The International House of Mojo

It was reported everywhere today that Benoit Mandelbrot, the so-called Father of Fractals, passed away at the age of 85. The French-American mathematician is famous for identifying the geometric shapes known as fractals, and technology for creating them was the foundation for the early Lucasfilm game Rescue on Fractalus!, where it was used to draw the craggy landscapes of the alien planet that the player explores.

Of course, people who played the extensively pirated version of Rescue on Fractalus! and therefore knew it under its development title Behind Jaggi Lines! have no idea why the rest of us are grieving.

Source: Montreal Gazette

Chewbacca on a squirrel fighting Nazis.

Chewbacca on a squirrel fighting Nazis.

Chewbacca on a squirrel fighting Nazis.

That is all.

Source: DeviantArt (via Kotaku)

Something I've never really thought about before, and suddenly have a deep appreciation for, is Mark Ferrari's colour cycling work on Loom and The Secret of Monkey Island. But what's colour cycling, you ask?

It's the clever technique used to make water look like it's rippling, or fire dancing, or clouds racing, without having to use sprites. It's accomplished by changing the colour palette, which basically means it's very, very hard. Here is a bad example to show you what I mean.

Joseph Huckaby, though, understands this well. And he's actually managed to replicate Mark's advanced understand of how to use colour cycling properly using HTML5 - and the results are very pretty indeed.

So, thanks Mark Ferrari - your work continues to be appreciated by us all. And thanks to you, Joe, for reminding us :)

Source: Effect Games (via Kotaku)

Yet another thing on the 'Will Never Happen' list has happened: Entertainment Weekly is pimping out Monkey Island 2. Possibly one of the most mainstream recommendations of the game yet, to a crowd that might be called the opposite of 'hardcore adventure game fans'. What the hell next?

Will Never Happen List

1. LucasArts re-release classic adventure games

2. Monkey Island 5

3. Tim Schafer to go on late night talk show

4. Monkey Island appearing in Entertainment Weekly

5. Ron Gilbert to release game

6. Jake to make Sam & Max game

7. Jake to make Monkey Island game

8. Trapezoid youtube video to hit 83 million views

9. Remi to post the cheques

10. Monkey Island movie

Source: Entertainment Weekly

Click here to see a rather nice Photoshop painting of LeChuck with a voodoo doll. I bet you wish you could draw something like that, to pass the time whilst you wait for MI2:SE to appear on PSN (released later today!) and other formats (released tomorrow!)

Luckily, you can! A full tutorial is available on the same page. But, as the man himself says:

Good luck, suckers.

Source: PSDfan

For awhile, Steve Purcell's been sharing all sorts of great artwork of his to the world through his blog, Spudvision, many of it starring everyone's favorite dog-and-rabbity thing. In his latest post, Purcell reveals his intention to separate future Sam & Max related material into its own blog, while Spudvision will continue to be used to share "any other kinds of art, especially Toybox which is the home of your very own host Starchie Spudnoggen."

Source: Spudvision

So you want a Lost adventure game made by LucasArts alumni eh? Sadly this isn't an actual game, but marvel at some enterprising young soul's gallery of pictures that imagines 'If LucasArts makes a Lost game in 1987'.

My favourite's Locke trying to open the hatch and commenting 'that doesn't seem to open'. After that point I don't get any of them.

Source: Kotaku

Sadly, it appears that Plunder Island's citizens will no longer be able to buy the very latest in vaporware beverages or piratical weapons technology, at least not from little Kenny's shop. Er, I mean...

Gary Coleman, the voice of Kenny Falmouth in The Curse of Monkey Island, has just died of a cranial hemorrhage, brought on by a head injury he suffered at his home. He was 42.

Coleman was most famous for his role as a child star on the American TV sitcom Diff'rent Strokes. His character's catchphrase on the show was "What'chu talkin' 'bout, Willis?" Notably, the CMI team tried and failed to get the line "What'chu talkin' 'bout, Guybrush?" into the game.

So our erstwhile staff member Kroms has found a brand new DeathSpank trailer. However, someone else had to post about it, because the other staffers unanimously voted to exile him forever from our Ultra Tippity Top Secret Mojo Newsroom after the incident with the giraffe, three melons, and a snorkel.

More linkage.

UPDATE: Kroms says, "Be sure to check out these four gameplay videos on the same site. Plus this video, and this other one, and this one too, on 1UP."

To which I say, "Man, we never should've exiled you. More work for us."

There's big news in Star Wars fandom: it seems the first-draft script of The Empire Strikes Back has been circulating online for over a month now. (Another timely Mojo news item!)

A history lesson is in order: Shortly after the colossal success of the original Star Wars, George Lucas hired noted pulp SF novel author and Hollywood screenwriter Leigh Brackett to write the script for Empire. She duly turned in a first draft, but sadly died of cancer before she could make any revisions.

Without a co-author, Lucas wrote the next couple of drafts himself, before handing his drafts over to Lawrence Kasdan (the man who also wrote Raiders of the Lost Ark and would go on to script Return of the Jedi) for a polish. But it seems that during the period after Brackett's death, Lucas made some major changes to the story of Empire.

Brackett's script would have created an entirely different series from the Star Wars saga we know today. Most notably, the draft envisions a world where Darth Vader and Anakin Skywalker are two separate people: Luke meets his father's Force ghost while training as a Jedi knight, and then goes on to duel Vader in Cloud City.

Also, Luke has a twin sister who is referred to--but it's not Leia. Instead a girl named "Nellith" is said to have been separated from Luke at birth. Although spoken of, she is never actually seen in the film, setting up a plot thread for future sequels.

(I guess old George really was making it up as he went along.)

The script is available here. Do note that the site is experiencing heavy traffic at the moment, and is periodically shutting itself down to recuperate. So it may be a while before you can access the download page. Nonetheless, you'll likely want to download it before the Lucas Legal lawyers pounce.

EDIT: Mojo now has its own mirror of the script, just in case.

Source: Cinematical

Some sad news: Heavy metal singer Ronnie James Dio, who as you may remember was the first choice to play arch-villain Doviculus in Brütal Legend, has died of stomach cancer at age 67.

Dio is most famous for replacing Ozzy Osbourne as lead singer of the band Black Sabbath after the latter left rather acrimoniously.

Ultimately Dio was dropped, somewhat suddenly and unceremoniously, from Brütal Legend, and his character was recast with Tim Curry. Speculation that this was done to get Ozzy to agree to appear in the game remains unsubstantiated.

Our most heartfelt Mojo condolences go out to Mr. Dio's widow and other family members. He will be forever remembered as "that guy who was almost in a really awesome Tim Schafer game." (You're fired. -Ed)

Source: CNN

Who says you have to play adventure games to experience great writing and fascinating characters? Not Valve, whose 2007 first-person-puzzle-em-up Portal featured a malevolent robot and some of the best writing the medium has ever seen.

"First person? **** you elTee! This is Mixnmojo!"

Oh shush. It's free until the 24th of May - so if you haven't played it yet, why not give it a try? There's more to life than pointing and clicking, you know*.

And, as usual when I make rambling posts outside of Mojo's remit, I've attached a bonus LucasArts-related fact in order to satisfy the LFN's strict rules: Portal was co-written by Erik Wolpaw, who, as Kroms will relentlessly tell you, co-wrote Psychonauts.

*Disclaimer: Portal does, in fact, feature pointing and clicking. It's kind of integral...

Source: Steam