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Microsoft hired the co-creator of ‘Portal’ to build games for the cloud
Kim Swift is Xbox-bound after a stint at Stadia.
Amazon Fire TV lineup trailer has dinosaurs, lasers, and laser dinosaurs
Amazon announced a plethora of development partners when it revealed Amazon Fire TV, its new streaming video and games device. While Mojang's Minecraft got top billing during Amazon's Wednesday presentation, the company's own Amazon Game Studios has plenty in the works as demonstrated by this trailer. For a device Amazon deems "not a game console," Fire TV has some fetching and very traditional looking games in the works based on this teaser. A side-scrolling platformer where you play as a caveman clubbing dinosaurs and then inexplicably disintegrating dinosaurs with a giant laser; a soft-colored world of papercraft woodland animals not dissimilar to Tearaway; and what looks like a turn-based medieval RPG; Amazon Fire TV will cover its genre bases if nothing else. There's even another platformer that looks like some bizarre version of the Jetsons, but you control Ernie from Sesame Street's doppelganger as he shoots aliens. While Ernie Shoots All the Aliens isn't a likely title for Amazon Game Studios' sci-fi platformer, the teaser doesn't provide titles for that game or any of the others in this lineup. It also doesn't say what developers in Amazon's stable are working on what games. Amazon acquired Double Helix, developer of Killer Instinct and Strider, in February. Far Cry 2 and Splinter Cell designer Clint Hocking announced he'd joined Amazon alongside Portal creator Kim Swift on Wednesday as well. The potential talent behind these new games makes them all the more mysterious. Except for the one about dinosaurs. That seems pretty straightforward. [Images: Amazon]
Far Cry 2's Clint Hocking, Portal's Kim Swift join Amazon Game Studios
Portal Co-Creator Kim Swift and Far Cry 2 Lead Designer Clint Hocking have joined Amazon Game Studios. Hocking made the switch in February, according to his LinkedIn profile, following his departure from Valve near the end of 2013. Swift was previously creative director of Airight Games, which launched Soul Fjord exclusively on Ouya in January. Likewise, her profile on LinkedIn now notes her new position at Amazon as Senior Designer. The news follows Amazon's announcement of its Fire TV media streaming device, which is is on sale today for $99. The Fire TV's controller can be purchased separately for $40, and while games on the Android-based machine can support third-party Bluetooth controllers, gaming was deemed a "bonus" feature of the device. Amazon founded the in-house development studio in August 2012 and purchased Killer Instinct developer Double Helix in February. [Image: Clint Hocking]
Funky free roguelike Soul Fjord out now, exclusively on Ouya
Soul Fjord is now available on the Ouya store. Developed by Airtight Games, the rhythm-action game stars an afro-sporting viking named Magnus Jones, who is hacking through enemies to get to the afterlife nightclub Valhalla. The developer describes its gameplay as "an extreme mash-up of rhythm game meets dungeon crawler with a roguelike twist," so death in the Norse mythology-based world holds some permanence, as seen in the game's launch trailer. Soul Fjord is free to download and supported by in-game purchases. Airtight previously launched first-person puzzler Quantum Conundrum for PC, PS3 and Xbox 360. Creative Director Kim Swift also served as co-creator of Valve's hit puzzle-platformer Portal. If that's not enough star power for the funky game, its soundtrack comes from Grammy-nominated Journey composer Austin Wintory.
Portal co-creator's Pixld now on iOS
Pixld, the iOS puzzle game from Portal co-creator Kim Swift and Quantum Conundrum developer Airtight Games, is now available on the App Store. It's currently going for an introductory $0.99, but having introduced itself it'll return to a regular price of $1.99.The games gives players a grid of cyan and navy blocks, tasking them with making color-matching rectangles by flipping the blocks' colors. Sounds simple, except flipping a block's color also flips the color of every adjacent block. With time-based, moves-limited, and one-life modes, Pixld is a test of vision, reflexes, and strategy. Oh, and it has weird textspeak-like shorthand in its menus, but don't worry, it's nothing too egrgs.
