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Double Fine Adventure Kickstarter concludes with $3,335,265 amassed
"It's been an amazing experience," Tim Schafer said as the last bit of funding rolled in for Double Fine Adventure. "So much love."And so much money! The Kickstarter project, which aimed to collect a mere $400,000 for a new, classically designed adventure game from Schafer's San Francisco-based studio, concluded with a total of $3,335,265 in funding -- after just over a month. An accompanying documentary will capture its creation, step-by-step."I don't want to say this is the end of the whole game industry as we know it ... it's not, it's not!" Schafer joked, surrounded by festivities in the Double Fine office. As the Kickstarter clock counted down, the visibly grateful designer said fans no longer had to accept no for an answer when it came to their favorite "niche" entertainment. "You can choose."
Double Fine remembers 'Amnesia Fortnight' in GDC postmortem
In a GDC panel called "Creative Panic: How Agility Turned Terror Into Triumph," project leads from Double Fine's quartet of "Amnesia Fortnight" projects each outlined the process and inspiration behind their games -- with the exception of Costume Quest's Tasha Harris, who didn't share her insights because she wasn't there. "Amnesia Fortnight is a psychedelic mushroom and we all took it," studio head Tim Schafer said, before adding that it was really a two-week team game design exercise held in the middle of Brütal Legend work.Born from a break in AAA development, the Amnesia Fortnight forged a new direction for the company when Brütal Legend 2 was canceled.
The Schafer stigma: How his successful Kickstarter went to your head
I first heard about Kickstarter at San Diego Comic-Con 2010 in an early morning panel about black writers and artists in the graphic-novel industry, titled "Nappy Hour." I was there to secure a seat in the following panel -- which was a Dark Horse feature and may have included an appearance by the wonderful Gerard Way, writer of The Umbrella Academy and singer in this amazing band you probably haven't heard of (don't judge me) -- but "Nappy Hour" turned out to be one of the best presentations I saw that weekend.Throughout the panel, author and performer Pam Noles mentioned Kickstarter as an underground, free-spirited way of funding creative projects, and said she had used it to fund a few of her own endeavors. I imagined an online co-op of artists and philanthropists holding hands and running through rich, green fields together, composing sonnets about how wonderful everything was, and supporting only the most remarkable of projects. When I got home and checked it out myself, I found a site similar to Etsy, but where the items for sale were half-finished, semi-formed ideas from people who seemed dedicated to carrying them out.I thought it was wonderful.
Double Fine Kickstarter adds new rewards, Schafer and Gilbert talk it out
Double Fine's fundraiser for its point-and-click adventure title exploded on day one and has currently raised almost $2.1 million, and there are still 18 days left. To celebrate, reward its backers and entice even more, Double Fine has revamped its rewards for denomination-specific donations as follows: $30 tier: Digital Soundtrack of the Documentary $60 tier: Double Fine Adventure Book (digital PDF) $100 tier: Special edition box set with the game disc and DVD/Blu-Ray documentary $500 tier: Double Fine Adventure Book (physical copy)As standard for Kickstarter projects, hitting a higher reward tier gets backers all of the rewards from previous tiers as well. For extra incentive, the 35-minute discussion between Tim Schafer and Ron Gilbert -- filmed before the Kickstarter began -- demonstrates the passion and thought that will be fueling Double Fine's game; check it out above.
Double Fine's adventure coming to PC, Mac, Linux, iOS and Android devices [Update]
Double Fine has just announced that its upcoming Kickstarter-funded adventure project will be DRM-free on the PC, Mac, and Linux when the project finally launches. A closed beta for Kickstarter supporters will be available on Steam."We got a little bit more money than we thought we'd get," Double Fine's Tim Schafer said in a YouTube video announcing the platforms. "So the game is going to be just a little bit better. Well, it's going to be a lot better, actually." The project will also be available on iOS devices and "certain Android phones."Schafer also added that, due to the astounding amount that has been donated (now over $1.8 million!), the game will include full voice in the English version as well as subtitle support for French, Spanish, Italian, and German. Another few bucks and we're sure they'll add Klingon.Update: Double Fine's Greg Rice tells us that backers of the project will have access to the PC, Mac, and Linux versions of the game. Granting access to the mobile version by backing the game via Kickstarter is "not currently possible."
