As Halloween is approaching, we'll be bringing back some of the features about the company most closely related to this holiday: Autumn Moon Entertainment. Since Bill Tiller quit LucasArts and founded his own company to make adventure games, Mojo has kept up with his actions. The first feature to return from the dusty Mojo archives is Gabez's interview with the man himself from 2007. Bill discusses his then upcoming game, A Vampyre Story, cancelled Full Throttle sequels (with images!), and takes Gabez out for an action filled lunch!
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I sort of figured the U.S. would find Bin Laden before A Bat's Tale found funding. On Facebook, Bill Tiller volunteered status updates on A Vampyre Story 2: A Bat's Tale and A Vampyre Story: Year One, respectively. The prospects of the latter are way better than the former:
Currently A Vampyre Story 2 production is controlled by Crimson Cow and they don't plan to fund it anytime soon due to lack of investment in their company. The game is 40% done and just needs investment to be completed. I will make announcement when or if that happens.
A Vampyre Story: Year One we hope to have done this year, and I'll post here any new information on that here when we have some new news about it.
Source: AVS Facebook page
Well, now you can! Amazon is currently selling the game for $1. Or $4 if you want to buy it used.
Source: Amazon.com
Bill Tiller has posted a new "in-progress rough sketch" for A Vampyre Story: Year One. It is of a Castle Warg location, and you will presumably be walking through and picking up objects in it while experiencing a sensation that I like to refer to as, "the happy."
And let me just toss this one in here to conserve on the Mojo energy bill: Stacking got stroked in a Gamasutra article dealing with game difficulty.
Source: Bill Tiller's twitter feed
Details on A Vampyre Story: Year One remain hard to put one's hands to, but Bill Tiller has made another twitter update with evidence that its production falls firmly in the category of non-fiction: this image of a yet to be skinned character model. Looks like some kind of carnivorous plant. Will there be a Maniac Mansion in-joke? Will a nasty if obscure dead-end result if Mona pours developer fluid on it? Is Alan Turing's halting problem really unsolvable? The answer will no doubt arrive whenever the episodic, iPad-bound prequel to A Vampyre Story does.
And if you find out when that is, let us know.
Source: Bill Tiller's twitter feed
Touch arcade is reporting on the forthcoming release of the iPhone/iPad/iPod Touch/web game 'Smuggle Truck' a side scrolling physics based driving game where you have to stop your cargo of illegal aliens/stowaways/kidnapped hostages/extended family members [Note to self: delete as applicable before going to press] from flying out of your truck.
What sets this new Owlchemy Labs title apart is that Autumn Moon's Bill Tiller has been hired to redo the art from scratch. The game started out as an entry to a 48 hour game creation contest, where all the games had an Immigration theme.
What sets this new Owlchemy Labs title apart is that Autumn Moon's Bill Tiller has been hired to redo the art from scratch. The game started out as an entry to a 48 hour game creation contest, where all the games had an Immigration theme.
Source: Touch Arcade
Don't make the mistake of thinking that sentiment comes from us; we loathe you. But the folks at Autumn Moon sure don't, as evidenced by this wonderful yuletide greeting they made especially for you.
Happy Holidays, all!
Not that any of us really forgot, but it's a sobering reminder of how trying being an adventure game developer must be to know that even game ideas that publishers like are rejected on the basis of genre. Such was apparently the case of a proposal Bill Tiller shopped around to no avail at some point in the recent past. Accompanying [a large piece of] a lovely painting of a freighter called the Lisa Marie crashing into a harbor, Bill writes:
Concept art from a game proposal, lots of publishers like it but dont want risk any money on adventure games. Guess we'll have self fund it.
Turn the record over and tell us something uplifting, Bill! Still, a sliver of hope at the end there. Hopefully Year One will strike a chord with gamers and enable Autumn Moon to make all the games about vampires, ghost pirates, robot assassins, and rust-covered vessels that we can handle.
Source: Bill Tiller's Twitter
Bill Tiller's slice of Twitter has once again been flavored with a topping of Year One sneak peek-ery. Taken perhaps from a cutscene, Bill offers a bucolic image of Shrowdy von Kiefer sipping some crimson essence during a picnic, potentially on Lake Warg. What's on his mind? Is anyone sitting next to him? Could this somehow be used to extrapolate exact details of the ending? It's more fun than analyzing a Crystal Skull trailer!
