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The 7th Guest 3 materializes with FMV out of thin air
Trilobyte has grand plans for The 7th Guest 3, a follow-up to classic horror puzzle games The 7th Guest and The 11th Hour. The team is seeking $435,000 on Kickstarter to craft an HD, full-motion-video game with 20 puzzles at least. If the Kickstarter video is anything like the final product, The 7th Guest 3 will be just as campy as the original games. This time around, the entire mansion of famed toymaker Henry Strauf is a giant puzzle, and its rooms twist, turn, disappear and rearrange themselves depending on the riddles players solve within its walls. It sounds a bit like Hogwarts – or for those with creepier sensibilities, the Navidson home in House of Leaves. The 7th Guest and The 11th Hour recently launched on Steam and they're still on sale, in a bundle or separately, through the end of Halloween. Trilobyte has 38 more days to raise $435,000 for The 7th Guest 3 on Kickstarter, with more than $18,000 gathered in its first day.
The 7th Guest, 11th Hour bundle up for safety on Steam
Classic PC adventure game The 7th Guest and its sequel, The 11th Hour, are now available on Steam as a bundle for $15 or individually for $10. The 7th Guest comes in PC, Mac and Linux flavors, while The 11th Hour comes in PC and Mac varieties. The 7th Guest made it through Steam Greenlight in August, and in March, developer Trilobyte announced The 7th Guest: 3, a follow-up to The 11th Hour for PC, Mac and mobile devices. At the time, Trilobyte was looking for funding partners and had Kickstarter as a backup plan – but now it's Plan A. The Kickstarter campaign for The 7th Guest: 3 should launch around Halloween, Trilobyte says.
The 7th Guest: 3 coming to a PC, Mac or mobile device right behind you
Trilobyte has lured The 7th Guest: 3 out of hiding (yes, it was under your bed) and onto PC, Mac, iOS and Android, possibly within the next 18 months. The 7th Guest: 3 is the 3D, puzzle-licious sequel to Trilobyte's The 7th Guest and The 11th Hour."In the world of The 7th Guest: 3, you will re-enter the mysterious and magical mansion, newly restored with games, puzzles and artifacts," Trilobyte co-founder Charlie McHenry tells Polygon. "But it is still haunted, as players will soon discover. You will learn more about what happened on that terrible night, and discover the real story and previously hidden secrets of the gaming world's most mysterious toymaker."Trilobyte is talking with potential financiers and plans to launch a Kickstarter in April, should funding fall through via other channels, McHenry says. The game could be done in 12 - 18 months, with some of the original development team working on The 7th Guest: 3 alongside new puzzle designers. If the actual game is as unsettling as having a colon before "3" in the title, Trilobyte is on the right track.
DevJuice: 6 tips for tightening your pitch video
As a developer, you're probably aware that selling your app can be just as important as creating your app. Today, one of the regulars in #iphonedev asked me to take a look at his pitch video. Intended to sell the idea of his app to possible reviewers, blogs, and other media, his first attempt demonstrated many common pitfalls. After discussing these with my editor, we decided to run a DevJuice to offer some recommendations. What follows are six tips to help you create tighter video pitches. Use these suggestions to help tune your product videos before you send them off to bloggers. You can view both the before and after versions of the video at the bottom of this post. "Tender Loving Care" by Trilobyte Games will launch on Tuesday for $13.99. It runs on both iPad and iPhone (iOS 5 and later). 1. Be brief. I felt his initial video was too long. Nearly two minutes in length, he forgot a key fact about communication. Squirrel. Many busy reviewers have the attention span of a toddler, if that. Instead of spanning two minutes, I suggested he cut his video down to 30 seconds. 2. Find your hook. Another issue was his message. Buried deep in his two minutes was one really good hook. I recommended he bring that out, punch it big time, and then stop. If you watch the videos that follow, see if you agree with me as to what, exactly, that hook was, and why it was effective. 3. Focus on the message. He made a really common mistake that I best characterize as "you think viewers will be as enchanted with the moment-by-moment playback of your game as you are." His first attempt contains a fairly long game excerpt, which I found distracted from his message rather than supported it. His updated video allows the reviewer to follow up and test the games hands-on, rather than trying to engage with it as a static video playback. I believe hands-on testing is always a better way to appreciate game play. I don't suggest you skip game coverage entirely, mind you -- but you should just offer enough to engage interest and no more. The viewer should get a sense of how the application operates, but doesn't need a blow-by-blow introduction. 4. Communicate your successes. He failed to sell a really important strength of his company. I'll call this one: "play your winners." His company is rather well known for another game. I recommended that he punch that game somewhere in his presentation, along with the name of the rather well-known actor who appears in the game. 5. Avoid passive voice. I recommended that he drop the buzzwords and passive voice descriptions, and offer more engaging descriptions to the viewer. More often than not, the problem stems from a "good enough" mentality. You lead with your first attempt. Take a break. Go back after a while and listen to your script, then edit it. You have nothing to lose but your "is"-es. 6. Guide the viewer. Finally, I recommended that he conclude the video with concrete information of what to do next, should someone be interested in following up. It never hurts to lead a potential reviewer by the hand after engaging their interest. Agree with these points? Disagree? Drop your opinions in the comments. Before Video: After Video:
PSA: The 7th Guest free on iOS and Mac App store today
In 1993, we were too busy getting our chat room trolling on to play classic adventure games like The 7th Guest. Thankfully for us, modern technology lets us revisit older works via new platforms. The 7th Guest, for instance, has been available for quite some time on iOS and OS X.But hey, maybe you – like us – have yet to purchase Trilobyte's seminal work? You'll be glad to hear, then, that the OS X and iOS versions of The 7th Guest are totally free today in celebration of May Day. We're not second-guessing it either! Free game!