Quantum Conundrum doubles down on DLC this summer
Two new DLC packs are planned for Quantum Conundrum, Square Enix announced today. The "Desmond Debacle" and "IKE-aramba!" add-ons will be available later this summer for 240 MS Points ($2.99) each.The Desmond Debacle DLC pack launches on Steam first on July 31; PS3 and Xbox 360 get the DLC on August 14 and August 15, respectively. Players will explore a new wing of Quadwrangle Mansion with Desmond, self-professed "drinking bird" and guide through these new puzzles.IKE-aramba! tasks players with rescuing an Interdimensional Kinetic Entity, the titular IKE. Players will "leap seemingly endless chasms" when this second DLC pack launches on Steam on August 28, followed by PS3 and Xbox 360 on September 11 and 12.Those who've picked up a season pass through Steam will get both of these DLC packs as part of the their purchase.%Gallery-161003%
Quantum Conundrum confuses PSN on July 10, XBLA on July 11
Those without the requisite hardware to run Quantum Conundrum on the PC will have to wait until July. Quantum Conundrum will come to PSN on July 10 for $14.99, and XBLA on July 11 for 1200 MS Points ($15).If you prefer to pick up Quantum Conundrum through Steam, it's now available on the PC for $14.99. Putting down $19.99 for a Steam pass will also earn you the soundtrack and two future DLC puzzle packs.
Quantum Conundrum review: First rule of physics, don't talk about physics
Back in February, Airtight Games creative director Kim Swift told us that she wanted Quantum Conundrum to play like a Saturday-morning cartoon – lighthearted with a slapstick edge, similar to Looney Tunes or Cartoon Network programming. This may be why I found it so unnerving that Quantum Conundrum reminded me more of Fight Club than any kid-friendly cartoons.The standard-edition DVD of 2002's Fight Club has a looping menu that plays a round of light, elevator-style percussion music while the screen flickers invitingly on the Play button; this lasts just long enough to lull the passive listener into a false sense of tranquility, before it smashes into a measure of jarring electrical guitar and pulsating images for a few terrible seconds. Then the screen clears, and the torture repeats.One night in my wayward youth, I fell asleep watching this Fight Club DVD. For hours after the movie had finished and returned to the menu, I would be jolted awake just enough to know nothing about what was going on, only to immediately fall back asleep once the soothing interlude picked up again. For hours. It was disorienting, sinister and, looking back on it, kind of hilarious.Quantum Conundrum's soundtrack may be similar to Fight Club's menu screen's, but the game itself rides those same waves of frustration, persistence and disjointed comedy – the game is lovely, but the story is jarring. Some of its story elements are almost funny, some of the narrative almost make sense, all of it almost reaches a realm of lucid clarity. And yes, it does this for hours.%Gallery-158844%
Quantum Conundrum coming to PC June 21
Square Enix has finally laid down a launch date for Quantum Conundrum: The game will arrive on Windows via Steam on June 21. You can preorder the game right now either as a standard edition, or as a "season pass," with three exclusive Team Fortress 2 items, a downloadable soundtrack, and all of the future puzzle packs.Preordering the game also earns you 10 percent off, and you'll be entered into a sweepstakes to win the opportunity to have your portrait hung up in the in-game world. Snazzy! Quantum Conundrum will also arrive on Microsoft's XBLA and PSN, though Square is only sticking with "summer" as a date for those versions so far.
Quantum Conundrum trailer gives us a cute creature to coo over
Not since the Ewok have we been so immediately in love with a short chubby hairy thing. Sorry, John De Lancie – this little guy is now our favorite Quantum Conundrum character.
Quantum Conundrum's latest trailer blows the doors off time, our minds
Quantum Conundrum's more than just fluffy pillows and super heavy stuff. It's also all about ripping apart space and time itself at your whim, with the helpful aid of a glove-enabled "shift device," as demonstrated in the trailer above.
