[diego]

Well, there's just not enough information in order to make an official news. Even if Keith Arem was to remake the game there is no official announcement of it but only "what ifs" on message boards and facebook.

What is Toonstruck 2? Is it a remake of original game with scenes that were deleted? Ok, great. Who will make it? Is there a team, is there a plan, is it an independent project? Who is standing behind the project? Is Keith Arem the project leader doing an independent game?

Look, this http://www.night-of-the-meteor.de/en It's an underground project which is remaking Maniac Mansion using Day of the Tentacle style. Now, they didn't make Facebook page asking for tremendous support, but presented their project as an indy effort. We've got a clear idea what is the project about. In this little project, there are more elements to make it "news" than in Toonstruck.

And don't get me wrong - i'm the biggest Toonstruck fan.

[CrimsonBlue]

Toonstruck 2 isn't a fan project, it already exists, including several screens. It just wasn't finished and released because of the state of adventure games at the time. You can't compare it with a fan remaking MM in DOTT style, because 1) Toonstruck 2 isn't a remake, but an unreleased/unfinished sequel to the first game, and 2) It's not a fan-project based on some other developers IP.

From what I understand, is that he's hoping to update and release Toonstruck 1 and 2 in one game (seeing as it was originally intended to be one long game from the beginning).

[diego]

Toonstruck 2 doesn't exist. What exists though is the material that was planned to be in the original but was cut and planned to be included in the sequel. The original Toonstruck 1 had an ending that wasn't planned at first place, but due to cut material that was the game turned out to be. If you are to remake the Toonstruck 1 now, using the suffice material, that would mean that you need to change the idea of the original game as well.

I'm comparing remake of MM to Toonstruck simply because it's unsure whether who holds the license to Toonstruck, and because we don't know what exactly is "Toonstruck 2".

So, as i said, "Toonstruck 2" is not simply something like Warcraft: Lord of the Clans which was a complete product but never got published.

[Spiketheclown]

Keith Arem owns the rights to Toonstruck and Toonstruck 2. According to one of his letters, Toonstruck 2 is almost completely finished in terms of plot, graphics, animations, voice acting, etc. All what is left is programming. As for the ending: it was an open ending ("to be continued" type), so it would be easy to attach a second part just after this ending.

[zane]

personally, i dont think its fair what the creator is doing here. He did virtually no promoting of this beyond a couple twitter messages. People dont know what this game is, they need to be reminded. He cant expect a fan outpouring like kingsquest when there was only 1 game.

[Idrisguitar]

yep, i said it before (on another forum maybe) but the way he is conducting this is all wrong. and the more this gets broguht up the less interested i get.

i dont want him to make money at this point. if he cant get investors to help him out, he needs to find a way to get it done like most other indie developers, in his own time. not get random surveys and fan outcries to bail him out, while he basically does nothing.

this is harsh judgement considering i dont know exactly what he is doing on his own time. but from what i CAN see, he is trying to get us to give him his firepower for the next time he meets investors. thats not our problem, its his.

if he genuinely needs this to get this game done he should be A LOT more active on these boards, and other boards, and really...he should be all over the web. (i know thats what id do if i was trying to get my game promoted.)

30k signatures?...............he is on 3,098, and its been almost 7 months......he needs to change tactics.

[Spiketheclown]

First, the number 50000 wasn't chosen by Arem himself. I suppose that even a much less amount of signatures will be enough. Remember the petition for the Silver Lining, which reached only 3024 of its 100000 goal, but still was successful.
Second, Keith Arem's newest statement makes it clear that those signatures are only the very first step of the Toonstruck 2 plan. Beginning from the next months, Mr. Arem is going to start a professional advertising campaign just like the other game developers (sneak peeks at the development material, official announcements, etc.) All these Twitter and Facebook activities are just preparing the ground for the next stages.

[zane]

well thats good to hear. He had pretty much given the impression it was "give me all these signatures or im not doing anything with the game."

[Idrisguitar]

Originally Posted by Spiketheclown

First, the number 50000 wasn't chosen by Arem himself. I suppose that even a much less amount of signatures will be enough. Remember the petition for the Silver Lining, which reached only 3024 of its 100000 goal, but still was successful.
Second, Keith Arem's newest statement makes it clear that those signatures are only the very first step of the Toonstruck 2 plan. Beginning from the next months, Mr. Arem is going to start a professional advertising campaign just like the other game developers (sneak peeks at the development material, official announcements, etc.) All these Twitter and Facebook activities are just preparing the ground for the next stages.

yeah, good news.

maybe he should have communicated this more clearly. so i still stand by him being quite unproffessional at least in his execution of all this on the communication side.

so im still not very excited at the possibility.

