actually being so. It was all a cleverly veiled illusion.
To put it another way, it's not the SIZE of the world, but how INTERACTIVE it is. If players have the ability to comb through every background object (at least to the degree of KQ5 or 6), the world doesn't actually need to be that LARGE. It just has to be fleshed out. The object is to make the player FEEL like they have a greater latitude to explore as they see fit. Even KQ5, arguably the most expansive FEELING of the series, has fairly confined areas. KQ7 also feels large and explorable (though to a lesser degree thanks to the crap interface), and it is even broken into episodes! What I'm talking about is absolutely possible. All they need to do is make fleshed out areas with lots of extraneous interactions, and create a list of tasks that do not necessarily have to be completed in a specific order. Those smaller tasks can be part of a larger puzzle that unlocks the next area (or ends the episode.)
Seriously, I can't believe you of all people are arguing that this is impossible. TSL pretty much has done it already!
I understand what you are saying, and I know TSL has done it. But I've worked at Telltale, as well. Telltale's model doesn't fit the number of screens TSL has. It would be way too much for their production cycles.
If you compare TSL to Tales of Monkey Island, for example, TSL's world is much bigger. A world the size of TSL would cost Telltale a lot of money. That's what I'm saying.
I understand what you are saying, and I know TSL has done it. But I've worked at Telltale, as well. Telltale's model doesn't fit the number of screens TSL has. It would be way too much for their production cycles.
If you compare TSL to Tales of Monkey Island, for example, TSL's world is much bigger. A world the size of TSL would cost Telltale a lot of money. That's what I'm saying.
So basically you're saying that a professional company with paid workers and a budget couldn't accomplish the same level of gameplay depth and quality as a group of amateur fan developers with no budget or compensation?
Why does that statement not seem to make sense to me?
So basically you're saying that a professional company with paid workers and a budget couldn't accomplish the same level of gameplay depth and quality as a group of amateur fan developers with no budget or compensation?
Why does that statement not seem to make sense to me?
Because we had years to make it happen. And we didn't care how much we "spent". That makes a huge difference. Producing that same amount of content in a year period, would have been next to impossible, even with a big budget. Note that I'm talking just about quantity (number of screens, number of characters, number of actions you can perform, etc), they will definitely have better quality.
We are talking about x number of months to craft the first episode, but then it goes down to a timeline of roughly one to two months to put together a full episode. Trust me, I've been there, that times passes FAST. You could insert 40 more people to create more content, yes, but 1) that's money, 2) in such a short amount of time it becomes extremely chaotic to manage, because you still want only a few people managing a huge team in order to hold the vision into something coherent.
Remember, a game like Mask of Eternity, or even Gabriel Knight 3 took 2-3 years to make. Those are 2-3 years of spending a lot of money maintaining a team. That's a hit that Bioware could take these days, but it would ruin a "small" company like Telltale. Professional has nothing to do with it --again, we are not in the golden years of adventure anymore where Sierra was one of the lead developers, they had a PR monster machine and their games were the popular ones. All that has changed immensely. And so, in order for a game like King's Quest to survive in this time, it would have to adapt to a lot of things.
What I'm hoping we get is what Tales fans got when you compare it to something like Curse of Monkey Island. Still, a lot less scenes/characters, but it was done in such a smart way that they managed to keep the feeling of Monkey Island. But, like you've said before, King's Quest is about exploration. Maybe Telltale will come up with a way where they give us a big forest that they manage to create within their budget, I don't know, I really don't know what's going on in there anymore, and they have scaled up since I left. But I'm setting my expectations accordingly to the amount of content they have created for all of their games, because that's probably what we are going to get for King's Quest.
I'm talking from personal experience as I've been delving a lot into that lately. If we were to do a commercial project, it would be hugely scaled down from the size of TSL --TSL would probably cost 2-3 millions dollars or so to make or more with a timeline of 2 years or so (if graphics were updated to latest technology). That's just development money and not counting in any Publicity/Publishing/Licenses related costs. Unfortunately, I don't think any adventure game would make that kind of money back.
And, in general, that's why I say that we have to get over the 90s, with these big adventure games, with these big worlds to explore, with them being much less accessible, etc. My comment was oriented towards all that. Telltale is the ONLY company in the whole world that has managed to succeed, and it's not only because of dumbing down their games, it has to do with a lot of smart decisions they have made, including the perfect size and amount of content in their games.
