Gamescom Debrief
Aug 11, 2015
I'm back from Gamescom and just about caught up on my sleeps.
It was fun being part of the Microsoft show. I've never been involved in one of those big presentations before and it was fun to see from behind the scenes.
I was part of the indie section and for the most part they didn't let us watch the rehearsals for the rest of the show (they know what a blabbermouth I am). I showed up at 10am and we did two rehearsals and it was deemed by higher powers that we didn't need another one in the afternoon. The whole thing was a little nerve-racking. I don't like giving talks or presentations and I thought this one would be easier since I only had three sentences to say, but I was wrong.
When I give a normal 40 minute talk, if I screw up a line, it's one of 1000 sentences, but with this, if I screwed up a line, it was like I'd screwed up ⅓ of my entire presentation. It's odd how much little thoughts like that can worm their way into your head. I became obsessed with not screwing up ⅓ of my talk, and that, of course, made it a lot worse.
They also had teleprompters, which I've never used before and you'd think that would make things easier, but it actually worked against me. I had my little speech memorized, but my eyes kept darting to the teleprompters and my brain would panic that I wasn't saying what was being displayed.
The first rehearsal went flawlessly. I really screwed up the second one and was hoping we'd get to do another run-through, but it was deemed unnecessary. The second day I got the next two rehearsals right, but I still felt like I was fighting what my brain had memorize and what was being displayed. This was complicated by one of the lines I wrote being changed slightly. I had the world "Lucasfilm" in the second sentence and they removed that for legal reasons, so I was fighting what I had memorized with what was being displayed.
Everything worked out in the end and I had a great time. Everyone at Microsoft was great and fun to work with.
It's worth noting that none of the Kickstarter money is being used for the Xbox port. The money we got from Microsoft covers the port and there is a little extra to make the main game better.
Also worth noting that there isn't a good way for backers to get the Xbox version instead of (or in addition to) the Windows/Mac/Linux Kickstarter platforms. I asked about this to the point of being annoying and Microsoft has no way to mass distribute keys and deal with the accounting of it all. It's something they'd like to do, but they are a huge company and getting (seemly easy) things like this implemented is not easy. It might change in the next year, but it's unlikely. We will keep looking at options, but don't get your hopes up. We just want to be upfront about this.
Gamescom was huge. I'm used to E3, but this dwarfed it.
The main show was overwhelming, so I hung out in the retro area and played a brand new point & click adventure on the C64 and did a live on-stage interview.
I spent an hour talking to some students and tried to scare them out of getting into games (no luck).
I had a great time at the Adventure-Treff™ party signing Maniac Mansion and Monkey Island boxes, handing out pins and refrigerator magnets, and chatting with everyone. Good times and really good people. I didn't take any pictures except the one of a three head monkey t-shirt. I'm really crappy at taking pictures when I'm traveling so I just stole some from twitter.
It's good to be home and working on the game again.
- Ron
P.S. Cologne has a really big church. Not sure if anyone else noticed.
gamescom is open to everyone.
PS: Yeah, it took very long until that cathedral was completed. But it was worth it!
I code games on my free time only. Never made any adventure game because I only want to code games with a huge replay value. On the other hand, I think that adventure games (or with a very strong story line) are the best.
Playing Monkey Island with my best friend during a very hot summer of the 90's will remain one of the best memories in my life.
And... yeah... I'll buy Thimbleweed Park in order to make amends of pirating Monkey Island in the first place.
Are you not going to share the title???
Also, was your on stage interview recorded?
Glad you liked cologne.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d9hv_nUXszc
It's a 10 minute interview about Thimbleweed Park (I already posted this link today under the last blog entry but I think it also makes a nice addition to this new entry).
Btw, the C64 adventure Ron was talking about is 'Caren and the Tangled Tentacles', see: http://www.indieretronews.com/2015/08/caren-and-tangled-tentacles-c64.html
It was darned slow. I had to move it over the desk 3 times to get from one side of the screen to the other, but it felt a lot better than playing with the joystick.
I for one wouldn't object to tank controlls on the console version. I'm also not sure it I will ever play the console version, though, as I don't have one...
Actually the controls for Caren are optimized for using a Joystick with 4-way-commands, compact range for pointer movements and 16x16 pixel minimum size for objects to avoid pixel perfect access. Mouse option is kept in mind for the project, but tbh I don't think that this will be a significant improvement (except faster pointer movements).
http://www.protovision-online.de/development/heroes_and_cowards.php?language=en
The steelbook edition was sold at Gamescom and it will be available at Protovision very soon!
Everybody likes tentacles, but an original story has more chance of becoming something great.
That being said, it was great to see that you had a try with our early version of the game, Ron! After studying your game/engine so intensely that just seems about fair ;-) Not having been there obviously was a mistake. It really rocked -and continuously does so- to face the same issues as you did with ThimbleweedPark (and in fact with MM) such as walking-stuff, blocked passages, text-handling, scripting. There were moments that we were in sync *yay*. Ok, I am of course totally excited and after almost 30 years, it's time to continue this genre also for C64 where it all started : ) What you do remains an amazing source of (legal, in agreement with all copyright considerations and stuff) inspiration!
