It is definitely true that this is the kind of thing that Mike and Jerry would mock other companies for doing back in the day. This is the definition of cheap cash in.
No skin off my ass that a game I wont buy wont be any good, but it makes everyone involved look terrible, IMO.
Indica1 on
If the president had any real power, he'd be able to live wherever the fuck he wanted.
It is definitely true that this is the kind of thing that Mike and Jerry would mock other companies for doing back in the day. This is the definition of cheap cash in.
No skin off my ass that a game I wont buy wont be any good, but it makes everyone involved look terrible, IMO.
Really? I can't imagine that they would've mocked a grouping of big name characters like this and actually meant it. This is just a neat idea all around, fans of each series can buy it and in fact are probably more likely to buy it because it's cheap and doesn't look to feature anything but the characters they care about. It's very straightforward in its ideas and has great teams behind it. I think it's a great concept and will sell pretty well!
I don't understand where people are getting the THEY SOLD OUT implication from. Telltale does good games, and PA have a history of doing stuff with companies that make good games.
Jintor on
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SteevLWhat can I do for you?Registered Userregular
edited September 2010
I'm pretty sure this is going to be shown at PAX, so we should be hearing impressions of it soon.
I really don't see the controversy in Telltale doing a sequel to their Texas Hold'em game with popular, established characters. Let's be honest, who would you rather play poker with? Your loser friends, some randoms at a casino, or Max and Heavy?
The first two groups by far?
You must have some awesome friends.
Or just friends that aren't likely to kill him when they lose.
amnesiasoft on
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RentI'm always rightFuckin' deal with itRegistered Userregular
But then you have to develop a world, the mysterious land common to all video game characters, and what does it look like, how does it work, are you going to then try to get other people on board as opposed to just doing a quick one off to see how it's received, etc.
Which is my whole point, mash-ups only work if you put in that effort to make the world they inhabit feel real, and for the mash-up to have weight- otherwise it's a bunch of masturbating your fanbases- aka a cash-in.
Also, mash-ups are never poorly received in a financial sense, it's why the comics industry has been doing them for god knows how long. It's why MvC 3 is coming out. I could go on and on. But mash-ups are pretty much a sure thing financially.
A point-and-click would not have required substantially more money than a poker game, especially since Telltale develops point and clicks and thus have an engine to work off of. In any case you'd have to be a fool to honestly think that any game featuring those four on the cover wouldn't sell crazy bananas.
Really? I can't imagine that they would've mocked a grouping of big name characters like this and actually meant it.
Considering they were apparently too lazy to at least run the same artsyle with all the characters (seriously those screenshots look like they were done in two minutes with Gmod and paint. I mean seriously, look at Strong Bad and the edges of his sprite. It's literally as if they cut around him and pasted it in some static background.
So lazy.
And I think it's pretty telling that Tycho isn't shown at all- they probably gave him the same treatment even though he already has a 3-d model
Watch as its some 2-d sprite straight out of the comics
Also I hate mash-ups for a very good reason- whenever they're done, regardless of media, it pretty much boils down to the fan favorite characters to pop up to say some cheezy overdone one-liners and leave. The only way mash-ups really work is when they're set in a cohesive, integrated universe that accounts for their presence (e.g. the Marvel Ultimate Universe), or they're given time to establish a rapport and become deeper than "HEY LOOK AT ME YOU KNOW ME WATCH AS I REFERENCE SOMETHING YOU KNOW" something that poker doesn't allow by its very nature as a game.
Seriously I'm willing to bet that all of the "interesting dialogue" in the game are gonna be tired as hell jokes we've all heard before utttered again, and again, and again. Oh heh heh heh Tycho says big words! Hilarious! Strong Bad references Strongbadia or says sbemails or some shit! Oh tee hee hee the Heavy is gonna talk around sandwiches!
Considering they were apparently too lazy to at least run the same artsyle with all the characters (seriously those screenshots look like they were done in two minutes with Gmod and paint. I mean seriously, look at Strong Bad and the edges of his sprite. It's literally as if they cut around him and pasted it in some static background.
So lazy.
And I think it's pretty telling that Tycho isn't shown at all- they probably gave him the same treatment even though he already has a 3-d model
Watch as its some 2-d sprite straight out of the comics
That's not a sprite of Strong Bad, that's an in-engine 3D model straight out of their games.
And Tycho's model isn't being shown at PAX because it is, quote, "Not quite ready for prime-time". He'll have a 3D model, same as the rest, but it isn't finished yet.
Considering they were apparently too lazy to at least run the same artsyle with all the characters (seriously those screenshots look like they were done in two minutes with Gmod and paint. I mean seriously, look at Strong Bad and the edges of his sprite. It's literally as if they cut around him and pasted it in some static background.
