The International House of Mojo

Night Dive Studios, the company that managed to untie the legal mess surrounding System Shock 2 to negotiate the digital re-release of that game, is apparently negotiating to digitally re-release more games that are currently unavailable.

In this case, it seems they are trying to free the LucasArts adventure games from the Disney Vault, since they posted a teaser on their Facebook page that they are "Heading to Corley Motors!" (complete with a shot of Ben Throttle on his Corley motorcycle). After posting shout-outs to more LucasArts adventure games, such as Sam & Max Hit the Road on their twitter page, they were asked by twitter user BJ Wanlund to clarify the meaning of their LucasArts teases. Night Dive Studios responded by saying "We're hoping for it as much as everyone else, that's all we can say at the moment!"

So it seems like more classic LucasArts adventure games might come out on digital distribution sites some day after all. Or, they might not. We'll just have to wait and see how this situation develops.

Source: Threepwood4life

400 Days will be released next month on Xbox 360, PS3, iOS, and PC. In the meantime, Telltale has made available a new episode of their web series Playing Dead where A.J. LoCascio talks with developers Sean Ainsworth and Harrison Pink about the DLC.

Bill has made Update #7 to his Kickstarter, which includes a brand new screenshot from a game that will hopefully one day exist. In case it does, sign up for the official mailing list.

You can view the new screenshot along with all previously released art assets for A Vampyre Story: Year One in our gallery. Holy smokes, we have galleries!

Source: AVS:Y1 Kickstarter

Hey, we still have hosted sites! Hosted site, I suppose, if we're talking about anything that's, y'know, actually updated.

Anyway!

Our friends over at samandmax.co.uk recently talked to Melissa Hutchinson, the voice of Sam & Max's Girl Stinky, as well as The Walking Dead's Clementine. It's a good interview, so go read.

A good three weeks past when it might have had an impact, The LA Times has interviewed Bill Tiller, discussing his Kickstarter and career at large.

The interview is good, so check it out, but as far as its role in raising awareness, it's surely too little too late.

I'm gonna heap a little bit of scorn here: where the heck was the gaming press to expose this project? I don't think there was one word of coverage from the likes of Gamasutra, Shacknews, Kotaku or Joystiq.

Source: The LA Times

While the A Vampyre Story: Year One Kickstarter is looking mighty hopeless with ten days to go, the conclusion of E3 has led to the meager PR surrounding the project to ever-so-subtly rev back up.

There's a terrific new interview with Bill published by Adventure Corner. It's filled with great anecdotes and does not just serve to flog the crowdfunding campaign, so do read it.

As for the campaign itself, Bill has unflappably updated yesterday with yet another reward tier, a cutscene screenshot and the promise of more.

Bill also acknowledges what at least from here seems like the inevitable by discussing his Plan B:

If Bill ends up having to finish the game in his free time we can probably expect its progress to resume at its traditionally excruciatingly slow rate (recall that this title was first announced Halloween 2010), but I'm heartened that he appears to be so positive about it.

In that spirit of optimism here's hoping that some of those awesome-sounding rewards at least end up in the Autumn Moon store that Bill keeps promising and that he is onto something with his sense that the campaign is "raising awareness" for the franchise and that this will somehow benefit future endeavors.

In the meantime, I'll be waiting for Luke's goons to catch up with me. :-(

Source: Latest KS update

Touch Gen is reporting that yet another platform is in for a release of Ron Gilbert's The Cave adventure game. This time it's heading for iOS. The controls have been converted to swipe and gesture based rather than the more cumbersome virtual joystick favored by many iOS ports, and the hands-on report from E3 say they work well.

The game is due to hit the App Store this Summer sometime.

Source: Touch Gen

Jukka Jylänki has ported ScummVM's SCUMM engine to HTML5 using enscripten.

Head over to the website and you can play demos of Maniac Mansion, Loom, The Secret of Monkey Island, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis, Day of the Tentacle, and Sam & Max Hit the Road directly in your browser!

When not Kickstarting out new games, Double Fine is, apparently, getting their games IndieFunded. Polygon brings word of two new games in the making, both being funded by IndieFund. Note the "new"; these are not Broken Age or Massive Chalice.

What more? Go to Polygon to find out. Spoiler: We pretty much just quoted the whole article.

Source: Polygon

At the E3 Gaming Expo, EA Games announced that the Battlefront franchise is getting a new installment. The 3rd Battlefront game has had a stop-start life, with several companies beginning production before they were ultimately cancelled prior to any official announcement of the game's development.

Fast forward nearly 10 years and gamers still have many of those same Star Wars gaming fantasies – but now they wish to experience those larger-than-life battles in magnificent high definition, with all of the amazing special effects, vehicle physics and gameplay intensity that the next-generation has to offer.

Star Wars Battlefront, developed by DICE on Frostbite 3, will surprise and delight fans yet again with a new experience inside this beloved universe made with our signature DICE craftsmanship and commitment to excellence."

So there we go, new Battlefront is coming. Let's hope for more Star Wars story-driven games too, along the lines of Dark Forces / Jedi Knight or the X-Wing series.

Source: Battlefront 3.net

The meaning behind Telltale's short Vine teasers has been revealed: it's the extra content between The Walking Dead Seasons One and Two that has been teased since February.

400 Days is Telltale's first foray into DLC (not including the original The Walking Dead episodes themselves, which were marked as DLC out of necessity on XBLA). The 400 Days downloadable content is for The Walking Dead Season One, and is one episode containing five all new stories to play through. It is scheduled to be released this summer.

A bundle for PS Vita has also been announced. The bundle will include the original 5 episodes and 400 Days for the PlayStation Vita, and is scheduled to be released this August.

