maniac mansion
Latest
Play classic MS-DOS games without even leaving Twitter
Although they went live at the very start of the year, it was like all of our Christmases had come at once when Archive.org added 2,400 playable MS-DOS games to its website. Retro titles like Maniac Mansion, Oregon Trail and Doom are all available, with the only downside being that you have to visit each specific game's page to play them. However, the eagle-eyed folk at Wired noticed these have recently started working on Twitter, meaning you can get all of your social networking done while simultaneously saving Sandy Pantz from the evil Dr Fred. Thanks to Twitter's Cards platform, all you have to do is tweet the URL of the game you want to play and it'll take care of the rest. You can even embed the tweet (and thus the game) inside a webpage, exactly like we've done below.
Ron Gilbert's new 2D adventure game passes crowdfunding goal
Last week we brought you word of Thimbleweed Park, a new yet classically-styled 2D adventure game from Maniac Mansion designers Ron Gilbert and Gary Winnick. At the time the duo were seeking $375,000 to fund the game's development - a goal they reached just this morning. Anticipating the possibility of a massive outpouring of support, Ron Gilbert updated the Kickstarter page over the course of the weekend to outline stretch goals for Thimbleweed Park. If, in its remaining 24 days, the fundraiser reaches $425,000 the developers will have the game translated into German, Spanish, French and Italian. At $525,000, Thimbleweed Park will appear on iOS and Android devices. The big one, full voice acting for Thimbleweed Park, comes available at $625,000. Thimbleweed Park will appear on PC, Mac and Linux platforms. No release date has yet been announced. [Image: Disney/Ron Gilbert/Gary Winnick]
Maniac Mansion designers seek funding for new 2D adventure
Ron Gilbert and Gary Winnick, the duo behind the classic LucasArts adventure game Maniac Mansion, have launched a crowdfunding campaign for a new point and click 2D adventure dubbed Thimbleweed Park. "Why do we want to make Thimbleweed Park? Because we miss classic adventures and all their innocence and charm," reads the game's Kickstarter page. "They were fun and would put a smile on your face. We want to make one of those again and we want to do it right. We don't want to make a game 'inspired by,' or 'paying homage to' classic point & click adventures, we want to make a real classic point & click adventure." Plot details are currently barebones, but Thimbleweed Park tells the story of two detectives investigating a corpse found on the outskirts of a once-prosperous, but now defunct town. Players can switch at will between five playable characters, and Thimbleweed Park boasts multiple endings, depending on how you go about completing the story. Gilbert and Winnick hope to raise $375,000 to fund Thimbleweed Park's development, of which it has so far raised $6,192. If you're interested in supporting the project (or just want to save a pixelated hamster) visit the game's Kickstarter page. [Image: Disney/Ron Gilbert/Gary Winnick]
Daily iPhone App: The Silent Age is a great, stylistic point and click adventure
The Silent Age is quite an experience. It's a point-and-click adventure game, in the style of old games like Monkey Island and even Maniac Mansion. But as you can see from the screenshot above, it boasts a very original look and feel, one has a lot of style and a little bit of menace added in. The story is about a janitor who's pretty easygoing, when one day he's given a time-travel device and asked to save the world. And that's about all you need to know to start: The Silent Age unfolds itself like a puzzle box, very carefully and with a lot of excellent design. Unfortunately, the same issues that all of these point-and-click games seem to have are present here as well: The puzzles can sometimes get confusing, and the interface can sometimes not be 100 percent clear (usually, you need to find objects to use on other objects, but sometimes the solutions can be more abstract than obvious). But the good news is that The Silent Age's interface is very simple and straightforward, so there isn't a lot of room here for confusion. The game is more about experiencing the story and unlocking just what's going on, rather than trying to get you hung up on a specific puzzle. Plus, The Silent Age is currently completely free. At that price, there's no reason not to download this and check it out this weekend. It's probably not a game for everyone, but if you're ready for an experience that's a little strange and very experimental, give it a look.
Inside the mind of Ron Gilbert
Sega's booth was as loud and vibrant as the rest at E3 2012, humming with the frantic energy of a beehive that had just been kicked. Lacking a quiet corner, it was in the middle of Sega's bustling booth that I struck up an impromptu conversation with legendary adventure game designer Ron Gilbert.I told the Monkey Island and Maniac Mansion designer that I wanted to get inside his head, to find out where he gleans his inspiration from when starting new projects."You don't want to be in this head," Gilbert promised.%Gallery-156063%
LucasArts classics coming to iPhone?
Good news from our friends over at Joystiq -- they had the good fortune to speak with the folks over at LucasArts (who are currently working on reviving some of their old point-and-click library of games: Secret of Monkey Island is coming back to the Xbox Live Arcade, and other games, including the classic Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis, are due to make their way to the PC's Steam service), and the subject of the iPhone came up. While we didn't get any really great news (like, say, a release date), we did get a vague answer in the affirmative: "On iPhone, you know Apple's policy that we can't talk about a release until it's ready to release. But it would make sense that we would do something like that if we were to go in that direction ... wink wink, nod, nod."With a wink and a nod, it seems like a fairly safe bet that we can expect at least one or two iPhone ports of these old LucasArts titles in the future. The whole point-and-click genre (you can play a great little sample done by gaming genius Tim Schafer right over on his company's website) is experiencing a resurgence, and LucasArts is showing a lot of sudden loyalty to fan favorites like Monkey Island, Maniac Mansion, and Grim Fandango, so there's never been a better time to send a port or two over towards the App Store.