So lazy.
And I think it's pretty telling that Tycho isn't shown at all- they probably gave him the same treatment even though he already has a 3-d model
Watch as its some 2-d sprite straight out of the comics
That's not a sprite of Strong Bad, that's an in-engine 3D model straight out of their games.
Yeah, I remember from playing the first or second episode of the TT Strong Bad game that he looked sort of weird but it makes sense. I thought part of the point would be to maintain the art style from their respective games.
Yeah, TellTale makes point and click adventure games (among other things) based on various properties, using the forgiving LucasArts style of "go ahead and click everything, we put funny reactions even where it doesn't advance the game" more so than the Sierra-style "you forgot to click pixel (32,45) before leaving this screen, the game is now unwinnable". So, if the main draw here is "characters from TellTale properties along with other series known for their wit and charm talk over a game of poker", I'm confident that it's going to be good.
Kupi on
My favorite musical instrument is the air-raid siren.
"So what happens when video game characters aren't, you know, video gaming?" It's an inquiry posed more often by the fans of such games than the developers responsible for making them, and while opinions concerning what gaming icons get up to in their down time may wildly vary, a relaxing banter-based game of cards is certainly one of the more plausible suggestions.
Telltale's newly announced Poker Night at the Inventory looks to explore such a scenario, posing a friendly, dialogue-driven game of no-limit Texas Hold'em between such recognizable faces as boxing-gloved braggart Strong Bad (Homestar Runner, Strong Bad's Cool Game for Attractive People), sardonic wordsmith Tycho Brahe (Penny Arcade, Penny Arcade Adventures: On The Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness), the sandvich-obsessed hulking Heavy (Valve's Team Fortress 2), hyper-kinetic freelance policeman Max (Sam & Max Hit the Road, Telltale's episodic Sam & Max seasons), and, well, you -- the player, and silent observer to this spread of mixed-media madness.
"It's an excuse for us to get a bunch of characters from the industry together and let them interact as themselves in kind of a 'behind the scenes', 'back room' environment," explains Sean Vanaman, writer and designer at Telltale Games. "It's a poker game, but it's a dialogue-centric, character interaction-based poker game."
No game-changing power-ups, no crossover brawling, no ridiculous or unnecessary gimmicks -- just four friendly faces, one stylish speakeasy, a ton of dialogue, and a deck of cards. Everyone starts with $10,000, with the last man standing earning the ultimate prize: bragging rights over a spread of video game vets.
"Our CEO, Dan Connors, pitched this game idea to us, and then we went out and pitched it to the four license holders," adds Jake Rodkin, graphic designer and community coordinator at Telltale. "We contacted these creative people that we all really respect, and fortunately they like us back. But now the onus is on us to not ruin four other people's very personal creations."
"We're fans of all these franchises," notes Vanaman, citing the difficulties inherent to breathing life into such established characters. "We ran into Valve's Robin Walker here at PAX, and we were like 'Robin! Oh man, we won't mess it up!' He's really excited, but it's daunting -- when I'm sitting there writing dialogue for the Heavy, I have hundreds upon hundreds of chances to sell this character out, if I take it the amount of in-game dialogue into consideration."
"There's more speech among these four characters than the entire cast of a typical Sam & Max episode," explains Rodkin. "But all of the characters' creators have taken a pass at the script and signed off on things every step of the way."
While Poker Night's extensive script was written in-house at Telltale, the designers are quick to note the brand of back-and-forth required with the creators of the game's cast.
"It's all about trust -- there's a lot of trust," explains Vanaman about the game's production process. "The most hands-on the license holders have gotten, though, has been two very different experiences. One is Matt Chapman, who's the voice and co-creator of Strong Bad, and with him, you write the script -- and we knew this working with him on Strong Bad's Cool Game for Attractive People -- you write the script, and then he goes into the studio and becomes Strong Bad, and it comes out different... but still the same."
"Funnier, maybe," quips Rodkin.
"Funnier, and you learn words," says Vanaman. "I didn't know that 'ample hind-bosom' was a funny thing to say, but it is, and Strong Bad knows it's a funny thing to say."
"And working with Jerry Holkins of Penny Arcade, we just really hit it off," he continues. "We just talked a lot about who Tycho is and what he's about. I've been an enthusiast of the Penny Arcade web-comic for a long time, so we had really good conversations about 'Tycho is this, but not that'. So I finish the script, I send all the Tycho stuff to Jerry, and three days later, he sends me back edits -- and it would all really be just tweaks, like 'This word is really something more that Tycho would say,' or he might kind of spin the conversation in a different direction."
"Sometimes you'll write a character as the butt of a joke, but then the creator goes, 'Well, maybe my character was the one making the joke at someone else's expense!'" notes Rodkin. "Like, 'What if instead of Tycho getting picked on by the Heavy, Tycho outsmarts him?'"