Source: Bill Tiller's Twitter
Steve Purcell's newest addition to the official Sam & Max blog is a large version of a cover painting he did for the animated series DVD release. After revealing that it includes "two levels of obscurity," readers in the comments got to work, and soon discovered was a "Spock photon torpedo coffin with our favorite Geek's last name inscribed." Is this the final fate of the much-maligned Geek?
Elsewhere on the internet's Mt. Olympus of LEC adventure legends, Bill Tiller updated the Autumn Moon blog, explaining with no shortage of detail (or references to Night Gallery) exactly why Mona, with her fancy-pants bat transformation powers, couldn't just fly away from Castle Warg and halve A Vampyre Story's playtime. Don't eliminate higher education from your day!
Gametap has announced that they have added A Vampyre Story to their line-up. I have no idea what the service looks like these days, but at any rate it's yet another avenue for you to buy the game, making it available from every single digital outlet except the most appropriate (or at least the one The Tingler insists on): Steam.
In other AVS news, Year One is clearly underway, and if you thought getting a sneak at the game's creation was a gas, wait until I tell you that you get the same privilege for the game's web site, an early form of which Bill Tiller has uploaded a voyeuristic snapshot of here.
Bill has also updated the Autumn Moon blog with an entry where he responds to some fabricated fan mail. Does it address any niggling concerns you had about Autumn Moon's upcoming series? If not, you can always take Bill's suggestion and send in your own letter to billt@amegames.com. You might just get your reply immortalized, or at least put on the blog.
Source: The Pumpkin Post
Through the magic of Twitter, Bill Tiller is once again inviting us to be party to the creation of one of his game backgrounds. Witness the "collapsed hall" from A Vampyre Story: Year One in its original drawing form and then the beginnings of its color script. Check them out before I collapse you.
Source: Bill Tiller's Twitter
The second released screenshot for the first episode of A Vampyre Story: Year One, "When Mona Met Froderick," can be seen over at Adventure Gamers. My but Mona is a looker in that red dress.
Source: Adventure Gamers
The announcement of A Vampyre Story: Year One was short on details, so The Pumpkin Post decided to get some answers. Specifically, the answers to these questions they had in mind for Bill Tiller, who threw in a logo and a piece of character concept art for good measure.
The extremely informative interview discusses specifics about the episodic Year One including how/why it came about, the intended number of episodes, and the recasting of Mona. You will also read about plans for the AVS saga as a whole (which may involve non-game spinoffs in addition to the planned sequels), and some hopes Bill has for Ghost Pirates and new IP. Avoid getting assigned an F minus in my gradebook and read all about Autumn Moon.
Source: The Pumpkin Post
A Vampyre Story has gone episodic. The new game is entitled A Vampyre Story: Year One, and is coming to iPad, iPhone and, later, PC.
Read the official message on the Official Vampyre Story Facebook page:
A prequel! And the Pumpkin Post has the first, exclusive screenshot which we've totally stolen and added to our brand new gallery over here.
If, like me, you like your adventures in little sips of wine instead of giant chugs of beer; or, if, like me, you like your vampyres not sucking figuratively, but literally, and maybe not being lame enough to glow in the sunlight; then maybe you, like me, are the kind of person to want to get excited for this. So get excited! Autumn Moon is back, baby.
Read the official message on the Official Vampyre Story Facebook page:
Mona, opera-starlet-turned-vampire, and Froderick, wisecracking bat, return in this episodic prequel to the award-winning A Vampyre Story. Help the pair explore more of Castle Warg and Draxsylvania™, solve fiendish puzzles, and outwit hideous new creatures.
A prequel! And the Pumpkin Post has the first, exclusive screenshot which we've totally stolen and added to our brand new gallery over here.
If, like me, you like your adventures in little sips of wine instead of giant chugs of beer; or, if, like me, you like your vampyres not sucking figuratively, but literally, and maybe not being lame enough to glow in the sunlight; then maybe you, like me, are the kind of person to want to get excited for this. So get excited! Autumn Moon is back, baby.