Quantum Conundrum's Kim Swift gives us some cold, hard fluff
It's Saturday morning. You have a giant bowl of sugar-coated cereal, the comfiest slippers on your feet, and an entire day to spend watching talkative cartoon animals get comically mutilated in some of the most sadistic ways known to man. Quantum Conundrum is kind of like that -- sweet and fun, but with an inherent and surprising darkness, creative director Kim Swift told Joystiq in an exclusive interview."It has this very cartoony, dynamic feel to it with the gameplay," Swift said. "Tonality-wise, it came naturally that this game be slightly more lighthearted, slightly more on the slapstick, Looney Toons kind of a feel. But even Looney Toons has a darker element to it -- you're looking at these cartoon characters getting squished and all that stuff, so it's definitely not like we're watching PBS on a Saturday morning. More like Cartoon Network on a Saturday morning."Swift, known for her work on Portal and its student-project predecessor, Narbacular Drop, has been developing Quantum Conundrum for Airtight Games since 2009. While the title features the same first-person physics puzzle-style of her previous work, Swift said Quantum Conundrum operates in a completely separate universe and has a starkly different feel than anything she's done."With Quantum Conundrum, we're a little bit more slapstick and off the wall than Portal," Swift said. "And Narbacular Drop is Narbacular Drop."%Gallery-147497%
Airtight Games' Kim Swift discusses Portal comparisons and the democratic origin of Quantum Conundrum
"All I care about is, 'Is the game fun? Are players gonna pick it up and have a good time?' That, first and foremost, is my job," ex-Valve developer (Portal, Left 4 Dead) and current Airtight Games creative lead Kim Swift declared to me in a pre-NY Comic Con interview last week. She was referring to her current project, Quantum Conundrum, and its similarity to her past work on Portal. I was wondering if she worried that her first big game might color perceptions about her latest, similarly-sized game -- is it just more of the same? "Making first-person puzzle games is what I like to do," Swift said. "And there aren't a whole lot of games ... there's Portal, and that's about it. So, to me, this is the kind of game that I want to play myself." She told me that the idea for QC had come about before arriving at Airtight, and when the opportunity came to head up a team as creative lead, she jumped at the chance. But she also didn't want to be a totalitarian monster. "Once I had gotten my team together, I didn't just wanna say, 'Hey, we're making this game, dammit! It's gonna be the way I say it's gonna be!'" Swift explained. Rather, the team members created individual "one-sheets" which would then be voted on by the whole group. As it turns out, Quantum Conundrum won out. "It just happens that this one came out on top just because it was really easy to implement right away and test," she added. The game's room-based puzzles and play on dimensional mechanics make it "modular" -- as in, individual components can be easily swapped out for others and quickly tested. This kind of development structure allows for quick iteration, a value prized among game developers. It also makes things like DLC all the more possible, which already makes sense for a game like Quantum Conundrum. Whether gamers will be demanding more after the game ships "early" next year remains to be seen, but what I saw had a lot of promise. %Gallery-131812%
Kim Swift fills us in on Airtight Games' silent 2010
After Airtight Games' last project, Dark Void, failed to succeed with critics and at retail, the studio crept back into relative quiet for the majority of 2010. Aside from a job listing popping up late in the year for "several AAA titles," and the high-profile hire of Portal lead Kim Swift just before Dark Void's launch, the studio kept mum all the way until this past summer. Just before PAX, however, Japanese publisher Square Enix teased a big reveal for Swift's promised game. Days later, Quantum Conundrum was announced -- another first-person puzzler -- leaving us to wonder what else the studio might be working on. "There are currently two projects at Airtight: ours, and another unannounced project," Swift told me during a pre-New York Comic Con preview for Square's titles. "I can't speak to what the game is," she added (unsurprisingly). The Airtight Games site offers only a bit more assistance in divining the studio's other project, calling it, "another ambitious AAA title in a genre that is both unique and refreshingly unexplored," and teasing the image above. Swift did tell me that 16 folks at Airtight out of approximately 50 are currently head-down on Quantum Conundrum, leaving a sizable team for other things. And those 35 or so people have had plenty of time to get started, if development of the studio's other, "mid-sized" project is any indication. "We've technically been working on [Quantum Conundrum] for a year, but we didn't really go into production until maybe like, six, seven months ago. Not long," Swift explained with a laugh. "You'd be surprised at how many things 16 folks can make." AG's official site also promises "more news and announcements in the near future," so perhaps the studio is ready to fully awake from its year-long silence.
