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"once the FPS fad is up "

The FPS FAD is not a fad, it started way back in 1992-1994 with Wolf3D, doom and others. 20 years of yearly FPS games is not a fad. FPS is the sports games of shooters.

FPS is so popular because people experience life in the first person so its difficult to tire of that style of gameplay, if you go pickup Quake 3 or UT2004 and force yourself to play it, you'll get immediately immersed back into the fun of playing. The reason we (gameplay) players move on is to see different gameplay modes/etc. But gameplay is hard (tm), and most of the gaming masses don't really like the videogame aspect of games. They like the movie/story aspect.... and they make up the bulk of gamers now. So the game industry makes games like Mass effect 2, which is just a movie with the most basic fps gameplay, but they compensate for it with 'being part of an action movie' bit. We've moved from an era of gameplay focused games to set-pieces, story and virtual theme park experiences. Most people don't want to be challenged or play videogames, they want a themepark in which they are given the illusion they are good at playing videogames. This is why videogames have been dumbed down so much. Most modern gaming audiences are SBG's ('story based gamers') and they really despise gameplay that veers away from simple, dumbed down and easy.

The industry right now is a giant chimera, it's created a generation of 'gamers' who want movies and not anything too vidoegame like. There's a bifurcation between what I call "VR people" and "gamers". VR people want non games like Journey and the walking dead.

http://www.telltalegames.com/walkingdead/

These games are primarily are all just about using computers to render stories/movies and are closer to visual novels / virtual experiences, than games.

Who said adventure games were dead? http://www.telltalegames.com/walkingdead/

I've been playing a bit of Tales of Monkey Island with my kids who have enjoyed it even though they don't understand English. I think it's quite enjoyable and does the originals justice.

I would second or third the recommendation of Monkey Island. There is an remake available that's been ported to many platforms (PSN, Wii, PC, iOS, etc) called Tales of Monkey Island. My daughter (who is 7) enjoys it quite a bit. Some puzzles are a little too hard for her and I need to help her out, so it might be the right level for your girl. The humor helps a lot too, she might not get the puzzles but she enjoys some of the responses she gets for incorrect answers- keeping her from getting to frustrated with it.

My daughter also loves the Zelda series like Windwaker and the Twilight Princess. She likes these worlds and loves to play in them not just for the story line. Like playing fetch with the a dog in Twilight Princess, or placing the pigs in Windwaker in funny spots like try to get them on a roof, or in a water basin. She sometimes plays the older versions like Majora's Mask or the Ocarina of Time but sometimes seems a little turned of by the lack of detail/responses of the environment. [sigh] Kids these days! ;)

She also likes to play on my World of Warcraft account sometimes (with supervision, of course)- although I can see many reasons not to go that route (monthly $, stranger interaction, addiction/immersion). She likes to roleplay in the environment- go fishing, follow/talk to NPCs, sleep, eat, and sometimes go on a quest or two.

A remake is cool, but I think the more interesting news is that TellTale games is working on a brand new title for the Kings Quest franchise. There's a brief announcement on there blog. (You have to scroll down pretty far).

To provide a counter point: Puzzle Agent is $10 on the PC - originally $20 - and $5 in the app store. Monopoly sells for $40 on the xbox/ps3/wii, $3 as an app. Of course I got both of these for $1 on a Christmas sale, w00t. At least for now it seems the successful formula is to give away a Lite app for free, and charge $1 for the real app. I mean, it's a buck. Nobody really has to think twice about that, at least not anyone carrying an iPhone in the first place. They dominate the top app list like Angry Birds, Cut the Rope, Fruit Ninja etc. and because they're at the top list they get a ton more sales. If you're not in the top 50 it's a damn lot harder to get sales.

Point-and-Click adventure games may have dormant, but I wouldn't call them dead.

TellTale Games is starting to push them back to the fore. I would say "LucasArts and TellTale," but LucasArts reentering the Adventure game business was due to LucasArts President Darrell Rodriguez, who resigned back in May. Thus, LucasArts may leave the market again, without having produced anything new (only the 2 Monkey Island remakes).

As for adventure games, the golden age of 1990s is gone. There were EGA or VGA games like Space Quest and Monkey Island that were so fun to play and have no modern successors.