Look at a game like Dreamfall. Big, huge, pretty and fun. Where's the sequel? Where's the next adventure game from Funcom? It didn't sell enough. Telltale's game won't carry the headlines news. That's space is reserved for other games these days, so you either sacrifice a lot in order to make these games, or you fail miserably, like 95% of adventure developers in the 2000s. And then, for better or worse, we had Telltale coming along, and finding a way to steadily put out products every year. We can say whatever about their games, but damn, we got to applaud them in how they've managed to do this successfully where everyone else has failed.
Everything you've said seems to kind of prove many people's whole point on the whole issue. And that is that it shouldn't be attempted. Many would say it would be better if it stayed in the 90s than to be tarnished into something unrecognizable.
I don't think that way. Honestly, if it's not my cup of tea I won't play it, but that won't change my feelings about King's Quest. Mask of Eternity certainly didn't make me feel different about King's Quest V or VI. If anything, it just reinforced what masterpieces they were.
If it's not what you want, let a new generation enjoy it. It may even get them interested to go to the past and experience the old games.
If we didn't want it brought back officially, maybe we shouldn't have worked so hard in keeping it alive with our fan games
Telltale is the ONLY company in the whole world that has managed to succeed
There's an enormous amount of sense in what you've been saying, but this statement is a bit of an exaggeration. Look at Her Interactive for example. They've churned out a couple of entries in the Nancy Drew adventure game series every year, across multiple platforms, for a good number of years now. Pendulo Studios was founded in 1994, and while not exactly prolific, they still seem to be making games (and games that are fairly well rooted in old adventure traditions at that).
While Telltale certainly stands out in terms of rapid growth, I wouldn't say they are the ONLY company in the WHOLE WORLD that is doing ok.
There's an enormous amount of sense in what you've been saying, but this statement is a bit of an exaggeration. Look at Her Interactive for example. They've churned out a couple of entries in the Nancy Drew adventure game series every year, across multiple platforms, for a good number of years now. Pendulo Studios was founded in 1994, and while not exactly prolific, they still seem to be making games (and games that are fairly well rooted in old adventure traditions at that).
While Telltale certainly stands out in terms of rapid growth, I wouldn't say they are the ONLY company in the WHOLE WORLD that is doing ok.
Yeah, but Her Interactive's games are not something you would find as being hyped or wanted as a Telltale game. It depends on the public, I guess, but there's in general, from players and press, a huge gap when it comes to interest level from both companies games. There's a quality to Telltale Games that you don't find in other studios.
I did say constant release of games, as well. So, yes, I know about Pendulo and I know about other companies out there, but there's nothing that scratches Telltale Games when it comes to a steady, growing, successful formula. Everyone else is just gasping for air, or producing low quality products. That's what I meant.
Telltale is going to have to try a different approach with the KQ license, or it won't be King's Quest.
At least not in the eyes of fans of the old games. I firmly believe that it will be impossible to capture the spirit and tone of the original KQ games using the format Telltale has used with the majority of their adventure games--games like Tales or Sam & Max.
It's just that simple.
Now, despite my negative outcry, I don't think that it is TOTALLY outside the realm of possibility that they could do King's Quest justice, but it won't be with a game formatted like Tales of Monkey Island or Sam & Max. And CERTAINLY not one formatted like BttF. *shudders and crosses himself*
Telltale has shown with Jurassic Park that they are willing to experiment with new formats--they are even bringing down the episode count to four (presumably to flesh out each episode.) So maybe they will surprise us with something new for King's Quest.
That's what I'm hoping. Otherwise, it's already over.
Everything you've said seems to kind of prove many people's whole point on the whole issue. And that is that it shouldn't be attempted. Many would say it would be better if it stayed in the 90s than to be tarnished into something unrecognizable.
Well, one must remember, Cesar probably has an agena saying what he does. After all, his team was bucking hard to get the license themselves so we could get Angst Quest I, II, III starring the emotionally tortured King Graham and the creepy, whipped, anime-esque Alexander.
