Broken Age - Double Fine's Kickstarter Adventure Game

[aris]

You're the second person who's said they could have spent the money to make a sequel to an old hit. Seriously, don't we have enough sequels -- from publisher-backed games, no less?

Clearly, you haven't played Psychonauts.

I don't see why psychonauts would need a sequel, or indeed how is there is place for one. It's a fully contained and concluded story with that one installment alone.

 

[MicoSelva]

It was a great game that deserves a sequel and the ending makes it clear they have (or at least had at the time) more ideas to warrant one.

 

[aris]

It was a great game, absolutely, but what makes you think they had further plans for it?

 

[trustno1code]

Ok finished it. Certainly not the second coming of adventure game jesus, but well worth my money so far with the first installment. Looking forward to the second one!


Any ETA on the second part?

I read somewhere it's supposed to be May. In one of the release announcements somewhere, I think, but a projected release date probably doesn't mean much in this case.

Schafer in recent interviews mentions "late summer" now.

 

[MicoSelva]

It was a great game, absolutely, but what makes you think they had further plans for it?

Did you actually see the ending?

 

[Ninja Destroyer]

All they need is a kickstarter with 18 millions dollars goal. I'm fairly sure DF wouldn't needed more

 

[Darth Slaughter]

It was a great game, absolutely, but what makes you think they had further plans for it?

Did you actually see the ending?

As if a movie/game needs an ending to justify a sequel... even self contained stories can produce sequels, and stories with a hook for sequel not always mean the writers have a sequel in mind, and sometimes, they even disregard the hook and make a sequel following another plot.

Funny is that yesterday i rewatched Innerspace, an 80's movie that ended with a hook for a sequel... that was never made and i believe it was never considered in the first place.

That being said, it would be great if psychonauts would get a sequel in the same vein as the first one... but it would be though for DF to make a worthy one...

 

[suejak]

There is so much absurdity in this worthless thread.

1) You hate on Kickstarter, like the publisher model is somehow superior.

2) You compare Broken Age to indie games made by fans in their free time over many years, and somehow don't understand why BA cost more money. And this is sardonically hilarious to you, because professionals are sellouts.

3) You demand a SEQUEL to a dinosaur from the past, like every new release these days isn't a fucking sequel to something. It blows my mind that you think a sequel means something. Do you really think you would have liked a Full Throttle 2 from the same people who made Broken Age?

4) You compare Broken Age to DAEDALIC games and conclude that Broken Age is worse.

5) You dislike Broken Age but claim to like adventure games.

Str8 fax: if you like adventure games, you will like Broken Age.

If you don't like Broken Age, you can't claim to have liked any of the classics, you fuckin dirty loud retarded poser. There is very fucking little putting a game like Full Throttle -- short, bad puzzles, melodramatic, not even funny, over Hollywoodized, basically one long cutscene with proto-QTEs -- over Broken Age. And hey, GRIM FANDANGO'S VERBS sure were great, huh?

Every game had flaws. Broken Age's first act has one glaring flaw: shit puzzles. And that's it. It's already beating Full Throttle by my count.

 

[Aeschylus]

Every game had flaws. Broken Age's first act has one glaring flaw: shit puzzles. And that's it. It's already beating Full Throttle by my count.

I'll skip over your other blathering (well, I agree with #1 and #2 at least) and just say: when puzzles are basically the entirety of your gameplay experience, having shit puzzles is kind of a problem.

 

[suejak]

Every game had flaws. Broken Age's first act has one glaring flaw: shit puzzles. And that's it. It's already beating Full Throttle by my count.

I'll skip over your other blathering (well, I agree with #1 and #2 at least) and just say: when puzzles are basically the entirety of your gameplay experience, having shit puzzles is kind of a problem.

Who the fuck said it's not a problem? I specifically said that's it's one glaring flaw.

Hope you DESPISE Full Throttle, because I'll be damned if that game had good puzzles.

 

[tuluse]

Who the fuck said it's not a problem? I specifically said that's it's one glaring flaw.

Hope you DESPISE Full Throttle, because I'll be damned if that game had good puzzles.

I like the bunny rabbit/minefield puzzle, and the village where you meet Mo was nice though none of the puzzles stand out individually.

 

[Aeschylus]

FT is my least favorite of the classic Lucasarts games, yes, and that is part of the reason. The puzzles are still better than in BA though.

So, Broken Age has worse puzzles (because there is zero challenge to them), stripped down interaction, a pretty empty, small game world (and therefore very little exploration), and an irritating user interface. It fails basically every single *gameplay* aspect of an adventure game, and you say anyone who loves adventure games should love it? I actually dislike the game a lot less than many of the people here seem to, but it is not good as an adventure game.