Double Fine Kickstarter passes $1 million in under 24 hours, breaking yet another record
Double Fine will be able to fund at least two and a half adventure games and/or put an awful lot of money into creating an incredibly extravagant one, as the developer's Kickstarter project has just topped $1 million dollars. After being announced late last evening, the project's page already reflected a number exceeding the goal of $400K within just over eight hours.With another 33 days to go, and an incredible amount of momentum as is, we're thinking the sky's the limit for the Double Fine folks. And they'll get to that sky in their fleet of private jets, all custom designed to nest within one another like the characters in Stacking, and Tim will be the mothership. It's all so clear now! What have we done?!
Double Fine breaks Kickstarter funding records
It seems that Double Fine can attach the moniker of "record holder" to its latest venture. A representative from the crowd-source funding site Kickstarter has confirmed to Joystiq that Double Fine's adventure game fundraiser now holds the company record for raising such a high amount of money in a short amount of time."I can confirm that there's not been a project that has raised as much as this one in such a short timeframe," the spokesperson revealed. Kickstarter says it does not keep a running tally finalized projects, but its listing of 'Most Funded' ventures shows a number of concepts that came close to the one million dollar mark, since 2009.The Kickstarter spokesperson also confirmed that Double Fine's project "now has more backers than any other project on the site." The current total of backers sits at over 17,000.Double Fine's project -- which took about 8 hours and 11 minutes to fund -- currently sits at over $675,000 ... and there are still 33 days left.
Double Fine's Kickstarter adventure surpasses $400K goal
It took about 8 hours and 11 minutes. Late last night, developer Double Fine revealed a new project, one that would only be created with help from fans. Dubbed 'Double Fine Adventure,' the game would bring the developer back to its rich adventure game heritage, which helped put company icons Tim Schafer and Ron Gilbert into the industry's spotlight.The asking price was high -- $400,000 to create a brand new PC-based, "classic point-and-click adventure utilizing modern touch technology -- but gamers were more than willing to help.Funding for the game still runs for an additional 33 days and support does not seem to be slowing. On the official Kickstarter page, Double Fine notes that "extra money" earned during this process will be "put back into the game" as well as a behind-the-scenes documentary following the creation of the new title, which will only be distributed to those who back the project. The additional fund also mean the game "can appear on more platforms, be translated into more languages, have more music and voice, and an original soundtrack for the documentary, and more."At the time of publishing, the Kickstarter project has 9,464 backers, putting $432,249 towards Double Fine's next adventure. Joystiq has contacted Kickstarter to find out if Double Fine's project is the fastest project to hit such an impressive funding total in the company's history, but have yet to hear back.A jovial Schafer wrote on Twitter: "Okay, on to the next project! the next thing we need to do is get this Black Sabbath reunion back on track, people."
Double Fine returning to its adventure game roots with Kickstarter project [update: Funded!]
Double Fine has announced that it will finally return to its adventure game roots. Utilizing the crowd-sourcing power of Kickstarter, Double Fine will hope to fund the project. As rewards for funding, the developer will offer bonuses such as "advance access to the game, original art from its development, and a bowling night out with the team."The project is already listed on Kickstarter, asking a hefty $400,000 for its completion. Double Fine also plans to "create a unique, serialized documentary available only to Backers," developed by the team at 2 Player Productions.According to the Kickstarter page, the game will be in development with a small team over a six-to-eight month period. The game is described as "a classic point-and-click adventure utilizing modern touch technology."In related news: though Minecraft creator Markus 'Notch' Peterson had offered to help fund a sequel to the cult-hit game Psychonauts, Double Fine isn't ready to announce the title. "These things take time to figure out -- if they can be figured out -- so please don't expect any Psychonauts 2 announcements any time soon," video game icon Tim Schafer wrote on Twitter.Schafer promises he and Notch are having a "lovely chat" about the possibility, and jokingly says the indie millionaire is a tough negotiator -- at his insistence that the game be dubbed "PsychoNotch."Update: Moments ago, Double Fine achieved its goal of $400,000. At the time of publishing this update, the project has 8,880 backers and is currently sitting at $404,168. The funding process took less than ten hours.
Schafer needs a millionaire to fund Psychonauts 2, Notch raises hand
Double Fine's Tim Schafer would love to make Psychonauts 2, he told Digital Spy -- he's pitched it to publishers a few times, but no one has ponied up for the project, and Schafer still needs a few million dollars to back it up. Enter: Notch.After learning of Schafer's problem, Markus "Notch" Persson, creator of Minecraft and resident indie millionaire, tweeted at Schafer, "Let's make Psychonauts 2 happen," followed by ";D Also, I'm serious." This afternoon, the official word from Double Fine is, "Tim and Markus are talking. Who knows what might happen?"Notch has followed up candidly, tweeting that he and Schafer are talking via email, hinting that they may talk more at GDC, and finishing with a warning: "Anyway, please don't get your hopes too high yet. Everything is extremely vague!"There it is, ladies and gentlemen. The potential multi-million-dollar business deal to create Psychonauts 2, started on Twitter and including a winky, open-mouthed-smiling emoticon. Ah, technology.