Telltale hopes to dynamically build on such inter-character relationships by exploring opportunities for interaction that wouldn't be readily available considering the cast's range of mixed-media backgrounds. One of Poker Night's key challenges, however, is making sure that said relationships don't come across obvious or forced.
"It's easy to make the Heavy just say, 'I will murder!' at every turn, and for Tycho to freak out," explains Vanaman.
Rodkin continues, "Right, but then we have Tycho threaten to mail-order in the Heavy's sister as his wife."
"It was important to build those dynamics to make them feel natural," notes Vanaman. "Strong Bad and Tycho, for instance, hate each other -- I don't think they ever agree -- but Tycho and Max get along really well, where the Heavy is wary of Tycho, loves Max, and thinks Strongbad is a tiny Heavy."
Telltale hopes to make such dynamics believable and entertaining, but also authentic: Strong Bad, the Heavy, and Max will all be voiced by their original actors, with Tycho's debut speaking role coming courtesy of Bay Area beatboxer, vocalist, and Telltale VA vet Andrew "Kid Beyond" Chaikin.
"We want to develop this place, The Inventory, as just a cool hang-out spot for video game characters to go," says Vanaman . "We're hoping that 'At the Inventory' will start to mean something if the space is cool and the game is good."
Poker Night at the Inventory is set for a Fall 2010 release on the official Telltale site, Valve's Steam service, and on Penny Arcade's Greenhouse for $4.99.
Also this little gem from the Telltale forums:
As for the characters and how they perceive the place, we wanted to mix it up a little based on their personalities. Tycho for instance knows that the other three guys are game characters and talks to them about it. The Heavy on the other hand, mostly thinks that his life is murdering people in Gravelpit and then going to sleep in the barracks. Sometimes he dreams that he dies over and over but knows thats impossible, as no one can kill Heavy Weapons Guy. Strong Bad knows that he was in a game, as a licensed character who was exploited by Telltale (see Behind The Bad), while with Max you can never tell if he knows what's going on or not since he likes having no short term memory to speak of.
"It was important to build those dynamics to make them feel natural," notes Vanaman. "Strong Bad and Tycho, for instance, hate each other -- I don't think they ever agree -- but Tycho and Max get along really well, where the Heavy is wary of Tycho, loves Max, and thinks Strongbad is a tiny Heavy."
When you get down to it, it is a very safe product. But it has to be, considering they're using four different licenses.
Essentially, if this just turns out to be a bunch of animated comic strips, along with a rudimentary poker game that could potentially lead to something bigger, I absolutely think it's a worthwhile project.
For $5.
Cherrn on
All creature will die and all the things will be broken. That's the law of samurai.
I'd lime both the previous responses. $5 is absolutely a steal for loads of great interaction between four strong and hilarious personalities, plus you get a poker game attached.
The only thing that would make this game greater is if there's cameos of characters from various games in the background. Like in the background you see another poker game going on with Gabe, Homestar, Ellis, and Sam.
"We want to develop this place, The Inventory, as just a cool hang-out spot for video game characters to go," says Vanaman . "We're hoping that 'At the Inventory' will start to mean something if the space is cool and the game is good."
This sounds interesting. So if Poker Night is successful, we might see more "[Thing] at The Inventory" games? Maybe... even a full season of adventure games? That would be neat.
"We want to develop this place, The Inventory, as just a cool hang-out spot for video game characters to go," says Vanaman . "We're hoping that 'At the Inventory' will start to mean something if the space is cool and the game is good."
This sounds interesting. So if Poker Night is successful, we might see more "[Thing] at The Inventory" games? Maybe... even a full season of adventure games? That would be neat.
Man "[Thing]" could be so many things.
I'd love to see fucking sports games with these guys. "Table Tennis at The Inventory"
I mean it already makes sense with Tycho being there.
The idea of Tycho being DM to that crowd playing D&D is exquisite.
Clearly Heavy is the meatshield warrior.
Max is a pyromaniac wizard.
Strongbad somehow ended up as a bard and is really not pleased with the situation.
Indeed, the voices, dialogue, etc were all provided by PAX attendees, as is tradition at TTG's Make A Scene panels. It'll be a while yet before we hear Chaikin as Tycho.
Incidentally, since the Tycho model shown at PAX was unfinished, here's a progress report form TTG's Jake Rodkin on how long 'til it's done:
We got it to "presentable for 20 seconds at PAX" but there's probably another week's worth of work going into him. The outlines need a lot of fixing, he had no shadows or shading to speak of, and after that we may tweak the shape a tiny bit, too, to get his silhouette looking correct once all the shading stuff is in.
