Joel-DeYoung
Latest
Hothead sheds more light on the death of Penny Arcade Adventures
Back when the discontinuation of the Penny Arcade Adventures series was first announced, Team PA explained that the decision was made due to the team's concern about developer Hothead being forced to split attention between PAA and then-recently-announced DeathSpank. As PA writer Jerry Holkins told it: "I think they could've made DeathSpank and Episode 3 but I think Episode 3 would've suffered. I mean, I know it would have suffered. So we'd rather not do it than do it half-assed and so we're going to finish that story but it's going to be on our website."Today, in an interview with Eurogamer, Hothead director of technology Joel DeYoung laid a little more blame at the feet of Holkins, implying that Tycho's alter ego had trouble keeping up with the workload required. "I think he really struggled to get the volume of text written for Episode 1, and then with Episode 2 coming out so quickly thereafter - it was five-and-a-half months," DeYoung said. "That was not worked on in parallel, and getting him to deliver that text was, er, frankly quite a struggle."This revelation comes a few days after Hothead erroneously teased that Episode 3 would be produced if the first two sold well on the Mac App Store, a notion that PA artist Mike Krahulik quickly batted down on Twitter.Though we may never know the real cause behind Episode 3's termination, whether it's Penny Arcade or Hothead that had too much on its plate, we'd imagine the truth, as is usually the case in situations like these, hovers somewhere in between.
SXSW 2009: Being Indie and Successful in the Video Game Industry
There's a wealth of indie-related gaming panels and goings on at SXSW this year, ranging from the previous "Games By The People, For The People" panel, the GameSalad folks, and the retro-cool Get Outta My Face arcade cabinet. Heck, there's even a company that wants to bring back Hypercard stack games. So we went back for more indie gaming panel goodness, just because we could. This was a panel by the game developers this time, rather than the people who run the companies ... so what did we learn? A lot of the same from the previous panel. Sadly Jonathan Blow couldn't make it, and was replaced by the above inflatable doll with the Freddie Mercury mug. Although covering his absence nicely were panelists Kellee Santiago from thatgamecompany, John Baez of The Behemoth, Ron Carmel of 2D BOY, and Joel DeYoung from Hothead Games who moderated. Check out the highlights after the break.
PAX 2008: Penny Arcade Adventures producer gushes about Episode 2
Last week during PAX 2008, we sat down with Hothead COO and Penny Arcade Adventures Producer Joel DeYoung as he guided us through Episode 2 and improvements to the engine. The gist of it is: if you liked Episode 1, you'll like Episode 2 that much more. Here's the rundown from our talks: Highlighting points of interest has been made easier! "If you have your proximity putting you close enough to 2 or 3 things, you can slide through that with bumpers," said DeYoung. There are now difficulty levels, including an Insane Mode (unlockable only after beating the game). Special collectibles and pickups are only available if you play Insane Mode. Comparatively, Episode 1's difficulty is "a little easier" than medium. All the weapons have been replaced. Tycho gets a shotgun, Gabe has new fist upgrades and your player now possesses -- wait for it -- a hoe! Also changed are the special attack minigames. You now have, among other new items, a revive potion. Healing won't be enough to bring your troops back to life. "Just adds a little bit of depth to it," said DeYoung. The real-time reaction for defense has been made more obvious (e.g. "Block!" now appears when you need to push block), but nothing analogous for attacking has been added. More after the break.%Gallery-30963%
Penny Arcade Adventures due on PSN this Winter (with Trophies!)
Oh, how you yearned for their unrestrained chuckles -- their sparkling smiles -- to be transformed into naught but a cacophony of wailing and ceaseless misery. What gave them the right? Was it their fancy PCs, Macs and Xbox 360s? Did they so enjoy coasting down The Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness on their technological toboggans that they couldn't even cast a single glance towards you, sitting atop a lonely and immobile PlayStation 3? Well, when the snow falls again this Winter, revenge will be yours.Also, Trophies! Posting on the official PlayStation Blog (they let anybody on there these days), Hothead producer Joel DeYoung confirmed that the first episode of Penny Arcade Adventures would arrive on PSN before the end of the year, complete with Trophy support and 1080p resolution. "Looking back, I think it's a shame that we weren't able to release the PS3 version closer to the initial launch of the game," he said.With the game's engine now up and running on the hardware, DeYoung expects that future episodes will arrive on Sony's platform in a more timely fashion. No more being left out in the cold, our monolithic friend.%Gallery-28425%
Joystiq interviews DeathSpank's Ron Gilbert
Described as "the perfect melding of a Monkey Island style adventure game with the wicked RPG gameplay of Diablo," Ron Gilbert's episodic endeavor also formed part of our recent GDC interview with Hothead Games. Though the Orphans of Justice still have quite a bit of growing up to do, we quickly quizzed designer Ron about Deathspank's upcoming lampooning of adventure game heroes, as well as the series' inevitable downward spiral in quality after the, uh, 600,000th episode.
Joystiq interview: Penny Arcade Adventures
It's fair to say that quite a lot is expected from Vancouver-based developer, Hothead Games. The group not only has to deliver a series of downloadable and episodic adventure RPGs in regular intervals, but also appease a fanbase so large and rabid that it can click your website to death -- accidentally, if you're lucky. On top of all that, the poor developers are occasionally dragged into a tiny room for the sole purpose of being poked by a plethora of questions regarding their upcoming games.Penny Arcade Adventures producer, Joel DeYoung, and Hothead creative director, Ron Gilbert, had to endure just such a prodding during GDC, the results of which can be viewed after the break. Appropriately enough, our interview's almost as long as the title of the series: On the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness.%Gallery-1545%
