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Heads up: Retrofuturist Metroidvania Headlander, developed by Double Fine and released by Adult Swim games in 2016 for PS4, Xbox One, PC, and Mac, is heading off of platforms...well, soon. Certainly before May. This is all part of the C-suite conniving happening behind-the-scenes at Warner Bros. that's seeing movies, shows, and now video games axed off for debt reasons that make sense to the money people.

If you want Headlander before it lands itself at the chopping block, head to GOG or Steam.

Source: The Verge

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If you’re anything like me, you glance past most backer emails, because… well, there’s really no “good” reason to do so, but here we are. Long story short—yesterday's Psychonauts 2 email was one I actually did read, and it was worth the thirty-second effort. In it comes word that the Art of Psychonauts 2 has gone digital and is available in your Humble Bundle account right now. And the 402-page monster is pretty damn impressive.

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And the motherlode hardback is "in the mail"—the same excuse we use for the Christmas-bonus cheques around these parts.

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As part of Grim Fandango's 25th Anniversary, DoubleFine put on a wonderful live concert of Peter McConnell's amazing soundtrack, and now you can watch it in the comfort of your own home. Just turn down the lights, get yourself a cocktail, and pretend you were there:

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And if you want to feel extra film noir vibes, there's a "Black & Bone" edition, too.

Thanks to TimeGentleman and Sopabuena for alerting us to this wonderful thing in the forums!

Source: The Forums

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Our fantastic friend, Double Fine (their words!), has thrown together a nice little look-back at Grim Fandango. Specifically, it dives into the fans’ memories of the game (which probably are foggy, seeing we’re basically past expiration at this point). Go read!

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Heads up for those of us who missed the first pressing: The Grim Fandango OST is once again available on vinyl from iam8bit.

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Source: GFN’s Bluesky

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Everyone's* favourite LucasArts adventure, Grim Fandango, turns 25 later this month (yes, you are officially THAT old) and DoubleFine are asking fans to share their "thoughts, art, cosplay, and more..."

Link: Share your Manny memories

Why are they asking for this? Good question! They say "so we can see where Manny's fandom stands in 2023". What does that mean?! An upcoming celebration? Market research on the viability of a sequel? Share your theories below...

* - Well mine, anyway.

Source: DoubleFine's Twitter/"X"

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Microsoft is up to its tired schtick again, or so Eurogamer reports. Following this Tweet...

... some concluded that “PSYCHOXXX” clearly means Psychonauts 3 or Psychonauts III. Setting aside that “PSYCHO” could mean any number of things—will we finally see a game adaptation of the famous Robert Bloch novel?!—“XXX” also has many meanings. Adult content, for example. Or a reference to the classic Vin Diesel film? Perhaps they’re talking about the Pussy Riot EP?

What XXX does not mean is “3,” but rather “30.” So, maybe an upcoming game named Psychonauts 30 is on the horizon? Or an entirely unrelated PSYCHO 30?

Stay tuned for more schtick.

Thanks to Lagomorph01 on the forums for the heads up!

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Well, here’s something: Broken Age’s Kickstarter campaign launched ten years ago. To either mourn time passing us by or to celebrate the occasion (depending on your point of view), Game Informer has put together a roundtable interview with the development leads behind the game.

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Tim Schafer, Greg Rice, Lee Petty, and Anna Kipnis are all there, and there’s even a “special thanks” to one James Spafford. I haven’t had a chance to check it out yet, but the odds of it being good seem good.

And what was Mojo up to ten years ago today? “LEC old timers submit to creepy Youtube interviews”—strangely related-ish. (Update! Other than the fact that the news post was from 2012—look, I can’t be expected to know that it’s 2023. In 2013 we were doing zilch on this day.)

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A few hours before Tim had his chest pinned with that aforementioned award over in Las Vegas, IGN took advantage of his vulnerable state by talking with him extensively about all things Double Fine.

One of the other biggest changes for Schafer personally was Double Fine’s acquisition by Xbox, a move that opened a number of new doors for the studio. As Schafer puts it, Double Fine historically tends to make “weird” games that tend to be difficult to find funding for. But with Xbox’s support, he’s not only had the funding, but he’s also had the boon of Xbox Game Pass to put those weird games in front of people who might not have ever tried them at full price.