Because we had years to make it happen. And we didn't care how much we "spent". That makes a huge difference. Producing that same amount of content in a year period, would have been next to impossible, even with a big budget. Note that I'm talking just about quantity (number of screens, number of characters, number of actions you can perform, etc), they will definitely have better quality.
We are talking about x number of months to craft the first episode, but then it goes down to a timeline of roughly one to two months to put together a full episode. Trust me, I've been there, that times passes FAST. You could insert 40 more people to create more content, yes, but 1) that's money, 2) in such a short amount of time it becomes extremely chaotic to manage, because you still want only a few people managing a huge team in order to hold the vision into something coherent.
Remember, a game like Mask of Eternity, or even Gabriel Knight 3 took 2-3 years to make. Those are 2-3 years of spending a lot of money maintaining a team. That's a hit that Bioware could take these days, but it would ruin a "small" company like Telltale. Professional has nothing to do with it --again, we are not in the golden years of adventure anymore where Sierra was one of the lead developers, they had a PR monster machine and their games were the popular ones. All that has changed immensely. And so, in order for a game like King's Quest to survive in this time, it would have to adapt to a lot of things.
What I'm hoping we get is what Tales fans got when you compare it to something like Curse of Monkey Island. Still, a lot less scenes/characters, but it was done in such a smart way that they managed to keep the feeling of Monkey Island. But, like you've said before, King's Quest is about exploration. Maybe Telltale will come up with a way where they give us a big forest that they manage to create within their budget, I don't know, I really don't know what's going on in there anymore, and they have scaled up since I left. But I'm setting my expectations accordingly to the amount of content they have created for all of their games, because that's probably what we are going to get for King's Quest.
I'm talking from personal experience as I've been delving a lot into that lately. If we were to do a commercial project, it would be hugely scaled down from the size of TSL --TSL would probably cost 2-3 millions dollars or so to make or more with a timeline of 2 years or so (if graphics were updated to latest technology). That's just development money and not counting in any Publicity/Publishing/Licenses related costs. Unfortunately, I don't think any adventure game would make that kind of money back.
The only reasons KQ8 and GK3 took 2-3 years were largely technical issues and the fact that Sierra's new management had no faith in adventure games. Consider that that KQ8's production started in 1996, and was planned to be released for Christmas 1997--Only Dynamix's failures and the new management having no faith in adventure games and trying to control Roberta stopped that.
The only reasons KQ8 and GK3 took 2-3 years were largely technical issues and the fact that Sierra's new management had no faith in adventure games. Consider that that KQ8's production started in 1996, and was planned to be released for Christmas 1997--Only Dynamix's failures and the new management having no faith in adventure games and trying to control Roberta stopped that.
That may have been part of it, I won't talk about MoE because I don't know the story, but GK3 took 3 years because it needed them (and I had a conversation with Jane Jensen about it). Granted, there were a lot of technical issues why this happened, but that's all part of the complexity of systems since 3D was implemented. The truth of the matter is that as developers get their hands on better and better technology, times also increase. For the 3D technology, you have to do your 2D passes, but then, when you get to the modeling part, that normally takes more time than 2D. Nowadays with Normal Maps which brings the ability of doing extraordinary detail on things, a character that you could do in 5 days prior to this technology, now can take 15. The more detail and features you can add, the more time game making is going to take.
The development cycles of Sierra games in the 90s were about a year each with a mid size team. You would not be able to do that in less than 2 years today and you would need double or triple the team. Just look at a credits list of a game of today and compare it to a game from the 90s. Look at the absurdity of Uncharted or Assassins Creed lists. They never end, they keep rolling and rolling and rolling. Making AAA titles is absurd in how expensive it can be today. In the same way, GK and MoE were pushing the technology back in their day, and MoE was basically their first adventure product where they did this. They might as well thought that it was going to be easy, and then they hit the reality, and complexity of it. Which is the point I'm trying to make, you can't compare the production time of VGA games from the 90s to 3D games, not from today, and not from the late 90s either. I'm not saying that the VGA games are "easy" to put together, they are definitely not child play, and they have their own nightmares like animation for example, but 3D goes through all of that, and adds another layer of complexity to things on top of everything.
Even games like Final Fantasy went from being released year after year (VII in 97, VII, in 98, IX in 99 or 00) to taking two years for X, and then 5 years for XII and 5 years for XIII. Politics, etc, play part in that, but that's also because if you make mistakes in this generation, the price you pay is very high, because everything is more complex, and harder to "redo" or "fix".