The 7th Guest and The 11th Hour re-released for PC
Retro-game host DotEmu has released, in classic horror-puzzle form, The 7th Guest and The 11th Hour, further supporting our theory that both titles were an extensive viral ad campaign for red Slurpees at 7/11. Both titles are $10 each and available for download here and -- look out there's something over there!
Graeme Devine's new studio releases Clandestiny on Mac App Store
Former Ensemble Studios lead designer Graeme Devine's new development studio, GRL Games, released its very first title today on the (similarly recently released) Mac App Store: a remake of Trilobyte's 1996 adventure game Clandestiny. Considering Devine helped develop the original -- shortly after co-creating The 7th Guest and The 11th Hour, no less -- we trust that this remake simply reeks of authenticity. Check out the trailer posted after the jump to get a sense of the game's super charming, retro animated style. If it floats your boat, you can grab Clandestiny on the Mac App Store for $9.99. If it doesn't, you should take a look deep inside yourself, and try to figure out exactly when it was that your soul died.
The 7th Guest launches on App Store
What? Oh, yeah ... yeah, just hold on, we'll be with you in a sec. ... Now, where were we? ... But wait, that can't ... Huh? Oh, yeah, the post, right, sorry. We've been staring at the frigging "letter can puzzle" in The 7th Guest for like an hour now and we're honestly this close to snapping our respective iPads and iPhones over our knees at this point. ... Wait, maybe if ... no, that won't work! Dammit! You know, we're actually a little busy with this to write a post right now. Hey, why not go to the App Store and get The 7th Guest ($2.99 on iPhone, $5.99 on iPad) for yourself while you wait for us to figure this out? Now, if you'll excuse us, we're gonna watch the video of the chubby ghost lady for like the hundredth time to see if we missed a clue.
Trilobyte's Charlie McHenry on 7th Guest and FMV's mobile future
As I've admitted more times than I can count, I'm part of the narrow subset of gamers who loves FMV games. It is, in fact, such a narrow subset that I'm the only game critic I know who's a member of it. It was with an understandable amount of incredulity then that I reported the news that one of my favorite FMV devs, the long-dead Trilobyte, was returning to relevance with an iOS port of its classic The 7th Guest. I reached out to new COO Charlie McHenry to try to find out if this new Trilobyte was just interested in a one night stand, just playing with my heart or in it for something more serious.
The 7th Guest coming to iPhone in December
Retro games continue to make their way to the iOS platform. One of the latest early-'90s games about to make its way to iOS is Trilobyte's FMV adventure/puzzle game, The 7th Guest. The company says it is due to come out sometime early next month. When it debuted in 1993, The 7th Guest was one the first computer games to come out on CD (CD!) and was originally priced at US$79.95. For the iOS version, you'll only have to fork over $3.99. It seems this won't be a universal app, as it's labeled as an "iPhone" game. Perhaps an HD version will be in the works if the iPhone version is a winner. Are you a newcomer to The 7th Guest and interested in picking this one up? Or are you an old 7th Guest veteran who wants to try the app out on your iPhone next? Give us your thoughts in the comments. [via Joystiq]
The 7th Guest coming to iOS ... from Trilobyte
OK, so we don't have jet packs or the ability to vote through our DVRs (you did remember to vote, didn't you?) but at least you can say this of 2010: A game that once required CD-ROMs to work is now available on your iPhone. Or more specifically, spooky FMV gem The 7th Guest will be available this December on the iOS platform. We've put a trailer for you after the jump if you're completely in the dark (i.e. younger than 25). Oh, oh, but we haven't told you the best part! Guess who's bringing the game to market? None other than a reformed Trilobyte Games, the original house behind not only The 7th Guest but other oddballs like The 11th Hour and (at least in part) the supremely odd Tender Loving Care (starring John Hurt). Can you believe it? ... C'mon, where all my FMV nerds at? ... Anybody?
