Mark Ferrari™ Joins Team Thimbleweed™
Jun 01, 2015
So my dream team on the art development side of Thimbleweed Park is a reasonably short list, consisting mainly of people we've worked with in the past on a number of our graphic adventures, in particular artists who were instrumental in making the SCUMM games around the time we created Maniac Mansion, Loom and Monkey Island.
At the very top of the list is Mark Ferrari and we're amazingly excited to announce that he is now part of Team Thimbleweed and will be doing most of the backgrounds. Mark was the background artist for the incomparable Loom and was also responsible for the stunning backgrounds on Monkey Island 1. Mark might truly be the most talented background artist I've ever worked with.
It's hard to contain our excitement of having Mark on board.
Here is one of the tests he did for the entrance to the circus Ransome lives in. It's a long way from being done, but you can see where he is going with it.
Keep in mind that this is just a initial samples he did for us and (although they might not look like it) are still wireframes. Ron and I are still working to determine the final nuances of the graphics and although we'll be showing off a number of examples, most are still placeholder art, we'll let you know when something's actually final, we promise!
As one of the premier environmental artists in the gaming industry, during our tenure at Lucasfilm/Lucasarts Mark's early work with us is considered legendary. In the 80's he managed to stretch the look of 8 bit color palettes with innovative dither techniques, lighting and layout. Mark also developed a truly unique approach to color cycling/palette shifting unlike anything seen before or since.
Remember, this isn't animation in the traditional sense, rather it's all being done by just organizing and changing palette registers in sequence. At that time we didn't have the computing power necessary to just make it an animated .gif... This was mind blowing stuff!
I first met Mark at, of all things, a science fiction and fantasy convention being held at the San Jose Red Lion Inn (shades of ThimbleCon). Everyone was talking about some guy in the art show who drew amazing stuff in colored pencils... I took a look at Mark's work and was amazed, they practically looked like oil paintings done in prismacolor pencil.
Being the art director of Lucasfilm Games at the time had its perks and I was immediately introduced to Mark. My memory's a bit fuzzy, but I don't think Mark really had any computer experience at the time. In those days I invited candidates out to Skywalker Ranch for lunch and an art test working on an IBM PC in dpaint.
To say Mark was a natural at computer graphics would be an understatement, he was constantly breaking new ground, first on Loom and then on Monkey Island. As with most of the art staff from those days, Mark remained friends with Ron and I over the years.
Having Mark on the team will move the art more in the direction that will end up being half way between Maniac Mansion and Monkey island as he'll be taking over finalizing most of Thimbleweed Park's background art development. We haven't completely finalized the look, and this is a little different from the Kickstarter art, but we like where this is going.
In any case... welcome to the team Mark, it's great to be working with you again!
Head on over to Geekscape for interview with Ron and I.
- Gary
Really? It already looks awesome!
Also, can you maybe modify/update the Thimbleweed site to include a page that includes all the people currently involved in the project and what their roles are? And, also provide links to their personal websites as well?
I also support the idea of having a "Team" page.
IMO the look of MM always was a bit like high school dioramas (I know it was early days and things wasn't advanced). That all changed with MI1. I still remember the opening of that game, going down the port, past the bar and into town. Wow.. Just wow. Suddenly there where lots of details and depth to all the backgrounds.
Here's one hoping to see some of that again :)
This is getting better and better guys!!
I took a quick look at the picture of the carnival before I read about it and really really hoped it was for Thimbleweed, but I was afraid that it's for some another project Ferrari was working on.
It was for Thimbleweed! Yay! Let me in there already! =)
Earth shattering adventure game news!! Mark is back!! ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!
Hope this means there will be colour cycling in the game itself, I love that stuff.
1. This project is what I wish Borken Age would have become. Therefore I think that Ron and Tim have pretty different opinions about how a classic adeventure game looks like and they don't seem to be compatible. I like Ron's approach a thousand times better than Broken Age. That is why I'm happy that there is no involvement of Schafer on this project.
2. I'm still wondering why Ron has left DoubleFine only to start his own classic adventure a few months (?) later. The only reasons I can think of are that Ron either doesn't want to work with Tim on a project like this or that he thinks the project wouldn't benefit from that.
Bottom line: The humour, design, art and project management on Thimbleweed Park are (at the moment, as Ron constantly keeps repeating: It could still go to hell ;-)) pretty much spot on. So I am more than happy with the direction the project is going. If Ron would've thought Tim Schafer would make the project better he probably woud have started it while he was still at Double Fine or would have asked him already for a collaboration.
Owning your own game company, you own the rights to the games that you make.
Owning your own game company and being a game developer, you get to have 100% creative control over the games you make.
Owning your own game company, you get to decide who you want on your team.