But this is actually a very good example of what people are asking Telltale to do. They are asking them to leave what is tried and true for them in order to do new things. When you take people from their comfort zone, it creates risk. Sometimes, that risk must be matched to sales expectations. If KQ's sales expectations match their sales expectations from Jurassic Park (and trust me, they must have numbers), they will probably take the risk with King's Quest as well. If not, then they may just stay within their comfort zone in order to minimize risk. That whole thing of "well, then they must try a different model" makes sense as a fan, but not as someone who is running a company and is responsible of feeding the families of those who they have employed.
Now, are they listening? Yes, they are. Will they give us the KQ we want? no, they'll give us Telltale's King's Quest, not Sierra's King's Quest. Will it have that full exploration feeling to it with a bunch of different screens, characters, and interactions? If Monkey Island is an example to follow, the answer is no, because Tales was much smaller in number of screens and characters than every other game in the series? Will it be horrible even if it's that way? We don't know. Hey, maybe they understand what we fans want, because sometimes it seems obvious to me that we don't know and that we want all different things in a KQ. Right, but that's what the series itself taught us --always be different, there's no true King's Quest, and there's no definite way of approaching this series.
They say It all depends on Roberta's mood at the time, so, since she's retired and traveling in her boat around the world, maybe this game will feel more like Monkey Island than King's Quest :P
(and, yes, I know she's not working on this, Anakin, this is a joke
Comments
I think that it was worth announcing that they got rights to make a King's Quest game, it certainly made me happy. Game is probably still in it's early stages, so I don't know why they should tell more about it. I'm certain that once they have finished other games and when KQ is closer to release they will tell us more about it.
It's important to remember that Telltale stays pretty quiet about their games until they're really close to release. Hell, The Walking Dead is just a few months away and we've barely heard anything.
We probably won't hear anything about King's Quest until The Walking Dead finishes at the earliest.
First, Telltale spells their company name with neither a hyphen nor a space.
Second, not for at least a year I'd expect. Well... perhaps we could hear something about it at next year's E3, but don't get your hopes up.
Yes and no. The Walking Dead was technically featured at E3 and SDCC, but all we really got out of it is...
-Some concept art.
-A single screenshot.
-Being told about two of the new characters, Lee and Clementine.
-That the player's choices in early episodes will affect the outcome of the later ones.
-What might be music from the game's soundtrack.
Not a whole lot seeing how the game was announced months ago. We still haven't seen the game in action, or even been told how it'll play. (We know it's not going to be a conventional Sam and Max-style point-and-click.)
Again, TTG has enough projects that I'm not sure they'll get around to announcing anything about this for quite a while. Especially given that it was the last project on their list of upcoming games when it was first announced. Not that they have to start or finish each project in the exact order as on that list, but it certainly could be an indication of how long they may take before doing anything with the game.
And I think that it's good that KQ is at the end of the list. With franchise like KQ it's better to take all the time you need and make a decent game, rather than make quickly a half-baked game, which would just annoy the fanboys and make them cry for murder.
I think it's because Telltale knows that they have bitten off more than they can chew with this game and its nitpicky asshole fan base (proud member, right here!
I can't tell if you're serious or not! I'd say it's more due to the fact they tend to keep pretty quiet on the info front until they're actually gearing up for a release. There are a few things in the queue before KQ comes out.
Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight.
This is, after all, the most active forums they have of an unreleased game.
Just what I thought! They want to see what we expect from the game, and they may change their plans according to it. Perhaps they will even release polls in the future.
I doubt it. Telltale has already proven that they don't think their customers are capable of complex thoughts. Why would they put any stock in their customers' ideas about gameplay?
However, it is this formula what has made them stay successfully afloat in a market where every other commercial adventure company has horribly failed in the 2000s.
At the end of the day, they've found a balance that has allowed them to SURVIVE, and produce what can be considered the best adventure games of this generation, with a constant flux of releases, while reviving old gems that we hold dear.