Ron Gilbert to give keynote speech at PAX 2009
We consider the creation of the SCUMM engine to be a historic event that's on par with the invention of the light bulb or the discovery of fire, so forgive any and all typos you may find within this post -- it's tough to type while squealing and flailing your arms about. A press release just landed in our inbox which revealed the keynote speaker for the 2009 Penny Arcade Expo in Seattle, WA -- it's Ron Gilbert, inventor of SCUMM and creator of Maniac Mansion and the first two Monkey Island games. A collaboration between this adventure game luminary and the pair of comic-producing philanthropists isn't too surprising -- after all, Gilbert did consulting work on Penny Arcade Adventures: On the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness. Surprising or no, we're still buying two passes to show how awesome we think this is. (No, you can't have the other one. It's symbolic.)
Classic LucasArts artwork turned into movie posters
All too often when mixing genres, the results – like that Mountain Dew left over from last night – fall flat. However, one enterprising forum-goer has has defied convention (and warmed our hearts), successfully marrying classic LucasArts adventure games with our wall's longstanding desire to be covered in nostalgia. The results consist of several beautiful posters, most based on original artwork lifted from an era when LucasArts wasn't afraid to point and click, including Tim Schafer and Dave Grossman masterpieces, The Secret of Monkey Island and Day of the Tentacle. Designed to be printed and hung, we can't think of a better way to hide that unsightly crack above your bed.
LucasArts' PC adventures possible on DS, stalled by size limitations
To this day, it baffles us that LucasArts still hasn't re-released its library of adventure titles, if only so our non-gaming friends can believe us when we tell them the developer "doesn't just make Star Wars games." Speaking to Eurogamer, Fracture assistant producer Jeffrey Gullett said it's something they've looked into it but that there's an issue of size limitations for a DS version. Said Gullet, "The cart size of the DS makes it impossible to put out ports of any of our old graphic adventures ... There's literally not enough room on those carts to put the games out." The standard DS cart supports up to 256MB (but with slower data transfer speeds), while the DS version of ScummVM is just over 7MB. We're not sure if Gullet meant the entire LucasArts adventure library wouldn't fit on a cart, but we're willing to bet you could at least get the first three Monkey Islands under 128MB.
C64 emulator for iPhone
Unfortunately we don't have much more than a splash screen on this one, but Stuart Carnie sends word that he's used the Apple SDK to port a Commodore 64 emulator on to the iPhone. He has yet to put in a Save/Resume state mechanism, a way to browse for files and disks, or a virtual keyboard/joystiq to control it with, but the hard stuff is done, so by the time the App Store comes around, we may have a working C64 emu in there ready to go.As long as it's ok with Apple. In point of fact, we have no idea how any emulators might work in the App Store -- actually, we have no idea how any apps will get in the App Store. Sure, it would be cool to play the original versions of Sim City or Maniac Mansion or Elite, but without Apple's OK to let any of those on the platform, we may not be able to do so without jailbreaking the thing anyway. We'll see -- if Carnie, once his work is done, can't get an official emulator in the App Store, maybe we'll be able to try it out and put it to use in some other, less official way.
DS Fanboy poll: Remakes of choice
Earlier this week, we asked you, our dear readers, to discuss games you'd like to see given a spit and a polish for the DS in this age of remakes, and as usual, you came through in a big way. In fact, you gave us so many fantastic suggestions that we've decided to split our selected list into two polls instead of just doing one. We can't include everything suggested, obviously, but we've prepared a selection of bigger releases and more obscure titles, and we're going to let you vote every day, just in case you want to throw your support behind more than one game. Once you've voted, we will profile the top two results from each poll and examine exactly why they would be well-suited to our favorite handheld. So try to vote for the titles you think are the most suitable, those that would most benefit from the kind of treatment we're seeing with the Dragon Quest and Final Fantasy titles ... and hey, vote for the games you'd just like to see in portable form as well.And if you just can't decide ... well, that's why we're letting you vote more than once! You can vote your heart and your brain, and the cream will rise to the top.
Virtually Overlooked Week: JC's picks
Virtually Overlooked has taken over Wii Fanboy! All this week, members of the staff will be outlining their personal picks for future Virtual Console releases.Everyone can guess how my childhood was spent, since I talk about old games constantly. So, instead of relating a nostalgic anecdote for you, I'm going to use this intro space to tell you about the last week or so.When I'm not personally advancing the cause of random old games on next-generation consoles, I'm a full-time grad student at the University of North Texas, working on a master's degree in library science. From last Thursday until yesterday, I was in the midst of my capstone-- a seven-day marathon paper-writing session meant to be the final test of my suitability as a librarian. My wife and I were also preparing to move from Texas to Washington, which happened this Saturday. Add my regular coursework and job responsibilities to that, and, as you can imagine, I've been a complete wreck. My Fanboy colleagues are probably rolling their eyes right now as I complain again about my workload, but I feel like it was a pretty significant experience, one I hope never to repeat.I am now safely ensconced in a Washingtonian apartment, and I turned in my last essay in the early hours of Thursday morning. Getting a chance to write about a bunch of old games is like a vacation. I've been looking forward to this all week.Since this is a VO special week, I'm taking the opportunity to talk about more mainstream games than I usually cover. So there's a better chance that you guys have played this stuff, and we can all share in some retro-euphoria.
