"Self-indulgent journal entry #2495"(This post was supposed to be published yesterday, but for various reasons (some of which involve a yak, some string, and cocoa butter), it was postponed. Until now. Thus "yesterday" in the post below really means "yester-yesterday".)
A few people have taken the time to comment on yesterday's post - read it
here. Always nice to get another perspective.
I also spotted this comment:
I wonder one thing...they always rumbled about how TLJ 1 made a profit after selling 450,000....why are they suddenly not happy with it and want to change it? I'm very disappointed by what I've read, maybe others will be happy.We're actually quite happy with TLJ. It's by no means perfect, but we're certainly not
unhappy with it. Any changes to the formula would be the result of changes in technology. PCs (and consoles) are capable of a lot more now than they were six years ago (when we finalised the specs for TLJ), and we'd want - and need - to exploit the current technology as much as possible without deviating too much from the needs and desires of our audience, both new and old.
I would like a potential sequel to TLJ to have fully 3D environments, because there's so much you can do in terms of puzzles and interaction when you're moving around a "real" location - gameplay that just wouldn't have been possible in the first one. But combat and platform-jumping? Uh, no. We wouldn't turn it into a shooter or a fighter or a platformer. The changes would be limited to the environments, the characters, and the interface and controls - not the gameplay. It would still be an adventure - a natural evolution of the single-screen point-and-clicker.
I think
Broken Sword 3 looks pretty interesting. Revolution's willing to take a chance, and that's a Good Thing. I have no idea whether it'll work or not, but if it does, kudos...and we might pick up a few pointers from their approach. I'm sure some of their fans aren't too happy now, but if the game's good, they'll come around.
Just to make one thing clear that probably wasn't too clear in yesterday's post: I'm neither a console gamer nor a PC gamer. I'm just a gamer. Probably not the most hard-core type of gamer, nor a very good one, but I do try to play as many different games on as many different platforms as possible. And that includes the PC. Unfortunately, I haven't been able to afford keeping up with the Joneses on the hardware-side of things, which means that I miss out on a lot of intriguing (and technically demanding) games on the PC. Since I work in the "industry", however, I get to see what's out there, and when I definitely
need to upgrade my PC (*cough*Doom III*cough*), I
will upgrade my PC. Maybe someone will even release a great adventure that requires a top-of-the-line PC. In that case, huzzah! I loves them good graphics.
(And right now, my most-played game is
Sim City 4. On the PC. Even if they released that one on a console, I'd still play it on the PC. Some games just work better with a mouse, keyboard, and monitor...even a crappy one.)
I'm just expressing my personal views here, by the way, and attempting to reassure everyone that, yes - when it comes to TLJ 2, as well as our other games - we do care about the core audience, the people who've played (and liked) the first one, and yes, we're listening to everyone's opinions. Whatever we choose to do in the future, it won't be to every gamer's liking, but hopefully it will be to the average
adventure gamer's liking.
I'm guessing that a lot of people who read my journal do so to keep themselves updated on the future of TLJ, and if you have strong opinions that you'd like aired, feel free to send me an
e-mail, and I'll (hopefully) post your comments here.
