Telltale games has just announced the release of their first game. A few months back they claimed that before the announcement of their first big adventure game they'd probably be releasing a mini title or two. This is one of them. Telltale Texas Hold'em is the name of the game - a poker game that might be more about the characters than the cards. It's available both at Telltale's website, and the newly opened Adventure Gamers store for a fan community discount of $14.99.

Dan Connors, CEO of TellTale, told Adventure Gamers a little bit about the game, and why they - an "adventure company" are starting with a poker game...<:MORENEWS:>

Telltale Games is about great characters and stories; Telltale Texas Hold Em is about characters. The reason this is the first product released by Telltale Games is because it is much more straightforward then launching a full adventure game based on a license. All the work we are doing on characters now will definitely benefit the quality of our adventure games.

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The Telltale Engine and Toolset will be used to build all of our products. It is focused on elements required for 3d storytelling and character presentation. The reason why we chose Texas Hold Em as a game mechanic is that poker is all about nuances in the players. Everything we have done with the engine for Telltale Texas Hold Em will be iterated on in our future games.

As for Adventure Gamers opening a store, who knew? To be honest, an adventure site selling adventure games has been a long time coming. There are casual games portals across the net, but why nothing specifically for us adventure fans? "Wait, but what are you getting at? Adventure Gamers' store only sells a poker game!" That very question is answered on the main page of the store itself:

Adventure Gamers is partnering with Telltale Games to sell Texas Hold ?Em, a casual game they made while negotiating their first big adventure contract. We want to raise awareness of this promising team of ex-LucasArts developers, but this isn't yet another casual games portal. In the future we also hope to add all sorts of web-distributed genuine adventure games to this store ? from Telltale Games and from other developers.

So, until then, check out the game over at AG's new store - give it a go and let them know what you think. It's definitely something to tide us all over until Telltale's formal adventure announcement.

Now, to go download the demo myself and give it a shot...