“Game Pass lets us reach people who maybe would've been too nervous to drop 70 bucks for a physical copy of a thing,” he says. “But they see it and it looks really compelling and they're like, ‘Oh, I'll just download it and play it.’ That's a great place for us to be, so that changes us, and I think it'll lead to us being more like ourselves and more creative…It's allowed me to move forward projects that I had on the back burner, thinking, ‘I would never be able to pitch this to a publisher. It's just too strange-sounding.’ And now we can make those games, so they're going to get weirder, that's all.”

A lot more ground than that is covered, so hear all of what Tim had to say in the final moments of his pre-Hall of Fame life. And savor it, because from now on you’ll only be hearing from him through an elaborate network of limo drivers and bodyguards, what with him being, formally speaking, a Big Shot.

Source: IGN

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Assuming you’re unemployed, you’ve survived the great voyeuristic chronicle that is Double Fine PsychOdyssey, be it on YouTube or by hauling down hundreds of gigabytes from Archive.org, where it’s been sportingly commended for your offlining needs.

Now we come to the time for post-mortems, victory laps and retrospective quarterbacking. Leading the vanguard is YouTube channel MinnMax, which has logged hours of virtual discussion on the documentary with no end in sight. Their panelists have included members of the 2 Player crew, members of the industry, and Maniac Mansion NES object tagger Tim Schafer.

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I mean, there’s no bottom here.

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Do you think there has been a sufficiency of documentary miniseries about Double Fine Productions? Follow up question: How does it feel to be wrong all the time?

2 Player Productions, which probably ought to be considered tenants of the Double Fine offices at this point, are at it again. This time the exalted documentarians bring you a series on the development of Psychonauts 2:

From the initial Fig pitch through a large acquisition by Microsoft and through a global pandemic, Double Fine PsychOdyssey traces our process in intimate detail. This was a huge project that took over five thousand hours of footage filmed over six years including interviews, meetings both in-person and online, and playtests. Then they weaved it into a bizarre basket of thirty-two episodes (22 hours!) for your viewing pleasure.

The first of those THIRTY-TWO episodes (all available now) can be found below, much of it covering the founding of Double Fine and the production of the original Psychonauts, complete with rare home movie footage. It’s pretty unflinching, too, regaling such harrowing tales as the infamous layoff of the original design team and the cancellation by Microsoft.

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This is obviously a comprehensive must-see, but you all knew that going in, having previously seen, possibly even on a $5 Blu-ray, that twelve-hour calling card known as Double Fine Adventure.

Source: YouTube

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That young upstart Tim Schafer is starting to make waves in the industry. How else do you account for the fact that the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences will be inducting him into their Hall of Fame at the upcoming DICE Awards? The details are right here, should you find yourself in Vegas two weeks from now.

As a matter of trivia, Tim was very nearly inducted into the Mojo Hall of Fame™, but in the end the votes just weren't there. I'm usually against calling people out by name, but let's just say Thrik's spite over the cat track puzzle has a shocking half-life.

Congratulations, Tim!

Source: AIAS

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Last year we brought some attention to the work of one @ScrungusCrungus, who has apparently devoted their time on Earth to reverse-engineering the Psychonauts source code, and more broadly to the discovery and collation of every fragment of esoterica related to the classic game. Certainly, Mixnmojo should be the very last to judge such an obsession.

The ongoing quest has included the search-and-seizure of rare pre-release media, which means the disreputable archives of certain fan sites and communities active in Double Fine’s earliest days are being plumbed, to the justifiable horror of us all. Mixnmojo, the Idle Thumb forums, and Thrik’s dedicated yet sadly unmaintained fan site Razputin.net (which today redirects you to an Archive.org snapshot) are but a few of the resources that have fallen into the crosshairs of this Robert Caro-esque level of research:

ScrungusCrungus even politely noticed that The Grim Fandango Network (another milestone from Thrik’s executive training days) underwent a rather yawn-inducing theme change, leading to a bonding moment that international relations could stand to benefit from looking to as inspiration.