Oh, I had just skipped to where he calls Sam an odious lout. If I had watched the next two seconds where his voice changes it would have been more obvious. I didn't know what Make A Scene was.
Posts
It is definitely true that this is the kind of thing that Mike and Jerry would mock other companies for doing back in the day. This is the definition of cheap cash in.
No skin off my ass that a game I wont buy wont be any good, but it makes everyone involved look terrible, IMO.
If the president had any real power, he'd be able to live wherever the fuck he wanted.
Really? I can't imagine that they would've mocked a grouping of big name characters like this and actually meant it. This is just a neat idea all around, fans of each series can buy it and in fact are probably more likely to buy it because it's cheap and doesn't look to feature anything but the characters they care about. It's very straightforward in its ideas and has great teams behind it. I think it's a great concept and will sell pretty well!
My Backloggery
Which is my whole point, mash-ups only work if you put in that effort to make the world they inhabit feel real, and for the mash-up to have weight- otherwise it's a bunch of masturbating your fanbases- aka a cash-in.
Also, mash-ups are never poorly received in a financial sense, it's why the comics industry has been doing them for god knows how long. It's why MvC 3 is coming out. I could go on and on. But mash-ups are pretty much a sure thing financially.
A point-and-click would not have required substantially more money than a poker game, especially since Telltale develops point and clicks and thus have an engine to work off of. In any case you'd have to be a fool to honestly think that any game featuring those four on the cover wouldn't sell crazy bananas.
Considering they were apparently too lazy to at least run the same artsyle with all the characters (seriously those screenshots look like they were done in two minutes with Gmod and paint. I mean seriously, look at Strong Bad and the edges of his sprite. It's literally as if they cut around him and pasted it in some static background.
So lazy.
And I think it's pretty telling that Tycho isn't shown at all- they probably gave him the same treatment even though he already has a 3-d model
Watch as its some 2-d sprite straight out of the comics
Also I hate mash-ups for a very good reason- whenever they're done, regardless of media, it pretty much boils down to the fan favorite characters to pop up to say some cheezy overdone one-liners and leave. The only way mash-ups really work is when they're set in a cohesive, integrated universe that accounts for their presence (e.g. the Marvel Ultimate Universe), or they're given time to establish a rapport and become deeper than "HEY LOOK AT ME YOU KNOW ME WATCH AS I REFERENCE SOMETHING YOU KNOW" something that poker doesn't allow by its very nature as a game.
Seriously I'm willing to bet that all of the "interesting dialogue" in the game are gonna be tired as hell jokes we've all heard before utttered again, and again, and again. Oh heh heh heh Tycho says big words! Hilarious! Strong Bad references Strongbadia or says sbemails or some shit! Oh tee hee hee the Heavy is gonna talk around sandwiches!
That is all.
I must say, you keep an incredible track record.
That's not a sprite of Strong Bad, that's an in-engine 3D model straight out of their games.
Yeah, I remember from playing the first or second episode of the TT Strong Bad game that he looked sort of weird but it makes sense. I thought part of the point would be to maintain the art style from their respective games.
Tofu wrote: Here be Littleboots, destroyer of threads and master of drunkposting.
Tell Tale makes good games? I've always just known them for the Lego Star Wars games, which were okay but not great.
Telltale has nothing to do with that. The Lego games are made By Traveller's Tales.
Whoops, I've been mixing those up for a while, then.
If anyone wants to give us some PAX hands on impressions I'd be very appreciative.
Found an illuminating interview with Tycho's VA named.
http://www.gamepro.com/article/previews/216419/pax-2010-poker-night-at-the-inventory/
Also this little gem from the Telltale forums:
So awesome.
Essentially, if this just turns out to be a bunch of animated comic strips, along with a rudimentary poker game that could potentially lead to something bigger, I absolutely think it's a worthwhile project.
For $5.
Tofu wrote: Here be Littleboots, destroyer of threads and master of drunkposting.
Man "[Thing]" could be so many things.
I'd love to see fucking sports games with these guys. "Table Tennis at The Inventory"
I mean it already makes sense with Tycho being there.
Switch: 6200-8149-0919 / Wii U: maximumzero / 3DS: 0860-3352-3335 / eBay Shop
Clearly Heavy is the meatshield warrior.
Max is a pyromaniac wizard.
Strongbad somehow ended up as a bard and is really not pleased with the situation.
No its probably the WIP one from their upcoming Jurassic Park game
No, it's the voice of the velociraptor.
I'm fairly certain that none of the voices in that video are the ones normally associated with the characters.
Incidentally, since the Tycho model shown at PAX was unfinished, here's a progress report form TTG's Jake Rodkin on how long 'til it's done:
Glad to see they're striving for authenticity.