We HAVE to get over the 90s, really. That was a great time, we got our gems, there will never be anything produced that can (or should try to) replace them. No matter how close they aim for it, it will be a game for this generation. And it has to be in order for Telltale to continue to be successful. And we can kick and cry and want KQ4, 5 or 6, and we'll be disappointed and whine. me thinks we should just enjoy it. Some of the things we are asking, we KNOW already we are not going to get, and that has nothing with Telltale wanting or not to listen, it has to do with making games that make back as much money as they put into them. And KQ5, in this generation, will not do it.
Name ONE company that does adventure games, and that comes as close as Telltale's success in how they've been able to grow in the way they have, that can have better and better production values with every new series. There's none. None. It doesn't work anymore. Blame today's economy, blame bloated salaries, blame the longer to produce technology, the days of Sierra and LucasArts models of adventure games are gone and they will stay gone until the technology changes enough that allows them to become popular again. And until that happens, I'm not going to hold my breath.
I'll just be happy to return to Daventry once more, done with the better technology that it's ever going to get up to this point.
But if you are unhappy, go and play Black Mirror 3, Memento Mori, The Whispered World. Those are true adventures like those of the 90s. Sans the production values. And developers and publishers struggle and struggle to keep afloat. And in the meanwhile, Telltale continues to grow.
Really, are we truly thinking that a company will risk so much? I for one, don't really want them to. I have a lot of friends there I'd hate to see get laid off because of a title failing to perform as well as it could because of not being accessible to the masses. And, at the end of the day, they find ways to balance accessibility and fans, which shows they care and listen within the model that works for them. Tales of Monkey Island is the perfect example of that.
Bottom line is that adventure mechanics of the 80/90s and production values of the current decade are mutually exclusive --at least for a profitable successful formula within the current market. Asking Telltale to do that is like complaining to Ubisoft because Assassins Creed is nowhere as hard, nor as unforgiving as the original Prince of Persia.
That's not really a good comparison at all. Assassin's Creed is significantly more complex in its mechanics than the original Prince of Persia--not LESS. We're talking about Telltale actively making its games less playable, less interactive, less explorable, and ultimately MUCH less engaging than ever before. Not only are they sounding the death knell of adventure games as they have traditionally been known, they are actively removing the GAME portion of their games, to the point where calling them games starts to become something of a stretch. And I think it's complete BS to act like Telltale's approach is the "wave of the future" or something, because it's not new. Games like Dragon's Lair and Space Ace did the same thing 25 years ago, minus the punishing timing-based sections. And those games are now little more than novelties relegated to the figurative dust bin of gaming history. Time will tell if this approach to games will fail as badly as I hope it does. BttF proved that this methodology can, and often does, produce terrible games. Jurassic Park will be the real test though--it goes much farther than BttF in terms of the way it deviates from traditional gameplay. Its own developers have admitted that they were going for "interactive movie" over "graphic adventure game," so we'll see how it goes. If it does bomb, though, I hope they will rethink their strategy--I do agree that some of their earlier games have been excellent. And I also agree that Tales of Monkey Island has, so far, been their crowning achievement. We'll see if they can reach those heights again...so far it has been a steady downhill slope.
I don't think that Telltale games are killing the adventure genre. They were already dead. If anything, they are bringing them back to the mainstream. Regardless of the reason, BttF has been their most successful game yet in terms of sales.
The mechanics of AC have been expanded, yes, but they have also been incredibly dumbed down. You were talking about complexity of puzzles and that was what I was responding to: the fact that things have become easier in our generation. Apparently, nobody wants to become frustrated by having to think in a game. Exploration, that's another topic and I agree that AC has evolved the gameplay of PoP into a vast and very interesting open world. But, again, we were talking about difficulty.
On BttF--I have to wonder how much of the "success" in terms of sales is purely due to the game carrying the BttF license and billing itself as the next installment in the classic series, rather than on the merits of the product as a game itself. I wonder how many of those sales actually finished all episodes of the game after spending that initial $29.99 on the season. I know I didn't. I stopped after episode 3 and have absolutely no intention of going back to it. I just have to wonder how the statistics would change if we were talking about customer satisfaction after playing through the completed final product. People were willing to take a leap of faith with BttF, mostly because Telltale hadn't yet released anything so utterly terrible before--many made the mistake of assuming it would be up to the same level of quality as their previous games. I know I sure did, and I regret it.