It's not that sad. There's still gems here and there.

Don't forget Strong Bad's Cool Game For Attractive People! http://www.telltalegames.com/strongbad

Try getting a good adventure game like the old Lucasarts point-and-click adventures.

As you or others may not be aware, Tales of Monkey Island is thoroughly enjoyable. Telltale Games is doing a good job on this "long-dead" game formula with other games like the Sam & Max franchise as well.

Nope. Just mono and wine... no need for wine.. .Linux has plenty of native apps to handle what wine might bring, but who wants to have safe, but never lock it.

Wine brings me the ability to play Tales of Monkey Island.
I'd like to know the name of the native linux app that can handle this.

Until there's a real market for games editor to develop games that work on linux, wine will be necessary for linux to be a viable choice on a personnal desktop computer for a lot of people.

because Monkey Island is being done : )

http://www.telltalegames.com/monkeyisland

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loom_(video_game)

What, like Tales of Monkey Island (aka "New Monkey Island") that comes out tomorrow?

np: Tim Exile - I Saw The Weak Hand Fall (Listening Tree)

Bah, bring on the REAL gaming news of the day, MONKEY ISLAND!!!

Part of my concern is for history. Physical media with little to no DRM means that future generations can have access to the past. Future game designers can see what has gone before, to mine it for good ideas, to avoid reinventing the wheel. If everything is online locked, games can go away, forever. The only people with long term access, our video game history custodians, will end up being those will infringing copies. Not a future I look forward to. Sure, you chose to not take care of your physical media. But I do. And I know others who do.

If we had an option between Steam and physical media, we'd both be happy. Heck, if I could get both for a small premium, I'd pay for it in a minute. (Telltale Games has a hundred or so bucks of money because they do exactly this.) But that's an option. It's (at least for Valve's games), Steam or nothing.

If you're looking for WiiWare, Strong Bad's Cool Game For Attractive People (SBCG4AP), is available on Wiiware. I'm pretty sure it's a point and click type adventure game. I've been meaning to look up more info about it.

Here be the link :D http://www.telltalegames.com/strongbad

At least we're getting some new Sam & Max.

I blame the recent console-ization of gaming for lowering our collective attention spans.

Also Linux firefox + the latest available flash - there are conflicting reports as to whose fault it is - still suffers from the notorious wmode="transparent" bug which breaks quite a lot of sites to varying degrees. E.g. the customer login on Telltale games was unusable without flashblock last time I checked.

Wish (mostly) granted: Sam & Max

The last thing I think I heard about Sam&Max on the Wii was that Telltale had hired a Wii programmer. Nintendo contacted them back in September, the blog post on it is here. I don't think a version of season 1, or what if anything they're doing with it has been confirmed yet though.

I went ahead and finished off season 1. Abe Lincoln must die was awesome. Reality 2.0 was great, and the ending credits for Bright Side of the Moon were great... but constantly having to go back to the same locations, with no real variety in there still kinda bothers me. I wish I could've revisted places like the White House, TV studio, and the Mafia-Free casino to solve some of the later puzzles would've been nice. Instead it's new location, location you started in in the first game, every episode. I got really tired of that same street.

How about you buy the great games made by the same people? You have the fantastic Psychonauts, a hilarious game with fantastic artwork, available cheaply everywhere in the world from Steam. You also have the new Sam and Max series for more adventure heavy games. Haven't played any of those episodes yet, but reportedly also fantastic.

Don't sit there and complain about lack of originality in today's games market. There are PC games out there just as good as the golden classics you remember, please buy them and give the makers an incentive to continue!

From the official press release: "Funds will be used for new titles, expansion to additional hardware platforms, and additional staff"

Which additional hardware platforms is a bit early to speculate on (and only one of their goals), but I wouldn't be surprised if they were looking into the Wii and/or Mac.

I was thinking the same thing.

To those who are not aware, Steve Purcell created Sam and Max, which is now under control of Tell Tale games after the contract expired with LucasArts. He did not create the Monkey island series, a series which is very missed, by the way. :(

I am Murray!!

Don't know where you've been hiding, but Sam & Max are back!