IGN has posted a trailer for the 400 Days DLC, which is embedded below:

Who doesn't love a good game from Ronzo? And Scurvy Scallywags is good, but how good is it? We give it a look.

Adventure Gamers has published a new interview with Bill as his A Vampyre Story: Year One Kickstarter hobbles past $32k. It's a satisfyingly massive article covering, if I'm not mistaken, every single moment of Bill's life, including the explanation for why over twelve months separated his initial tweet about the Kickstarter and its launch last weekend. There's some art in there, too.

Go read it. Then check out the latest updates for the Kickstarter to discover that there are some new tiers available at $20 and $40. A $20 dollar pledge gets you a free copy of A Vampyre Story and its splendid soundtrack. You'd be a fool to not be all over that. And you can tell you I said so.

Source: Adventure Gamers

When Double Fine launched their Kickstarter to fund Massive Chalice, our man in San Francisco, Robert Betancourt, travelled to their offices to speak with designer Brad Muir. The result from his expedition can now be found right here.

Or over here.

Double Fine's Massive Chalice has already jumped over its $725k goal, and is on its way to do very well indeed. Not Broken Age well, but let's face it... Times have changed as far as Kickstarting games go.

Proof in the pudding is Tiller's Year One Kickstarter limping toward $20k, or 10% of its goal. We all think you owe it to Jason to make this game happen -- did you see his video?! -- and come on... It's an adventure game from Bill Tiller. It will if nothing else look gorgeous, and his introduction video is pure class. Run and Kickstart if you haven't already done so.

And finally we have Telltale teasing six seconds (and another six seconds) of what looks like it might be The Walking Dead Not Season 2 But Something To Keep Your Attention. Hey, it should be good, whatever it is.

Bill has made his first update to the Year One Kickstarter. In response to the concern that there was too big a gap between reward tiers, he has added a new one. For a $75 dollar pledge, the so-called Lake Monster tier, you get the following additional rewards:

- A large map (18” by 24”) of Draxsylvania
- PDF Atlas of Draxsylvania Atlas Book with color maps, art and descriptions of the history and geography of Draxsylvania and its macabre citizens
- Video lesson on How to Design Animated Characters the Autumn Moon Way

• A physical Sheet of A Vampyre Story Stickers

At the time of this writing the Kickstarter has reached $18.5k in pledges. That's the mathematical equivalent of stressing that they've got a long way to go, so be sure to use your disposable income to tell Bill you love him if you haven't already.

Source: AVS: Year One Kickstarter

I haven't been posting much lately; we've all noticed it. The temptation will be to assume the worst of me - that I've succumbed to laziness or apathy, or outright disdain for you, specifically.

But consider:

The day has finally come. The three minute animated Kickstarter pitch video that Autumn Moon has been working on since April 2012 is finally finished, and A Vampyre Story: Year One is now live on Kickstarter!

The game, which is a prequel set in the first year that Mona is captive in Castle Warg, begins when she first meets Froderick the bat. It is an episodic adventure for Windows (on Facebook, Bill Tiller mentioned that the first episode will tentatively be called Spring, with the other three being the remaining seasons of Year One), using 2D backgrounds and 3D characters with a Curse of Monkey Island style verb coin interface, just like the original game. The first episode should be about one third the size of A Vampyre Story, and have about five total hours of game play.

The Kickstarter goal is $200,000 for episode one, and (according to the afforementioned Facebook page) the other episodes could be funded through this kickstarter as well, depending on how much money is pledged.

The minimum tier with the download of the first episode (for Windows, but Bill Tiller has stated that Linux, Mac, and iOS versions are a possibility if the Kickstarter does well enough) is available for only $8 (with beta access included!). If you pledge higher, you'll get a digital download of Pedro Macedo Camacho's soundtrack for the game at $25, a digital artbook at $50, a special collector's "big box" version (made with the dimensions of the Curse of Monkey Island box) at $100, a hardcover art book at $500, and even more goodies at the higher premium tiers. So, choose your tier and pledge your support for this classic style adventure game.

For those of you wondering about A Vampyre Story 2: A Bat's Tale, the reason that one's not being Kickstarted is because the rights lie with the publisher, Crimson Cow. But, Bill Tiller did mention on Facebook that if this Kickstarter does well, the chances of A Vampyre Story 2 coming out soon ("fall 2014 or sooner") go way up.

LucasArts / Bioware classic RPG 'Knights of the Old Republic' is now available for the iPad. It sells for US$9.99. The game was ported by Aspyr Media, who are responsible for a number of PC-to-Mac conversions, including KOTOR.
Joystiq have reviewed the iPad version here, if you want to know what's been updated to make it work on a touchscreen.

Perhaps this bodes well for further LucasArts classics that Aspyr ported to Mac previously, such as Jedi Outcast, making their way to the iPad in due course.

Source: iTunes

ScummVM, the program that lets you play classic adventure games on modern computers, consoles, phones, and tablets, has been updated with support for four new engines, bringing support for six new games: 3 Skulls of the Toltecs, Eye of the Beholder, Eye of the Beholder II: The Legend of Darkmoon, Hopkins FBI, Tony Tough and the Night of Roasted Moths, and The Journeyman Project: Pegasus Prime.

In addition to the new games, there's support for the Macintosh version of Discworld 1. And, of most relevance to Mojo readers, music is now improved in the Macintosh version of many LucasArts adventures. If you're not interested in Macintosh versions of adventure games, this version comes with major bugfixes to the bike fight sequences on Old Mine Road in Full Throttle.

There are also other changes included as well, such as an update to the latest Roland MT-32 emulation code, a new grid chooser for save games, an extended FluidSynth configuration dialog, and Belarusian, Finnish and Galician translations for the GUI dialogs.