On adventure games in general--I certainly was talking about more than puzzle difficulty. BttF wasn't JUST bad because of easy puzzles--it was bad because you couldn't do shit in it. The entire game was set in an invisible hallway, with only a handful of side rooms and only the slightest amount of photographs hanging on the wall, metaphorically speaking, of course. By that, I mean that it completely and utterly lacked any sense of exploration and interaction, beyond the handful of interactions necessary to solve the "puzzles."
That's where a game like Assassin's Creed shines, despite the lack of any really punishing difficulty.
Personally, I don't think high difficulty is a requirement for a good adventure game. But I absolutely DO think that the ability to explore and interact with the world, beyond the meager interactions necessary to simply advance the core plot, is indispensable. And that's where Telltale has failed--miserably.
Yes, Heavy Rain sold well but it wasn't a continuation on a beloved franchise and it wasn't an adventure game. If they turn King's Quest into an "interactive movie" I will not buy it. I won't even give it a chance.
One the one hand, it really IS synonymous with 90s adventure game design elements. Trying to separate the two completely would be a mistake. On the other hand, there are certainly ways to update and modernize those elements (WITHOUT DUMBING DOWN THE EXPERIENCE--listen closely, Telltale!) that really could bring the franchise into line with today's gaming standards.
Another thing that makes King's Quest unique is that each installment in the franchise is quite a bit different, either in terms of game design, interface, story, etc. So which installment do they try to emulate? KQ5 or 6--generally considered to be the pinnacles of the series? KQ7--with its horrid interface and chapter setup that is closer to the traditional Telltale format? KQ8 with its action elements? Some amalgam of all of the above? It's hard to say.
One thing all KQ games have in common is a sense of nonlinear exploration. This is an element that is almost entirely absent from Telltale's games, and one that I think will be crucial to figure out and capture, if they want to mimic the style & tone of King's Quest.
I strongly disagree that KQ games have been or should be primarily about story--I'm sure Telltale could expand on the usual bare bones KQ storylines successfully--story is one of their strong points--but it shouldn't be the SOLE focus of the experience, as it has been in most Telltale games.
So, again, you cannot expect something that the genre can't offer. You may get something similar, but never the worlds of the 90s. Those, these days, belong to games like Skyrim or AC or Dragon Age. or maybe even something like Heavy Rain. But, a point and click adventure?
And thus is why Telltale tries to modernize the genre so that they can draw masses in again, so they can offer bigger worlds eventually... or I'd guess that'd make sense.
Sigh...:rolleyes: I'm not talking about a world the size of Assassin's Creed II or Skyrim. Clearly, nobody expects that. I'm talking about a world that SEEMS large and expansive.
KQ5 and 6 had worlds that SEEMED large an expansive without actually being so. It was all a cleverly veiled illusion.
To put it another way, it's not the SIZE of the world, but how INTERACTIVE it is. If players have the ability to comb through every background object (at least to the degree of KQ5 or 6), the world doesn't actually need to be that LARGE. It just has to be fleshed out. The object is to make the player FEEL like they have a greater latitude to explore as they see fit. Even KQ5, arguably the most expansive FEELING of the series, has fairly confined areas. KQ7 also feels large and explorable (though to a lesser degree thanks to the crap interface), and it is even broken into episodes! What I'm talking about is absolutely possible. All they need to do is make fleshed out areas with lots of extraneous interactions, and create a list of tasks that do not necessarily have to be completed in a specific order. Those smaller tasks can be part of a larger puzzle that unlocks the next area (or ends the episode.)
Seriously, I can't believe you of all people are arguing that this is impossible. TSL pretty much has done it already!
I understand what you are saying, and I know TSL has done it. But I've worked at Telltale, as well. Telltale's model doesn't fit the number of screens TSL has. It would be way too much for their production cycles.
If you compare TSL to Tales of Monkey Island, for example, TSL's world is much bigger. A world the size of TSL would cost Telltale a lot of money. That's what I'm saying.
So basically you're saying that a professional company with paid workers and a budget couldn't accomplish the same level of gameplay depth and quality as a group of amateur fan developers with no budget or compensation?
Why does that statement not seem to make sense to me?