[Spiketheclown]

For anyone who's still skeptical about the whole idea: Keith Arem can easily be contacted on Facebook. It certainly wouldn't be a good idea to call him "unprofessional" in his face , but you may ask him a couple of questions and give some suggestions about the Toonstruck 2 campaign.

[rambler]

Why are you guys bagging out on Keith? As far as I know the guys from the Toonstruck 2 fan project started the websites and petitions..?? Please correct me if I am incorrect.

[Spiketheclown]

No, the petition, facebook, twitter, etc. were created by a Toonstruck fan (known as "Drew Blanc") on the proposal of Keith Arem, whom he previously mailed to ask about Toonstruck 2. "Drew Blanc" first posted Mr. Arem's letter on the fanproject's forums, but actually the fanproject guys have nothing to do with it. Check this thread for details.

[Toonstriker]

Everyone on this forum seems to be nattering on about how unprofessional Keith Arem is being about this whole thing.

It's as simple as this folks, The game BOMBED at retail back in the day. Obviously he's reserved hope for it because he maintains a warehouse with all of the original assets. To come out and openly say "Hey everyone I'm ressurecting a point & click adventure game that bombed at retail back in the day, I need everyone to get behind me and support me!" would be a very stupid mistake from a financial point of view.

What's happened here is that a group of fans who have been contacting him via email were fortunate enough to learn that re-releasing it is now on his mind. He let the word out quietly and now those desperate few are struggling to get the word out about it. According to the facebook message he's evaluating the costs right now, if it's ridiculously expensive he may very well abandon it and who could fault him for it?

To summarise, he makes sense that he's being so under the radar about it. Why risk losing a lot of money AND disapointing a lot of fans if things don't work out?

[zane]

Originally Posted by Toonstriker

To come out and openly say "Hey everyone I'm ressurecting a point & click adventure game that bombed at retail back in the day, I need everyone to get behind me and support me!" would be a very stupid mistake from a financial point of view.

Thats exactly what you have to say (minus the the bombed part). I dont know whos fault it was, but somebody came up with this specific number for the petition, and it came across "everybody sign it or im not doing it".
And it makes no sense to be under the radar about it. Thats like giving up before youve played. The game has 3 big names in popular culture, if he actually wants lots of people paying attention to it, then he needs to publicize that. I do undertstand the internal debate about whether or not its worth it financially, but thats something he has to decide before this kindv campaign was made. And i dont know how much hes actually involved with the campaign, but articles gave the impression it was his campaign.

[Rosswell]

Bit of info from Keith on Facebook

Hey all -

Just to add to Drew's post...We are not affiliated with PetitionSpot and are not asking or collecting any money from fans.

Please keep up your support for Toonstruck, and thanks for your patience and keeping it alive. More news to come!
...
Keith

Does this sound like hes making this out of his own pocket?

[Rosswell]

Don't know if anyone is aware but you can now play Toonstruck on ScummVM via the latest SVN build and it runs pretty good plus the intro video is now viewable so you don't get those gridlines running across the screen.

[zobraks]

Originally Posted by Rosswell

Don't know if anyone is aware but you can now play Toonstruck on ScummVM

Diego made us aware of that some time ago.
The Original news

[Rosswell]

Some big news from Keith, posted this on the Facebook page

'We're currently working on an enhanced re-release of TS1, but we may add some of the TS2 content if we can afford to do it. We'll likely re-build our fanbase, and then move onto TS2 next.

More to come!'

[rayvio]

good news and a smart move. Toonstruck is, I suspect, something of an unknown to most gamers who don't frequent websites discussing nostalgic gaming memories (poor buggers don't know what they're missing) so a re-release will definitely help a sequel

[Rosswell]

This may interest the AG staff as Keith has given details on when the official announcement will be made;

Hey all -

We're still quite a ways off, but I'm hoping we can make an official announcement by Comic Con or later this summer!

We appreciate your enthusiasm! Keep the dream alive! :-)