You can find some of ScrungusCrungus’ most notable findings collected on this blog dedicated to the purpose, but you’ll want to work up some loyalty toward the Twitter account if you want the minute-by-minute updates. And let’s not kid each other: you do.

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It's time to put that kidney up for auction.

Limited Run is throwing together yet another boom of a collector’s edition, this time for Grim Fandango. We’re talking USB drives, posters, prints, Bone Wagon replicas, and postcards. All for a mere $99.99.

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The sale goes live on November 4th and runs through December 18th. Platforms:

Oh! There’s also a triangle box for those who order Grim, DOTT, and Throttle. This is literally getting ridiculous.

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Double Fine can’t stop, won’t stop with their Limited Run editions. This time: Full Throttle .

For a cool $85, you get . . . well, a bunch of stuff. Game, soundtrack, posters, bandana, a USB drive that hopefully isn’t corrupted, and more. Orders start October 7th and run through November 20th.

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Like so many stories lately, this one comes from Twitter:

A very long thread of LUA voyeurism unfurls from there, including screenshots of amusingly candid comments in the code, hidden debug levels that were accidentally shipped, and some dialog lines that never get triggered due to bugs (Grim Fandango sympathizes). Even Psychonauts team members like Erik Robson (Lead Designer) and Kee Chi (Programmer) end up weighing in, so passionate fans of the game (and isn’t all of us?) might enjoy diging through.

It’s worth pointing out that @ScrungusCrungus seems to have been part of an effort to reverse-engineer Psychonauts for some time now, and past discoveries made along the way have also been documented for those who crave more.

Source: Twitter

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Not content with you taking out a second mortgage for the a Psychonauts 2 collector’s edition, Double Fine has joined up with Limited Run to produce a boxed Day of the Tentacle. For a somewhat reasonable $85, the loot includes an OST CD, a poster, a tentacle flag, a hamster hand warmer, and fake barf.

And if you’re a cheapskate, there’s a standard box with just the game for $35, too. Hell, get both!

Orders open on the 22nd at 10 am Eastern. Once again, here is the link for the Double Fine completionist.

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iam8bit has announced a bunch of Psychonauts 2 merchandise, all of which looks awesome. (And none of which is cheap.) Leading the pack is the “Psychonauts 2 Collector’s Edition,” which includes… well, everything, really. Sticker packs, art cards, discs, pin sets, and so on and so forth. The price? A cool $129.99.

Don’t put away that credit card yet, though: A super tempting six-LP set is waiting for you for (also) a mere $129.99. Or you can go for two discs for $49.99. A 250-page art book? Also $49.99.

And it all looks pretty sweet.

Of course, if you were a backer, some of these will be available gratis (for some). But you already read that email.

For the rest, go broke getting the aforementioned good.

Source: iam8bit

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If you are a Mac and/or Linux user—and why wouldn’t you be?!—you can finally enjoy the glory that is Psychonauts 2. Go through your Humble link, use your existing game key, and kiss your next few weeks goodbye. Psychonauts 2 was named Mojo Game of the Year 2021 for a reason after all. (Also the only new Mojo-related game from what I can remember, remasters aside.)

Bonus news: If you have any interest in becoming a game composer, learn from the best: IGN has a video interview with Peter McConnell and some other guy about how to get into the industry. (All respect to the other guy who I’m not familiar with.)

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We've come along way from this, now haven't we? Psychonauts 2 is well established to have been a critical darling, but it was no slouch in the sales department either -- at least if we're to believe this article from The Gamer. And we probably can, seeing as they're really just quoting a tweet from art director Lisette Titre-Montgomery, who refers to the sequel as the studio's "best-selling game to date."

Seeing as both the original Psychonauts and Brütal Legend sold over a million units over their lifespans, that would mean that Raz's latest adventure is in the seven figure range less than a year out. Now granted that's how many copies of Zak McKracken Germany sells in a day, but it's still pretty impressive if you ask me.

Source: The Gamer

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