Because we had years to make it happen. And we didn't care how much we "spent". That makes a huge difference. Producing that same amount of content in a year period, would have been next to impossible, even with a big budget. Note that I'm talking just about quantity (number of screens, number of characters, number of actions you can perform, etc), they will definitely have better quality.
We are talking about x number of months to craft the first episode, but then it goes down to a timeline of roughly one to two months to put together a full episode. Trust me, I've been there, that times passes FAST. You could insert 40 more people to create more content, yes, but 1) that's money, 2) in such a short amount of time it becomes extremely chaotic to manage, because you still want only a few people managing a huge team in order to hold the vision into something coherent.
Remember, a game like Mask of Eternity, or even Gabriel Knight 3 took 2-3 years to make. Those are 2-3 years of spending a lot of money maintaining a team. That's a hit that Bioware could take these days, but it would ruin a "small" company like Telltale. Professional has nothing to do with it --again, we are not in the golden years of adventure anymore where Sierra was one of the lead developers, they had a PR monster machine and their games were the popular ones. All that has changed immensely. And so, in order for a game like King's Quest to survive in this time, it would have to adapt to a lot of things.
What I'm hoping we get is what Tales fans got when you compare it to something like Curse of Monkey Island. Still, a lot less scenes/characters, but it was done in such a smart way that they managed to keep the feeling of Monkey Island. But, like you've said before, King's Quest is about exploration. Maybe Telltale will come up with a way where they give us a big forest that they manage to create within their budget, I don't know, I really don't know what's going on in there anymore, and they have scaled up since I left. But I'm setting my expectations accordingly to the amount of content they have created for all of their games, because that's probably what we are going to get for King's Quest.
I'm talking from personal experience as I've been delving a lot into that lately. If we were to do a commercial project, it would be hugely scaled down from the size of TSL --TSL would probably cost 2-3 millions dollars or so to make or more with a timeline of 2 years or so (if graphics were updated to latest technology). That's just development money and not counting in any Publicity/Publishing/Licenses related costs. Unfortunately, I don't think any adventure game would make that kind of money back.
Look at a game like Dreamfall. Big, huge, pretty and fun. Where's the sequel? Where's the next adventure game from Funcom? It didn't sell enough. Telltale's game won't carry the headlines news. That's space is reserved for other games these days, so you either sacrifice a lot in order to make these games, or you fail miserably, like 95% of adventure developers in the 2000s. And then, for better or worse, we had Telltale coming along, and finding a way to steadily put out products every year. We can say whatever about their games, but damn, we got to applaud them in how they've managed to do this successfully where everyone else has failed.
I don't think that way. Honestly, if it's not my cup of tea I won't play it, but that won't change my feelings about King's Quest. Mask of Eternity certainly didn't make me feel different about King's Quest V or VI. If anything, it just reinforced what masterpieces they were.
If it's not what you want, let a new generation enjoy it. It may even get them interested to go to the past and experience the old games.
If we didn't want it brought back officially, maybe we shouldn't have worked so hard in keeping it alive with our fan games
There's an enormous amount of sense in what you've been saying, but this statement is a bit of an exaggeration. Look at Her Interactive for example. They've churned out a couple of entries in the Nancy Drew adventure game series every year, across multiple platforms, for a good number of years now. Pendulo Studios was founded in 1994, and while not exactly prolific, they still seem to be making games (and games that are fairly well rooted in old adventure traditions at that).
While Telltale certainly stands out in terms of rapid growth, I wouldn't say they are the ONLY company in the WHOLE WORLD that is doing ok.
Yeah, but Her Interactive's games are not something you would find as being hyped or wanted as a Telltale game. It depends on the public, I guess, but there's in general, from players and press, a huge gap when it comes to interest level from both companies games. There's a quality to Telltale Games that you don't find in other studios.
I did say constant release of games, as well. So, yes, I know about Pendulo and I know about other companies out there, but there's nothing that scratches Telltale Games when it comes to a steady, growing, successful formula. Everyone else is just gasping for air, or producing low quality products. That's what I meant.
Telltale is going to have to try a different approach with the KQ license, or it won't be King's Quest.
At least not in the eyes of fans of the old games. I firmly believe that it will be impossible to capture the spirit and tone of the original KQ games using the format Telltale has used with the majority of their adventure games--games like Tales or Sam & Max.
It's just that simple.