Quantum Conundrum preview: Inter-dimensional charm
Recent Airtight Games convert Kim Swift's new downloadable title, Quantum Conundrum, is just about as charming as charming can be. You probably could have guessed that based on Swift's notably Portal-infused background, not to mention the pitch-perfect, cartoonish design aesthetic that pervades the manor home in which the game is set. But you really have to see its dimension shifting in action to fully understand it. The pitch is this: Using an "Inter-dimensional Shift Device," a young boy must traverse the sprawling mansion of his mad scientist uncle, Dr. Fitz Quadwrangle, to discover said relative's whereabouts. The device in question allows the user to shift each of the puzzle-filled rooms between four dimensions to achieve goals, changing the properties of each of the objects contained therein. It's a lot less complicated once you see it in action, until it gets a whole lot more complicated. %Gallery-131812%
Quantum Conundrum is Portal lead Kim Swift's new downloadable game
Quantum Conundrum, a new first-person puzzle game in which you gracefully shift between different dimensions and alter the physical properties of the environment, was inspired when the designer took a "stroll to the local bakery." Apparently, Kim Swift has not only moved from Valve to Airtight Games, but from America to Amsterdam. What exactly are they baking in there? Due to launch on Xbox Live Arcade, PlayStation Network and Steam in 2012, Quantum Conundrum sees you exploring the enormous manor (and eccentric manner) of your uncle, Professor Fitz Quadwrangle. Using an "interdimensional shift device," you can activate different dimensions that influence the house in unusual ways. One flips the gravity, another envelopes the world in a bubble of slow-motion (perfect for tossing items to yourself), and another renders heavy, serious safes as lightweight plush toys. That would be the "fluffy dimension," according to Gamespot's preview. Give that a look (there's a video too!) and learn how dimensional hopping helps you solve Quantum Conundrum.
Portal lead Kim Swift to debut downloadable game at PAX
After 2010's disappointing Dark Void, we'd nearly forgotten that Airtight Games had hired Portal Creative Director Kim Swift to lead development on a "new, unnamed project." Square Enix has rekindled our interest, announcing that it's picked up publishing rights to the game and will reveal the "top-secret joint project" at PAX this Saturday (7pm in the Pegasus Room for those of you in attendance). The only information we can glean from the announcement is that it's "downloadable" and "an incredibly fascinating and quirky game" so ... take that for what it's worth. Airtight Games' site says that while it's working on another "ambitious AAA title" it's also working on "a new mid-sized game with all kinds of physical possibilities." Physical possibilities, eh? That sounds like the one!
GDC 2010: From student game to success
Believe it or not, many of the best games start out as student development projects. The Misadventures of P.B. Winterbottom, flOw and even Portal all began life as student projects. Speaking at a GDC panel, the developers of the games listed above gave their advice on how budding student game designers can see their own projects become a success. The panel included Kim Swift, designer of Portal and currently of Airtight Games, Matt Korba and Paul Bellezza of The Odd Gentlemen (P.B. Winterbottom), and Kellee Santiago of thatgamecompany (flOw). The advice was wide-ranging, though all the panelists agreed that the best way to get a game noticed is to submit it to as many competitions and festivals as possible. Swift specifically noted that it's a good idea to literally drag people to come and play your game at festivals and shows like GDC. The game itself should "grab" players as well, with Korba saying that a festival showing of a game should be get players involved within five minutes.
Portal lead Kim Swift heads to Airtight Games for 'new, unnamed project'
Best known for her work on Joystiq's 2007 Game of the Year, Portal, Valve's Kim Swift is reportedly leaving her current position for Dark Void developer Airtight Games. According to Develop, she'll be heading up a team of developers working on a "new, unnamed project" for the US-based company. Airtight prez Jim Deal says that he's "thrilled to work with Kim," and that "her addition to the team represents a strategic move ... into new and broader gaming markets." Swift's team will be tasked with creating "games aimed at a more diverse audience" -- a challenge Swift appears ready to handle. "I've learned so much and had some amazing experiences at Valve, but when I heard I had the opportunity to work on innovative titles with my friends over at Airtight, I couldn't pass it up." And now we wait (and hope) for the puzzle-based air combat game that's sure to come of this partnership.
Left 4 Dead 2 demo running straight for Xbox/PC on October 27
Speaking about upcoming co-op zombie shooter Left 4 Dead 2 at EA's Tokyo press conference today, Valve's Kim Swift announced intentions to release a demo on October 27. Though no platforms were explicitly mentioned, we're betting pre-orders on both Xbox 360 and PC platforms will be getting first dibs, as Valve has already stated. From what we understand, the demo will feature multiplayer, though we're not sure to what capacity this will extend. Either way, Xbox 360 and PC owners will get a chance to try out at least some of the 10 melee weapons well before the game's November 17 release. We'll ask EA for more details on the demo as the Tokyo Game Show continues this week.%Gallery-64704%