PS: whose TwitterAccount did you take the dog from?
PPS: I finally realize: WE are the three-headed-monkey: code, gfx, music.
PPPS: Next step after completion of an Point-and-click Adventure for the C64 and the facial surgery to look like you: how did you lose that weight? That was in fact my wife's remark when I pointed at your picture on the web with 'look, HE wrote the original Point-and-click adventure for the c64!' - 'Nice, how comes HE lost that much weight?'
P^4S (no Xbox pun intended): At least now that our engine handles >1 rooms, my 4 year old daughter stopped complaining 'Why that little woman can not go through the door.'
All the best and the most possible (without posing a health hazard) of fun for your Project. Special Hi to DavidFox for tuning SPUTM and also being responsible for that one other great game for the C64.
Caren and the tangled tentacles
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R4P60l_Myo4
Only it's not a shirt, but fridge magnet.
And it's not lousy.
Thanks for being there!
http://www.redbubble.com/people/rkrovs/works/8815997-three-headed-monkey
PS: Talking about humans.....how can I always fail the Seckrit Question??
It´s about 157 meters high and was first opened in 1322.(but got expanded over the years)
Glad you had a great time in Cologne :) I´m living about 50 kilometers away from there.
It's rare to see a person actually look better and more vibrant at 55 than 25, and you were not exactly ugly at 25.
Don't think four years is going to make much of a difference. By then you'll be possibly be even better looking, with triumphant resurgence of adventure games TP will ensue.
He doesn't explain why.
Which I find very curious.
It's just that I have a hard time coming up with Xbox exclusives that are worth playing, let alone get the console for.
With multiplatform games PS4 will almost always win per default due to it's better hardware, one would think.
Only, some things matter beyond death. Look at the ideals, spirit and taste the companies behind the hardware project. What you choose to support is also a choice with consequences, albeit most often small. But collectively...
And of course I'm not *just* talking video game hardware here.
If Microsoft had the best deal as Ron wrote, why not! It doesn't seem to be an adhesion contract. I'm sure that Ron has checked the contract terms before signing it. At least a Playstation release doesn't seem to be excluded.
BTW, is there a Zak McKracken box that would have same thickness as the other games? My copy is thinner than the rest.
The best thing to do in those situations is to take as many drugs as you can beforehand so that you're completely tripping balls when you walk out on stage.
Though I must say -- I was very glad to see "Chuck" made an appearance in The Cave. :-)
Did you know that Colognes huge church (the "Dom" ) isn´t hollow?
I have been there on several occasions over 20 years and each and every time it wasn´t open for visitors... "just now"... yeah, right...
-> It´s all a fake I tell you!
That being said, it was great to see that you had a try with our early version of the game, Ron! After studying your game/engine so intensely that just seems about fair ;-) Not having been there obviously was a mistake. It really rocked -and continuously does so- to face the same issues as you did with ThimbleweedPark (and in fact with MM) such as walking-stuff, blocked passages, text-handling, scripting. There were moments that we were in sync *yay*. Ok, I am of course totally excited and after almost 30 years, it's time to continue this genre also for C64 where it all started : ) What you do remains an amazing source of (legal, in agreement with all copyright considerations and stuff) inspiration!
PS: whose TwitterAccount did you take the dog from?
PPS: I finally realize: WE are the three-headed-monkey: code, gfx, music.
PPPS: Next step after completion of an Point-and-click Adventure for the C64 and the facial surgery to look like you: how did you lose that weight? That was in fact my wife's remark when I pointed at your picture on the web with 'look, HE wrote the original Point-and-click adventure for the c64!' - 'Nice, how comes HE lost that much weight?'
P^4S (no Xbox pun intended): At least now that our engine handles >1 rooms, my 4 year old daughter stopped complaining 'Why that little woman can not go through the door.'
All the best and the most possible (without posing a health hazard) of fun for your Project. Special Hi to DavidFox for tuning SPUTM and also being responsible for that one other great game for the C64.
'Veto' is the handle of Oliver Lindau, the gfx-artist behind our C64 game 'Caren and the Tangled Tentacles'. My post was intended as an rely further up the comments. Sorry for this mess.
Back to ThimbleweedPark: it is cool that you managed an extra-release for an up-to-date console. Bringing 2d Adventures to those first-person-madness-machines is a win-win for sure.
From 1880 to 1884 it was the highest building in the world.
I´m the one with the 3 headed monkey plush figurine. ;)
Was a pleasure meeting you.
Happy to have the original Maniac Mansion poster now signed by Gary and yourself :-)
Plus all the boxes signed... so cool! :-)
PS. Is developing TP your daily work out? You lost some weight ;-)
http://grumpygamer.com/year_in_review_2013