Source: Twitter
It's short, it's direct, and it's to the point. That'd be Bill Tiller's latest tweet:
Big A Vampyre Story Announcement this weekend.
Be excited. And what with Halloween being this Sunday and all, the "big announcement" couldn't be any more timely. So what's it gonna be? And almost as if they've been infected by the same virus that has brought AVS out of dormancy, The Pumpkin Post has undergone a redesign, no thanks to you. In any event, it certainly seems like Autumn Moon is back on the radar, hopefully for the long term.
Source: Bill Tiller's twitter feed
With the immortal Talk Like a Pirate Day making port this Sunday, a few pirate themed games that you may or may not be obsessed with are being subjected to some righteous discounts. Exhibit A is digital vendor GamersGate, which is including Ghost Pirates of Vooju Island and Tales of Monkey Island in its week-long sale in honor of the holiday, marking down the games to $9.99 and $13.98 respectively.
When it comes to a Telltale season though, you're really better off going straight to the source, and wouldn't you know it, the seafaring wastrels have seen fit to get in on the action by hawking Tales for a truly irresponsible $4.99 from now until September 20th. Elsewhere in the orbit of Things You Can Have Telltale Charge Your Credit Card For, they will be unlocking Sam & Max Beyond Time and Space (formerly known as Sam & Max: Season 2) as part of that Great Adventure Bundle offer.
I'd like to abstain from indulging too much in piratey patter until Sunday, but it's sufficient to observe that these deals be a bounty worthy of Blackbeard himself, or would be if you didn't already own of all these games ten times over. You do, right?
Coming soon: Mojo news posts that aren't easily interpreted as thinly disguised marketing jabber for video game distribution corporations.
Resident expert on the female anatomy, our own SyntheticGerbil, could not help but discern that Captain Jane Starling's depiction on the US cover of Ghost Pirates of Vooju Island seemed somehow less eye-catching than it did on the European packaging.
Compare the swashbuckling rogue how she appears on the left side of this image to how she appears in this'un. Thank goodness there is someone out there with the courage to keep that smut out of our children's graphic adventure games. Infamous satyr Bill Tiller was unavailable for comment as of press time.
Source: Lucasforums
Did you know that A Vampyre Story has its own Facebook page? It's apparently a favorite of Mojo's Facebook page, the existence of which I often have to remind myself of.
Well, don't feel bad if you've never heard of it, because I hadn't either. If I had, you can be reasonably certain that I would have been on top of the AVS2 updates, apparently by Bill Tiller, that have been laying dormant there for months. Take this update from May 21:
AVS2 looks like it is on track for Late 2011 now. I was hoping early 2011, but the financing is a bit slower to come than we hoped. Sorry about the delay. Our goal is Halloween 2011, which would be a very cool day to come out.
We are looking into doing a iPhone/ iPad Prequel of AVS. We have to do some research and make sure we can do ti first. But if we can i think will be a cool game because the iPad seems like a really good venue for adventure games. So this will be an experiment. Wish us luck.
Today is a day of exciting releases. The first is of course the long awaited finale of The Devil's Playhouse (check out our review!) The game is apparently not quite out to season's subscribers, but it should be available before the night's through, Pacific Standard Time, so keep an eye either on your inbox or your Telltale account page. Hopefully, Kroms can refrain from flaunting his access to review copies to too many of you before then.
The second big release today is the North American retail version of Ghost Pirates of Vooju Island, almost a year after its initial release in Germany. The hand-painted pirate adventure game by Bill Tiller and his well-treated minions got an English release in the UK early this year and has been available worldwide in various digital outlets for almost as long, but today it can finally be found boxed and on store shelves in the United States and Canada. It's retailing for only $19.99, too, so you should probably show us that you're smarter than you look and order it from a place like Gamestop or Amazon (where the price is currently slashed at a ridiculous $10.86).
On the subject of Autumn Moon, you're running out of hours to submit your winning entry for the Pumpkin Post site redesign contest. Hopefully you didn't blow this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity which, not taken, would surely haunt you throughout your adult life until it is violently and mercifully syncopated by the cold grip of Death.
Anyway. Happy Monday, all!
Update: Capn_Nacho reports that The City That Dares Not Sleep is now available to season subscribers. Rev those downloads!