Are you aware that Telltale Games is trying to recreate Sam & Max adventure games in 3D, and so far is doing a fine job of it? The latest episode, "Reality 2.0," is both uproariously funny and fun to play, especially for old-school gamers. The previous epsiode, "Abe Lincoln Must Die!" is also great fun.

Indeed! I would think that Day of the Tentacle, Monkey Island, and Sam and Max Hit the Road would be all that people need to jump at this!

Sam and Max would be a big magnet for this now that the duo is back in the forefront of gaming thanks to TellTale Games. Those who were not around to experience the original game that started it all can go back and play what we've been talking about for over a decade!

Telltale Games - formed by former LucasArts employees.

Seems to me that any money for independent game makers is good.

What's particularly interesting to me about this is that they're offering a "non-exclusive" distribution deal.

Perhaps this is similar to what they're doing with Sam & Max?

There's no need to miss Sam and Max, they've already returned...

Wish granted: http://www.telltalegames.com/

I have not played it yet, but the new Sam & Max seems to be getting pretty good reviews http://www.telltalegames.com/samandmax.

The way the industry works now, almost no developer can afford to self-fund a "full-size" game. For most of those who can, it's an all-or-nothing bet; if the game tanks (And many great games regrettably do), the developer goes out of business. So for the overwhelming majority of developers, to do a full game it means getting a publisher to fund development. Publishers are understandably cautious about funding more risky (but potentially great) games. As a result you tend to see lots of knock offs, sequels, and crappy movie licenses. Innovation is stifled. Add on that most developers exist only so long as they keep getting publishers to fund them.

One way to escape this is to simply develop smaller games. That's great if you like that sort of game, but not so good if you really want to develop a sprawling RPG, a large FPS, just about any adventure game, or something similar.

Episodic content is potentially a way forward. These days the overwhelming expense in a large game is the content, not the programming. A first episode that represents, say, 20% of a game may only need 40% of the content. (Even better, episode two probably only needs 15% more content to generate the next 20% of the game, assuming you're releasing episodes quickly enough that you don't need to update your engine or art.) It's a much lower risk. More developers can afford to self-fund in this model. More risky ideas can be tried. I'm quite confident that Bone and Sam & Max weren't going to be funded by a major publisher as full games. As the developer typically self-publishes, if the game is a success the developer can bank it to support future development, possibly even more traditional big-single-release games.

Episodic content is problematic. As a customer you're left hanging mid-story. (Did we say you'd be playing Episode Two within six months of episode one? Did you purchase Episode One on that basis? Hope you don't mind waiting six more.) If the developer goes bankrupt or cancels an unprofitable line you may never see the conclusion. (Sucks to be you, Sin Episodes fans. Of course, you can suffer that even in "full" game releases.) While episodic content is almost exclusively sold online, reducing overhead and costs, you pay what overhead there is once per episode, driving costs up. I'm not a fan of episodic content for these reasons. But I believe at least some developers are embracing episodic content as a way to escape extremely cautious publishers.

and don't forget Sam 'n' Max either - they're cheap, and fun and (IMO) hold true to the original Sam'n'Max game.

The interestign thing to me is that the 3 big name episodic games are folow up on previous franchises. my question on that is why?
Is it simply that no one is willing to test the watters with a no name game?
Are the developers figguring on cashign in in brand name recognition (stupid idea with SiN as the orig was rather bad)?

That's just because the lesser-known titles aren't getting the same amount of press. I have the honor of being the recording engineer on all of Telltale's games (except their first title, a poker game). Sam & Max is not the first episodic title we've done, it's just the most recognizable. The first episodic game TTG produced was Bone, based on Jeff Smith's comic book of the same name.

It seems to be working out pretty well with the new Sam & Max games. Aside from the terrible audio quality on the voice samples, the game is top-notch in every way, and does a great job of capturing the feel of the classic LucasArts adventure. Sure, not all games fit the episodic model, but it's just right for a hilarious adventure game.