 

[Dexter]

1) You hate on Kickstarter, like the publisher model is somehow superior.

Who is? Both of them seem to have their problems but so far it has brought a lot of "incline" to the Codex.

2) You compare Broken Age to indie games made by fans in their free time over many years, and somehow don't understand why BA cost more money. And this is sardonically hilarious to you, because professionals are sellouts.

If Indie games made by fans end up being a lot better (and have their focus on more important parts of the "game") than the one done by the "professionals", what does this tell us about them?

3) You demand a SEQUEL to a dinosaur from the past, like every new release these days isn't a fucking sequel to something. It blows my mind that you think a sequel means something. Do you really think you would have liked a Full Throttle 2 from the same people who made Broken Age?

There is nothing inherently wrong with Sequels, they are just a "bad thing" if the quality gradually decreases, if it becomes a yearly thing because of money (Assassin's Creed, Call of Duty) or if people got enough from them already. I don't see what would be wrong with a sequel to a 19 or 9 year old game that people would like to see more of. Full Throttle might not be my first choice though. Also I think what people are talking about are "Spiritual Sequel" since Broken Age ended up being a Casual tablet game for young adults.

4) You compare Broken Age to DAEDALIC games and conclude that Broken Age is worse.

All Daedalic games I've played so far have been better than Broken Age (which were Deponia 1+2 and The Whispered World although I did get an urge to play some more after playing through Broken Age and I already have A New Beginning and Chains of Satinav). I even find their hand-drawn art better overall and characters more built out and generally interesting. They do fail in the sound/music and often the joke department though. I'm not sure what is so funny about this.

5) You dislike Broken Age but claim to like adventure games.

Str8 fax: if you like adventure games, you will like Broken Age.

I dislike (or rather I find it highly meh and it annoys me that some people can apparently find nothing but praise for it) Broken Age because I like Adventure games, for reference: http://www.rpgcodex.net/forums/inde...d-an-adventure-game.20927/page-3#post-2353529

If you don't like Broken Age, you can't claim to have liked any of the classics, you fuckin dirty loud retarded poser. There is very fucking little putting a game like Full Throttle -- short, bad puzzles, melodramatic, not even funny, over Hollywoodized, basically one long cutscene with proto-QTEs -- over Broken Age. And hey, GRIM FANDANGO'S VERBS sure were great, huh?

To be clearer Full Throttle had a more interesting world with an endearing and unique main character and that is largely what makes the game. I can't exactly remember most of the puzzles since playing it the last was long ago (might be due for a replay) but I think it had 4 interaction verbs and most of what you did during the short intro (climb out of the garbage bin, interact with the people in the bar, climb over the fence(?), get your bike running) had more complexity to it than most of Broken Age.

The other thing was also discussed here: http://www.rpgcodex.net/forums/inde...ter-adventure-game.69252/page-54#post-2943286

 

[Darth Slaughter]

If you don't like Broken Age, you can't claim to have liked any of the classics, you fuckin dirty loud retarded poser. There is very fucking little putting a game like Full Throttle -- short, bad puzzles, melodramatic, not even funny, over Hollywoodized, basically one long cutscene with proto-QTEs -- over Broken Age. And hey, GRIM FANDANGO'S VERBS sure were great, huh?

Full throttle is not the best adventure game of lucas arts. It's the closest lucasarts adventure that broken age can get. Full Throttle is very short, compared to other adventures of LA and was one of my main complaints back then... it was easier than the LA standard, but yet it was more challenging than broken age. Anyway it was the first solo project by tim schafer... DOTT, and Monkey Island were developed by ron gilbert and dave grossman.

Grim fandango had... verbs: you could look, you could talk/use, and you could pick. Three actions that differ from one-click-does-all. Even The Dig had a 2 button interface and a better scheme than BA. I doubt people were expecting a full verb menu filling half of screen, but at least a more modern way of representing it, as lots of adventures did before.

Oh, there's a fact that BA isn't even funny, apart from the girls being sacrificed in a form of a miss universe contest, which actually reminded of the human contest in future DOTT.

 

[Sceptic]

There is so much absurdity in this worthless thread.

I fail to see how any of your so-called attacks show absuridity in any way (well, your own retors do).

1) You hate on Kickstarter, like the publisher model is somehow superior.

False dichotomy and strawman. The hatin' on the way DF managed their funds simply dispels the myth that, if given no publisher interference whatsoever, developers can do Something Awesome with very little funding that doesn't cater to the lower common denominator. BA shows that, even when given tons of money and free reign and no publisher control whatsoever, a developer like DF will still make a humongously expensive and mismanaged project that caters to the lower common denominator. This has nothing to do with supposed superiority of the publisher model - clearly both models can be crap and lead to the exact same shit being released.