Owning your own game company, you get to reap the benefits of the success a game has whereas working for another company you are basically just getting paid for a gig and that's it.
What Ron and Gary are doing makes perfect sense with forming their own company, they are being their own bosses and the owners of their own games.
Also if I compare The Cave and Broken Age, I think Cave got closer to the feel of classic adventure games. The humor and puzzles are suitable for both young and older audience, when Broken Age looks and feels like it was a game designed for children. In both Cave and Thimbleweed park the atmosphere feels more mature which I really like.
*Jaw drops to the ground.*
@Ron: It is simply incredible how (at least seemingly) easily you can get real talents to work on Thimbleweed Park!
@Gary: From reading your post alone one gets a really good grasp on how much you appreciate working with Mark again. The details on how got him to work for Lucasfilms were really intersting. I'm more than exicted to see what this will mean for the graphical style overall.
"There is no check mark behind your name... Hmmm."
"Quick! Prove it by drawing another aweseome background art for Thimbleweed Park!"
I guess alle the people in the comment section of this blog know by now just how much this project is packed with awesomeness, talent and simply brilliant people. It would be EXTREMLY hard not to get excited about it!
One thing I wanted to add: The graphics in Monkey Island 1 were the reason I convinced my father to buy a VGA graphics adapter (we had a Hercules card with amber/black display before). And man: That thing was expensive back in the day! :-)
While I was fine with the Maniac Mansion style, the pinnacle of classic adventure game art to me was always Monkey Island, Loom, etc., so this news is amazing, as it pushes the game to the next level of awesomeness.
It also addresses the only minor criticism I ever heard about this game from people, which was that they wished the art style was more like Monkey Island, so it's cool that that has now been sorted!
I already knew that color cycling page but I never had the connection to LucasArts/Loom/MI1!
*happy dance*
Hey Mark, you wouldn't have a Twitter account by any chance?
You all are in the right way.
Thank you all for making this dream come true.
This game is getting better and better.
I've always adored color cycling! And I've been on the very page you've linked to, time and time again over the recent years. Some of these animations are so astounding! They not only remind me of Monkey Island, where color cycling was used under the big monkey head for the lava pools, but also for waterfalls in Monkey Island 2, Indiana Jones 4, and a lot of more water and lava effects from Indiana Jones 4.
Please, if there is some way to bring back color cycling, please be encouraged to do it! These effects are a form of art that's almost completely lost, otherwise!
Lots of smiles,
Jammet
Just absolutely love it!! And the waterfall is just stunningly mesmerizingly brilliant!
I guess now you set the bar high for adequately cool and immersive music. :)
We pledged for the 50$ version, and will debate in the next couple days to what reward level we want to go.
But my question, and I am sure I read it somewhere but cannot find it anymore: How can I raise my pledge? Say that if I wanted to go with the boxed game + signed poster + shirt for 350$, and substract the already paid money, where do I enter the remaining 300$?
And how would you know that the two payments are connected?
BUT, obviously here on this blog under the "Support Us" tab there are the physical rewards that you are referring to for $350, but it's kind of a strange situation because the $350 Tier here on this site is not the same as it was on the kickstarter page because that $350 tier included the phone book, pdf version of the "Making of Thimbleweed Park" diary and the boxed copy was going to be signed which was kind of a special deal for those who put that much while the kickstarter campaign was happening. It's just one of those things where people who put a lot of money towards a kickstarter campaign get better rewarded then what they might be able to get after a campaign ends because kickstarter rewards are often like limited-time special deals.
If I was in your situation, what I would do is click the "CONTACT" tab at the very top of this blog, and send them an e-mail copying exactly what you've asked about in your post and see what happens. Good luck!
I'd like raise my pledge too, but not if I lose the perk of being in the phone book with my recorded message. :).
"We are looking into a way to allow backers to increase their pledges. I’m gone all this week while I move back to Seattle, but we’ll look into it first thing Monday."
so I guess we will know more next week :-)
Moonnnnneeeeeeeeeeh! ;)
Let's hope for lots of water in thimbleweed!
And rain!! I don't think I have ever seen random weather or weather changes in any classic adventure game. Perhaps an idea , like iMuse: iWeather.
@Ron, @Gary: About Mark's backgrounds, have you considered including minimal dynamic lightning for the characters? Those street lamps are asking for it!! :)
On a side note, I'm really enjoying this development diary. I've never seen game development before and the closest thing I've seen is fiction story development but I'm really enjoying the parallels. The puzzle dependency charts especially look like they could be adapted to track parallel plotlines or characters across a story.