Double Fine's Happy Action Theater conjures up Kinect magic
Double Fine's next project, Happy Action Theater, just appeared on the floor of CES, right on time according to Tim Schafer's Twitter account. The game, available in February for what a Microsoft rep called a "reasonable" price, is basically a collection of 18 different minigames, featuring sandbox-style fun for the younger audience. But don't let that tame description fool you: Happy Action Theater isn't just a standard minigame collection made for kids. Instead, it appears to be one of the best experiences on Kinect yet, and a perfect marriage of Double Fine's expertise at finding almost instant fun, and its skill at wringing some impressive feats out of that Kinect camera.
How Tim Schafer ended up as a main voice in upcoming Kinect XBLA game Haunt
In Haunt, Parappa the Rapper developer Nana-OnSha's upcoming Xbox Live Arcade game, players will use Kinect to direct a main NPC voiced by Tim Schafer around a spooky, and somewhat goofy, haunted house -- that much we knew. And in a recent interview with Gamasutra, executive producer Masaya Matsuura and producer Dewi Tanner revealed how the main character came to be voiced by the Double Fine head and well-known goofy gentleman. "He's very, very interesting for it," Masaya said when asked about Schafer's participation. Apparently the main character's voice had already been recorded, but after hearing Schafer's speech at a GDC "Choice Awards" ceremony, the Nana-OnSha folks reconsidered. "We talked about 'maybe something is missed,' still," Matsuura said. "And one day you told me about how Tim would be a good voiceover actor," he added to Tanner. Tanner said that Tim's time was understandably constrained, being the head of another game studio and all, but the team "managed to squeeze him in nonetheless ... a couple of afternoons and we were pretty much done." Tanner also pointed out that Haunt isn't exactly a serious endeavor, and Schafer's "passé humor" was perfect for the role. The game is still absent a solid launch date, but it's probably safe to say it's gonna miss its previously scheduled 2011 release window. Tanner teased in the interview that, "We're just winding up the game right now; things are looking clean right now, so it should be a smooth submission." So, uh, soon-ish! Update: This piece originally listed Tim Schafer as the main character in Haunt, rather than the main NPC. It also listed Masaya Matsuura as the creative lead, rather than executive producer. Our apologies! [Image credit: 'skwathill']
Double Fine's Stacking to nestle in your PC
Double Fine has revealed its matryoshka-infused adventure, Stacking, will soon come to PC. The news came from Double Fine's Tim Schafer and Lee Petty during X-Play's Best of 2011 award show. Stacking took home the title of 2011's best downloadable game, with Schafer and Petty revealing the PC port in a rather unique way, which you can see in the video after the break (skip to 1:00). No other details were revealed, save to say that the PC version will be available "soon."
Double Fine releases Psychonauts app
The great game developer Double Fine has released an app for the App Store, and it's related to their very popular game Psychonauts (which recently arrived on the Mac App Store itself), but it's not, unfortunately, a port of the game. The Psychonauts Vault Viewer is instead sort of an ancillary add-on to the title, a compendium of all of the game's "memory vault" animations, along with new commentary from the game's creators Scott Campbell and Tim Schafer. It's interesting but if you've never played Psychonauts, you probably won't find a lot of enjoyment in the app itself. If you love the game, the app is like an extras DVD, with lots of game content and some other features. Vault Viewer is a free universal app, available now on the App Store. We've seen quite a few game companies use Apple's platform in this way, creating ancillary apps to their main games, and making use of the mobile platforms as a sort of a "second screen" for players either while they're playing or for a game on another platform. I wouldn't be surprised to eventually see a full iOS game from Double Fine, but for now, this is what we've got.