Now, despite my negative outcry, I don't think that it is TOTALLY outside the realm of possibility that they could do King's Quest justice, but it won't be with a game formatted like Tales of Monkey Island or Sam & Max. And CERTAINLY not one formatted like BttF. *shudders and crosses himself*
Telltale has shown with Jurassic Park that they are willing to experiment with new formats--they are even bringing down the episode count to four (presumably to flesh out each episode.) So maybe they will surprise us with something new for King's Quest.
That's what I'm hoping. Otherwise, it's already over.
Well, one must remember, Cesar probably has an agena saying what he does. After all, his team was bucking hard to get the license themselves so we could get Angst Quest I, II, III starring the emotionally tortured King Graham and the creepy, whipped, anime-esque Alexander.
The only reasons KQ8 and GK3 took 2-3 years were largely technical issues and the fact that Sierra's new management had no faith in adventure games. Consider that that KQ8's production started in 1996, and was planned to be released for Christmas 1997--Only Dynamix's failures and the new management having no faith in adventure games and trying to control Roberta stopped that.
That may have been part of it, I won't talk about MoE because I don't know the story, but GK3 took 3 years because it needed them (and I had a conversation with Jane Jensen about it). Granted, there were a lot of technical issues why this happened, but that's all part of the complexity of systems since 3D was implemented. The truth of the matter is that as developers get their hands on better and better technology, times also increase. For the 3D technology, you have to do your 2D passes, but then, when you get to the modeling part, that normally takes more time than 2D. Nowadays with Normal Maps which brings the ability of doing extraordinary detail on things, a character that you could do in 5 days prior to this technology, now can take 15. The more detail and features you can add, the more time game making is going to take.
The development cycles of Sierra games in the 90s were about a year each with a mid size team. You would not be able to do that in less than 2 years today and you would need double or triple the team. Just look at a credits list of a game of today and compare it to a game from the 90s. Look at the absurdity of Uncharted or Assassins Creed lists. They never end, they keep rolling and rolling and rolling. Making AAA titles is absurd in how expensive it can be today. In the same way, GK and MoE were pushing the technology back in their day, and MoE was basically their first adventure product where they did this. They might as well thought that it was going to be easy, and then they hit the reality, and complexity of it. Which is the point I'm trying to make, you can't compare the production time of VGA games from the 90s to 3D games, not from today, and not from the late 90s either. I'm not saying that the VGA games are "easy" to put together, they are definitely not child play, and they have their own nightmares like animation for example, but 3D goes through all of that, and adds another layer of complexity to things on top of everything.
Even games like Final Fantasy went from being released year after year (VII in 97, VII, in 98, IX in 99 or 00) to taking two years for X, and then 5 years for XII and 5 years for XIII. Politics, etc, play part in that, but that's also because if you make mistakes in this generation, the price you pay is very high, because everything is more complex, and harder to "redo" or "fix".
But this is actually a very good example of what people are asking Telltale to do. They are asking them to leave what is tried and true for them in order to do new things. When you take people from their comfort zone, it creates risk. Sometimes, that risk must be matched to sales expectations. If KQ's sales expectations match their sales expectations from Jurassic Park (and trust me, they must have numbers), they will probably take the risk with King's Quest as well. If not, then they may just stay within their comfort zone in order to minimize risk. That whole thing of "well, then they must try a different model" makes sense as a fan, but not as someone who is running a company and is responsible of feeding the families of those who they have employed.
Now, are they listening? Yes, they are. Will they give us the KQ we want? no, they'll give us Telltale's King's Quest, not Sierra's King's Quest. Will it have that full exploration feeling to it with a bunch of different screens, characters, and interactions? If Monkey Island is an example to follow, the answer is no, because Tales was much smaller in number of screens and characters than every other game in the series? Will it be horrible even if it's that way? We don't know. Hey, maybe they understand what we fans want, because sometimes it seems obvious to me that we don't know and that we want all different things in a KQ. Right, but that's what the series itself taught us --always be different, there's no true King's Quest, and there's no definite way of approaching this series.
They say It all depends on Roberta's mood at the time, so, since she's retired and traveling in her boat around the world, maybe this game will feel more like Monkey Island than King's Quest :P
(and, yes, I know she's not working on this, Anakin, this is a joke