I really enjoyed the blog up to now, but I am even more excited since this announcement. If your time allows, tiny blog posts about your drawing workflow would be super-cool! The web-page about canvas-cycling mentions the graphics of the HTML5 demo were drawn using DeluxePaint... What software do you use now, Mark?
By the way, will Thimbleweed Park graphics be based on true 8-bit-color graphics with color palettes - or use 3-channel RGB images that just do not make use of more than 256 colors per scene? (Convenient palette handling does not seem to be the strength of most modern graphic editors, if I am not mistaken?)
The "wireframe art" looks really excellent! Kudos to you.
This allready looks amazing. I´m much more excited then ever since knowing this game becomes true.
I´m just a huge, old (36) Fan of the Lucas Adventures and never knew who Mark was. Unfortunatelly.
Seeeing this Circus sample and of course the amazing 8bit animations, together with that fantastic looking Final Puzzle Dependency Charts, makes me fell this game will become a true sucsessor.
Not only for fans like me as I thought before. I think most of the kickstarter Backers are like me.
I´m really amazed.
regards Tim
Ah, now it works :D
It's really a middle course between MM and MI. The only methodic differences to Monkey Island that I have noticed are the use of black contour lines and the abdication of dithering. Moreover both the starry sky and the ground are looking completely different from MI.
I hope that no backer is missing a visual reference to MM from now on. But according to all these euphoric comments here it doesn't seem so.
Bt
Can't wait to see more of Mark!
But it's Monkey Island style graphics now. I cannot (yet) see the Maniac style charakters in those backgrounds.
As I love both art styles I'm not complaining, but I shed a little tear for the simplistic Maniac style backgrounds. Imho they are equally great.
One of the best statements I've ever read. 100% true.
Please let this be more like Monkey Island and Loom than Maniac Mansion!
I know the kickstarter was presented with maniac-mansion-like art, and animation/background tests so far have been on that direction, but I personally consider that style too 'blocky' and a bit distasteful.
I backed the project because I'm super excited for a new classic adventure from you guys, but the art direction was not something that excited me; I mainly was content to accept that I will enjoy the game despite it looking like Maniac Mansion and Zak McCracken.
Now looking at the circus sample, my jaw has dropped, and I have to speak up. Please let us enjoy the game with amazing pixel art that we won't be able to take our eyes off, don't artificially restrict yourselves to blocky-maniac-mansion-like art and animations.
Just ask in Kickstarter and we will give you the money for a new "Loom", a new "Monkey Island", etc... (just change the characters if you do not own the franchise, but please never stop doing this again!)
You can keep doing games like this and we will keep you funding. But it's got to be like this, not "modern adventures"! (like Broken Age)...
A few quick responses to things I've seen come up here:
Any art work you're seeing now IS just experimental mock-up of the actual scenes. The 'black outline' you're seeing in everything now will almost certainly not be there in the finished art, and LOTS of other things may change as well on our way to an established visual style for this game. So don't read too much into the specific details of any mock-up art getting posted at this point--though you can rest assured that all of us will be doing the best we can to make sure this game is as cool looking and atmospheric as any adventure game we've done. :] I too think that Ron and Gary's decision to do this project was brilliant. And I too have mourned the relative absence of such games for so many years. You can bet I'm as stoked as anyone to be a part of making this one.
I am intrigued by all the discussion here of Maniac Mansion art style vs. Loom and Monkey Island style. This seems to be an issue very much in play on our end too--and I have some ideas about how we might address that--which l will discuss with Ron and Gary before saying any more here. But it's definitely being explored. Stay tuned.
Lastly, just a reminder that Geekscape.net will be posting an 'interview' with me today--which may address some of your other musings about me and/or my involvement with this marvelous project!
Ciao for now. :]
But man, if you guys can get it anywhere near to that Monkey Island style, please do, it would be incredible.
I think when most people think classic adventure games, that's the style that comes to mind, so many of the golden age adventure games use that amazing combination of being both pixelated/old-school, but also like a painting...
These are classic games that spring to mind in that style -
Monkey Island, Monkey Island 2, Loom, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis, The Dig, Day of the Tentacle, Full Throttle, Sam & Max Hit the Road, Simon the Sorcerer, Simon the Sorcerer 2, The Legend of Kyrandia, Beneath a Steel Sky, Space Quest 4, King's Quest 6...
Can I say "excited" on the Internet? Hi mom!
And team complete, right?
I've been lurking out here, reading everything but never commenting myself. I just had to say how very impressed I am with these graphics. I backed this project at the $150 level because I really wanted to see another Ron Gilbert adventure. I did not really like the old skool graphics too much, but I understood the budget constraints. Looking at these graphics by Mark Ferrari, I want to up my pledge. This game needs to get done!
You guys seem to do everything right and this blog is amazing. Please keep it up.