In case you’ve been living under a rock for the last week or so, you’ll have missed the incredibly exciting news about Thimbleweed Park – a point and click adventure game currently under development with Kickstarter funding. The game is a curious story about two washed-up detectives called in to investigate a dead body found in the river just outside of town. Switching between five playable characters, you uncover the dark, satirical and bizarre world of Thimbleweed Park. The Kickstarter was a great success – the team has already surpassed their initial goal and are busy working on their stretch goals – largely because Thimbleweed Park comes from the same legendary, epic, epoch-defining adventure game makers that brought us the legendary, epic, epoch-defining LucasArts adventure classics Monkey Island and Maniac Mansion (to name but two!).
Those legendary epoch-definers are, of course, Ron Gilbert and Gary Winnick, who were kind enough to take the time to chat with XP4T about their new venture.
(L) Ron Gilbert, (R) Gary Winnick
XP4T: Wow, so how does it feel to have surpassed your initial funding goal on Kickstarter, and what made you choose Kickstarter to fund this project in the first place?
Gary: It feels great, we’re amazed and very grateful for the outpouring of support, both financially as well as the enthusiastic response we’re receiving from the audience.
Ron: This is the kind of game that could only be funded by people who love Point & Click adventures. I don’t think any publisher would fund it, which is fine. We’d rather have the flexibility to make exactly the game we want and promised.
XP4T: What made you go with not one, not two, but FIVE playable characters?
Gary: It pretty much harkens back to Maniac Mansion, where playing with multiple characters was one of the unique features of our first SCUMM game.
XP4T: Will you be using the SCUMM engine for Thimbleweed Park? If so, have you had to make any major updates or adjustments to satisfy the savvy modern gamer?
Ron: We’re not going to be using SCUMM for a couple of reasons. The first is just legal. We don’t own it. Also, there were a lot of tools that made up the SCUMM system and I don’t know where I’d find them all again. The biggest reason is that there are some small changes we want to make that only a more modern system can do. SCUMM was a great system, but it has become dated over the years. But our hope is that the game still feels like you’re playing a SCUMM game.
XP4T: Can we expect classy 80’s humor and witty writing from Thimbleweed Park?
Ron: I’m not sure what you’d call “80’s humor”. It will have the same kind of humor found in Maniac Mansion and Monkey Island.
XP4T: So was it a no-brainer to team up on this project?
Ron: In some ways, yes. Over the years, we’ve never both been free at the same time. It seems like a natural fit again. Hopefully we won’t hate each other 18 months from now.
Gary: Ron and I also have very specific roles when it comes to development; he has no desire to create art and I certainly have none to try programming.
XP4T: Can you expound upon the “Multiple Endings”? Is there more than one way to beat the game?
Ron: Like Maniac Mansion, each character will have their own ending, and depending on who solves the puzzles and with whom, the endings will change.
READ MORE…
Pages: 1 2
About The Author
-
Dusty Effsky
