[imisssunwell]

LucasArts possibly making new adventure games

From: http://kotaku.com/5549234/monkey-isl...from-lucasarts

Some quotes:

"We've always been in the action AND adventure game," Derrick responded. "It just seems that we've been emphasizing one over the other lately. The Special Editions and Tales of Monkey Island have been a way to measure the audience's reaction to us doing more straight adventure games and to see how the audience reacts to Monkey Island so many years after the first and last game in the series. It's been pretty successful so far."

But don't expect a new pure, point-and click adventure title from the company any time soon.
"But if we were to truly get back into the "adventure" business then I would say we need to take some of what we've learned from the "action" side of the business a little bit, look at today's audience sensibilities and reinvent the genre just as we did with Maniac Mansion 23 years ago."

This is exciting and the departure from point and click (thank god) makes it sound that their games will be modern in graphics, controls & UI, should they choose to make AGs again.


Their AGs were really good, with an innovative UI, engine and superb graphics for their time. I hope they will bring the spirit of those games to the modern gaming era, of course revamping everything to today’s standards.

[RockNFknRoll]

F yeah!

[Ascovel]

...and reinvent the genre just as WE did with Maniac Mansion 23 years ago."

"WE" meaning "people of whom no one has worked at LucasArts in the past 10 years"?

There's nothing left of the old LucasArts in LucasArts except the IPs. If the new team wants to reinvent the genre, their ambition doesn't mean to me anything more than of some random studio I know nothing about.

[Al Azif]

^Agreed

[AndreaDraco83]

I sadly second Ascovel's feelings.

[Hamham Chan]

Lucasarts should start by un-canceling Sam and Max: Freelance Police.

[imisssunwell]

Originally Posted by Ascovel

"WE" meaning "people of whom no one has worked at LucasArts in the past 10 years"?

There's nothing left of the old LucasArts in LucasArts except the IPs. If the new team wants to reinvent the genre, their ambition doesn't mean to me anything more than of some random studio I know nothing about.

Not necessarily, LucasArts has allot more funds than a random studio and also has much more expertise in making games than a random studio. They can get good writers, artists & programmers.

Also, the old guys were affiliated with Monkey SE remake and if their contribution turns out to be necessary, LucasArts can always pay them.

Should they choose to do so, LucasArts creating new AGs could really revive the genre.

Of course this is all partly hypothetical, no games have been announced, no art has leaked and no information on which team(s) will be doing it is available, just an interview at kotaku.

[potan]

But don't expect a new pure, point-and click adventure title from the company any time soon.

hopefully it's not another game like Lucidity, it looks good but i'm not really fond of the gameplay

[Kazmajik]

It goes without saying that I and many others would love anything adventuresome that LucasArts would care to do (but I'll say it anyway.)

[ozzie]

Well, I'd love it if any developer chose to produce adventures in the future. LucasArts sure has a long tradition in our beloved genre, one that they neglected for quite some time, so it would be a good sign if they started developing adventures or adventure-y games again, games with emphasis on non-violent problem solving, story, characters and exploration.

But yeah, I'm not terribly excited about it either. I don't know what great talent is still left at LucasArts. There may be quite a lot of adventure fans there, but all LucasArts did in the past years were action games. So they still have to prove their talent with adventures.

[J.H]

I read this article yesterday and sadly came to the same conclusion as most. I very much doubt we'll see any original adventure games from Lucas Arts again.

I don't think it matters tbh. Lucas Arts jumpstarted adventure games with great classics. But now there are scores and scores of games, some good, some bad, most of which are technically streets ahead of where Lucas Arts left off. About the only thing missing from todays games is the humour Lucas Arts had. Their scripts were funny. Most of todays scripts are poor.

[Maquisard]

This could work, especially if LA mines some of its franchises. A new Monkey Island produced with the kind of budget they have at their disposal would shit all over ToMi. The same talent is no longer there, but I'd bet the company's populated by rabid fans of the classics. Still, MI's probably not the way to go, for fear of oversaturation at this point. Bringing back Full Throttle, on the other hand.. Or, Indy could get back to his roots.

[rayvio]

please, I'm trying to pretend they made no Indy games after Atlantis and no movies after Last Crusade
a Full Throttle sequel would be nice, or maybe a sequel to one of the classics like Loom or Zak McKraken, but to be honest I'd really like to see them try something new. sequels are all well and good, but without the writers of the originals on board it's less likely to work out well

[Owskie]

Im sick of companies thinking they can reinvent the wheel, it never turns out good.

[UPtimist]

Quite.

However, what makes me somewhat excited about this is that it might actually mean a change for more bigger budget games. Even if they don't have the same people as they used to, that budget should still mean that they get people who know their trade well enough to make high quality. Even if the games are not that wondertabulous in the end, at least it's a change to the always-so-low budgets Unless of course they dump it to some corner-cubicle development team...

[cbman]

Sorry, double post

[cbman]

Originally Posted by imisssunwell

Not necessarily, LucasArts has allot more funds than a random studio and also has much more expertise in making games than a random studio. They can get good writers, artists & programmers.

Also, the old guys were affiliated with Monkey SE remake and if their contribution turns out to be necessary, LucasArts can always pay them.

Should they choose to do so, LucasArts creating new AGs could really revive the genre.

Of course this is all partly hypothetical, no games have been announced, no art has leaked and no information on which team(s) will be doing it is available, just an interview at kotaku.

Why do you care either way? I thought you hated adventure games?

[imisssunwell]

Why do you care either way? I thought you hated adventure games?

Not quite, Dreamfall, Fahrenheit were rather cool. I expect AGs to have the same level of craft that exists in other genres these days, eg. RPGs & Action games. AGs used to have top graphics, competent developer teams and were trying to embrace new technologies.

Unfortunately not the same standards apply to the majority of recent AGs. Companies like LucasArts are exactly the type of company which can revive the genre and bring it in line with modern standards. I’m all for AGs that are on par with e.g. Dreamfall in story, graphics, world design, voice acting, music etc.

Lucas has the potential to create such games, I hope they actually deliver something unique but only time can tell.

[Sughly]

Originally Posted by imisssunwell

Unfortunately not the same standards apply to the majority of recent AGs.

I would say when it comes to standards, storytelling is at a low across all games (with the exclusion of a few titles here and there). Sorry to go briefly off topic - couldn't help myself