I actually miss the days when developers' newsletters were fun to read, instead of just occasional e-mail blasts. There are definitely some companies still doing a good job of it, though. I really enjoyed Double Fine's Boot Camp Bulletin, which was the Psychonauts newsletter. (Shameless plug:) The company I work for also does a pretty good job, in my opinion: Telltale Interloper. I think it's largely a case of trying to put a bit of personality behind the company, which is what older printed newsletters used to do. I'd love to see more of it :)

Erm... It's now on sale through Telltale Games' entirely non-GameTap online store. Works just fine with a non-USA IP address and credit card. Plus it's more like a purchase over Steam - it's not a silly subscription service. Pay your $8.95 (plus tax) and it'll unlock the game for you, permanently.

(Incidentally, the 'demo version' is the whole game, but you can't progress beyond a certain point - it just needs the magical unlocking....)

http://www.telltalegames.com/store/samandmax

It's available everywhere.

Telltale's been working on the engine they used for Sam and Max with two previous episodic games based on the Bone characters... I played them through last weekend and had a great time. Same kind of style, slightly different humor but still hilarious. http://www.telltalegames.com/bone

The first episode is kind of short, but download both and it's great value for money. There's nothing like seeing a full size cow coathanger itself on a tree branch at full gallop...

If you're going to review an downlable subscription-based game, you could at least link to it!

Yeah. I wonder why that is, though. Probably due to legal issues/taxes or something like that?
Anyway, it's November the 1st so S&M: Culture Shock is now available (or should be, anyway) from Telltale's website:
http://www.telltalegames.com/store/samandmax

A very similar title (Out from Boneville) from Telltale games has in fact been ported to the Mac. See their blog entry:
http://www.telltalegames.com/blogs/telltale/?perma link=6F934CD8B1A3C874FBB0C9F47FAAEF4E.txt&smm=y

keep your fingers crossed.

So wait and buy the DVD once it's available. Or can't you be bothered to read the telltale games faq (scroll down most of the way)?

In addition to that, the first Bone episode is available for Mac since last week!

No one's going to release new games straight to gametap when they can sell them in stores and online for far more, just like no one releases new, quality products straight to the dollar store.

You know, that is so true when you ignore TellTale Games and Cyan Worlds. After all, they are making the Sam and Max episodic games and Uru Live respectively, both of which will be available through GameTap instead of brick-and-mortar stores. Yes, TellTale plans to eventually sell the games through its Web site and then as a CD or DVD-based compilation, but all of the episodes of Sam and Max will enjoy a period of exclusivity on GameTap first and foremost.

For those of you who dislike YouTube's low-quality video, the original video files are available here (scroll down to the bottom of the page for high-quality downloads).

Please, for the love of Xenu, PLEASE let them get better voice actors for the main characters this time!

If you've heard any of the previews on YouTube, the current voices of Sam and Max sound like disinterested bloggers mouthing the jokes compared to the 90's game or [shudder] the TV Cartoon voices.

Preview video

Even the announcer sounds distinctly 8th rate.

Really, the core of the product for an adventure like this IS the voices! Not that you need to believe the characters... but you need SOME skilled actors with some range in their voice to actually sound like they are meaning to tell jokes, perhaps with SOME sense of timing. There's other examples of the voice acting for the new Sam & Max too, on their web site. It's even worse, for my taste.

I love the old Sam and Max game and comics, I love the humor that is present in them so far - but man, do those mumbly voices annoy me. If they were at least immitating 30's radio, or 50's cartoons, I could understand, but it's like a substitute math teacher showed up in place of Lewis Black on stage and just mumbled his act without emotion - the concepts would be as funny, and perhaps the guy speaking would put a new spin out - but the emotionless presentation would destroy the work. You don't have to get someone amazing - just a pair of voice actors capable of pushing the sarcasm inherent in the caracters, and capable of some timing that can work of eachother.

Ryan Fenton

They seem to be talking about these guys: http://www.telltalegames.com/samandmax . Can't say I've heard of them before. But cool. The link is already slashdotted.

I'm ambivalent about this. On one hand, it's Sam and Max. I loved "Hit the Road." However, Telltale Games also brought us "Bone: Out from Boneville," which, IMO, lacked the comic book's charm, and padded itself out with too much walking around.

Comparing the old title to the new one, I just get the impression that Telltale has made it too sterile, and drained it of some character.