Double Fine's 'Amnesia Fortnight' game design jams saved the company
The recent downloadable releases from Double Fine, as well as the upcoming Sesame Street: Once Upon a Monster, all had their genesis in the company's "Amnesia Fortnight" events, in which small teams would make quick game prototypes. Schafer says that if not for those informal sessions, the company might not still be running. "We had done one Amnesia Fortnight in the middle of Brutal Legend, and one at the end, so we had eight prototypes," studio head Tim Schafer explained to Edge. "I thought eventually we'd start working on smaller games with the extra money that we got from these huge games, and then we found out that Brutal Legend 2 wasn't happening." With nothing else going on, Double Fine started looking for deals for the best four Amnesia Fortnight prototypes. "The thing I like about it is that we had a catastrophic event and the company saved itself purely based on the creativity of the team. Lee [Petty, responsible for Stacking], Tasha [Harris, who came up with Costume Quest], Brad [Muir, of Trenched], and Nathan [Martz, the game design puppeteer behind Sesame Street]- their ideas." Had the Amnesia Fortnight not have been a success, we can only imagine that Double Fine would be forced to hold "Amnesia Fifteenminutes" within the fortnights, in which each employee rushed out prototypes while rushing out their other prototypes.
Tim Schafer's original pitch for Once upon a Monster
Hey, did you guys know that Once Upon a Monster was originally intended to be a zombie game? Yup, it's true -- this behind-the-scenes footage of Tim Schafer pitching the idea to a top Warner Bros. exec proves it.
Learn more about Tim Schafer than you ever wanted to
Okay, you like Tim Schafer. Sure, who doesn't? But are you ready to really get inside the mastermind of Grim Fandango, Psychonauts and Brutal Legend? And we mean deep inside ... like, "cut him open with a lightsaber and sleep inside him tauntaun style" deep. If so, you'll want to watch "Tim Schafer's History of Videogames Adventure," a charming Gamespot documentary about the developer's life presented as an adventure game of sorts. Did you know, for instance, that Lucasarts staffers were permitted to select Star Wars concept art to hang on their office walls? The video's full of all sorts of gems like that, and if you can get past how visibly uncomfortable Schafer is with talking about himself for this long, it's well worth watching.
Trenched is a third-person tower-defense game
When Trenched was revealed by Tim Schafer at the end of this year's Game Developer's Choice Awards ceremony, we knew next to nothing about it. Though we can't tell you how we feel about it ourselves, previews are showing up all over the web that describe the game as a third-person tower-defense title set in an alternate history post-WWI world. G4 explains that the tower-defense-style battles of Trenched take place atop walking, upgradeable trenches. As it turns out, television monsters (referred to as "tubes") are attacking the world's mobile trenches and handicapped hero Frank Woodrof is bent on defending them. You'll employ Woodrof's ultra-manliness to defeat said "tubes" and restore alternate reality's normalcy. Or, ya know, Double Fine's bizarre version of normalcy in the world of Trenched. Schafer's team expects the game out on Xbox Live Arcade at some point in 2011.
Trenched is Double Fine's next game, 'is extremely, extremely manly'
Tucked away at the very end of the Game Developer's Choice Awards ceremony tonight was the announcement teaser for Trenched, the latest in developer Double Fine's series of downloadable games. This one is being published by Microsoft Game Studios for Xbox Live Arcade and we've got an off-screen capture of what Tim Schafer called the "extremely, extremely manly" trailer for you just after the break. [Update 12:50am – We've put the official, non-shakycam trailer after the break for your viewing pleasure.]%Gallery-118276%
Double Fine tells how it got to Sesame Street
The announcement that Double Fine's next game would be a licensed (!) Sesame Street (!!) game for Kinect (!!!) was something of a shock. In an interview with Gamasutra, studio head Tim Schafer and project lead Nathan Martz explained how the project grew out of a shared love of Muppetry and an original idea that just happened to be perfect for the franchise. Martz came up with the idea for an "uplifting" game during the same Amnesia Fortnight event that spawned Costume Quest and Stacking -- a game that involved "cute, furry little monsters, making music and having fun," as Schafer described it. As work continued on the prototype, which already featured cute Henson-esque monsters like "Marco" (above, the one who isn't Cookie Monster or Elmo), the idea of pursuing the license came up -- and then when Sesame Street and WB made a deal for games, Double Fine saw an opportunity. The game focuses on the Sesame Street idea of the "Whole Child Curriculum," teaching social and emotional skills as well as healthy living habits. In addition, though, Schafer asserts that it will be funny. He calls Sesame Street a "secret comedy show" and intends to keep the same tone in the game. "They're satirical -- they don't just make bland shows for kids, they make them actually funny," Schafer said. "I think that's important for the kids and especially for the parents who watch them together. We're hoping that this is something parents play with their kids."