2) You compare Broken Age to indie games made by fans in their free time over many years, and somehow don't understand why BA cost more money.

I am rereading this over and over, and I still fail to see the problem. If you're implying that BA costs money because it was made by profsunals instead of amateur fans, and that this excuse its bloated budget, well....

3) You demand a SEQUEL to a dinosaur

Stopped reading right there, typical suejak trolling.

OK I lie I did keep reading. And you're right, clearly a FT2 from these people would've sucked.

4) You compare Broken Age to DAEDALIC games and conclude that Broken Age is worse.

Haven't played Daedelic games so whatever.

5) You dislike Broken Age but claim to like adventure games.

I like adventure games with good puzzles. BA has shit puzzles -> I dislike BA. It's really not rocket science honey (with apologies to Jaesun)

Str8 fax: if you like adventure games with no puzzles, you will like Broken Age.

Fixed.

If you don't like Broken Age, you can't claim to have liked any of the classics, you fuckin dirty loud retarded poser.

See #5

And hey, GRIM FANDANGO'S VERBS sure were great, huh?

I've always made my stance on GF pretty clear, so whatever.

Every game had flaws. Broken Age's first act has one glaring flaw: shit puzzles. And that's it.

See #5. When your one glaring flaw is what MAKES THE ENTIRETY OF YOUR GAMEPLAY then your game is shit. It's like claiming a pinball game with shitty pinball mechanics is still a great game because of teh graphics and teh story.

Dexter beat me to it with better arguments too. Damn you Dexter!

 

[buzz]

I don't get why people still use the "oh they're a studio and people need to get paid!!" argument. It's not even a valid one.
Yes, people need to get paid at Double Fine. Which is the exact reason why this game should have been at least on the same level of quality with indie titles, or much better than them. And by that, I mean better production values "overall", not just in some slightly-less significant sectors.
Most adventure game fans would be more than content if the characters would just have a small mouth-moving animation when they talk instead of flailing their arms around and shit, especially if that resulted in more interactivity with the scenes for example. Crap, cut the voice acting if that would result in a bigger, fuller game.


Seriously, adventures are some of the least pretentious types of games to make. Even in the graphics/background/character design department there's less work to be done than in - say, an infinity-style RPG. The fact that individuals/small teams can make them is proof of that.

 

[Pyke]

If I want that I'll kickstart Werner Fucking Herzog.

Holistically the Kickstarter was for the game as well as the documentary. If you backed the Kickstarter you backed both, and the documentary more than delivers on its promise.

Which you're no longer able to buy at this point.

Really? Thats sad.

 

[m_s0]

The documentary should be getting a separate release sometime in the future if I remember correctly.

 

[J_C]

I don't get why people still use the "oh they're a studio and people need to get paid!!" argument. It's not even a valid one.
Yes, people need to get paid at Double Fine. Which is the exact reason why this game should have been at least on the same level of quality with indie titles, or much better than them. And by that, I mean better production values "overall", not just in some slightly-less significant sectors.
Most adventure game fans would be more than content if the characters would just have a small mouth-moving animation when they talk instead of flailing their arms around and shit, especially if that resulted in more interactivity with the scenes for example. Crap, cut the voice acting if that would result in a bigger, fuller game.


Seriously, adventures are some of the least pretentious types of games to make. Even in the graphics/background/character design department there's less work to be done than in - say, an infinity-style RPG. The fact that individuals/small teams can make them is proof of that.

If you have watched the documentary, you saw that making the engine and pulling of this artstyle needed a lot of work.

 

[FeelTheRads]

If you watch a documentary made by a company about how that company works you will see that they are awesome and what they do is very difficult, but they're always fair and honest about themselves.

I think this is what you meant.

 

[Deleted member 7219]

I saw the first couple of parts of the documentary. I thought it was ok. Then the game came out, and it was a big disappointment.

Why should I watch the remaining parts now that I know these people sat around making a bad game?

 

[Boleskine]

The documentary has been really entertaining. The sidequests are also worth a watch.

 

[evdk]

I saw the first couple of parts of the documentary. I thought it was ok. Then the game came out, and it was a big disappointment.

Why should I watch the remaining parts now that I know these people sat around making a bad game?

To laugh at them.

 

[toro]

Every game had flaws. Broken Age's first act has one glaring flaw: shit puzzles. And that's it. It's already beating Full Throttle by my count.

 

[J1M]

Someone post the twist, I want to judge your opinions of it without wasting 2 hours to play this.