Unofficial Tex Murphy

Wow, kicktraq thinks we'll end up with 1.6 million by the end of the campaign. What a low number! Something wrong with this thing?

Trilaan wrote:Wow, kicktraq thinks we'll end up with 1.6 million by the end of the campaign. What a low number! Something wrong with this thing?

Have a read of...

http://blog.kicktraq.com/why-you-should ... n-of-salt/

Joel wrote: Have a read of...

http://blog.kicktraq.com/why-you-should ... n-of-salt/

Oh, I know that, silly. It's called positive thinking! The power of optimism compels you!

True, but on Day 1 I predicted this project would successfully rival Double Fine, i've had to eat my words since. That's not to say it will fail, I think it'll succeed, but it won't surpass the dollar count of Double Fine.

I don't even see why Doublefine needed it since they've still been putting out games pretty regularly. Unless sales of Brutal Legend were much much worse than I thought.

they needed kickstarter because Schafer's reputation with the publishers was sunk, no one would deal with him after Brutal Legend (especially after the lawsuit- remember EA accused Schafer of lying to them and sued Activision for "Stealing" their investment. Simply the publishers will unlikely trust schafer ever again because of this.). So hence why they decided on going to the public directly. That said, there's a reason why Schafer's reputation sunk, its due to that the past 3 games he'd made were all flops and didn't turn profit. What he's at risk with this new game is that after release he might not be able to turn a profit, which in turn will mean Double Fine will have to rely on "Something else" to make money to keep the company afloat (I'm thinking Psychonauts 2).

With Chris and Aaron, they're having to resort to kickstarter on account that no publisher will produce FMV titles, FMV games have a bad reputation as is so no one wants to finance it, on top of this big finish tried to produce casual games with mixed success in order to fund project fedora.. but unfortunately wasn't enough to finance the project.. (fortunately though they seem to be able to keep the company afloat which is great!).

mr_cyberpunk wrote: With Chris and Aaron, they're having to resort to kickstarter on account that no publisher will produce FMV titles, FMV games have a bad reputation as is so no one wants to finance it, on top of this big finish tried to produce casual games with mixed success in order to fund project fedora.. but unfortunately wasn't enough to finance the project.. (fortunately though they seem to be able to keep the company afloat which is great!).

Which again makes me wonder why anyone would call it an "FMV" game if the word is poison. It's just a normal game that has live-action in it.

Why've I got this feeling of deja vu?

So we should all go out of our way to make sure people know it's not an FMV game, it's a live-action-integrated interactive experience. Or does that sound like a bit too much?

It's simply an adventure game. To me, the term "Interactive Movie" realtes to feature length games with quick time responses, almost a bit like Heavy Rain or even the Telltale's Jurassic Par. There's much more going in in TM than simple interactive cinematics because the game calls upon skills such as exploration, deduction, problem solving and logic.

A few hundred dollars less today all in all, but 30 more backers than yesterday, and still above 20k per day. This is still looking good.

I see your point and I quite liked Heavy Rain, too. Okay umbrella term it is, Adventure game.

Heavy Rain is how interactive movies ought to be done. Same with Farenheit, they're the exemplars that should be writing the template for the genre and resurrecting it.

Awesome video Cub!

(Sorry this is long.... I just kind of enjoy looking at different angles to a topic. Added headings for easier read.)

Well its all a case of semantics but according to Chris and Aaron Tex Murphy are FMV games or according to GOG Interactive Movie (on the Pandora Directive page - which hasn't hurt it getting new fans there). I wouldn't say it can be described as a game that just happens to have live action cutscenes, as the FMV goes beyond just cutscenes and is very much a big part of the games. I doubt CJ and AC would of wanted to describe the game any differently considering many feel it was a big part of the appeal of the games.

FMV Games vs the Film Industry

Imagine if the film industry had died because of a consistent run of bad movies being released (which has likely happened many times in some peoples opinion)? Does everyone hate Jaws because of what else came out in the same vein, such as Jaws 4? Which is considered one of the worst films in existence, nominated for various achievements in being terrible and won an award for "Worst Visual Effects".

I agree with what Chris Jones has hinted at in that FMV games are not that far from the film industry, he loved making films as a kid and seems to enjoy going to the cinema today, I get the impression he doesn't think of film in games being a world apart. He obviously would like people to appreciate film again in the game world just like they still do when they hop on Netflix on their PC, PS3, Xbox etc. But instead of booting up Netflix to enjoy filmed entertainment on their consoles or PC they should be able to alternatively boot up an actual game.

Difference to Film Industry - B-Movies Beat the Hits

But FMV games are different to the film industry in that the B-Movies got more marketing than the oscar winners early in in their life. People like to laugh at bad movies even in the film industry so they spread well, there are even clubs dedicated to watching them and of course many love MST3K. But the better movies still manage to go mainstream. However even today the games seen in series such as FMV Hell are more mainstream. SpoonyOne hasn't put up any of the better FMV games (though he has played them on his livestream), I think that is understandable as his audience have come to expect and want a certain type of entertainment from the FMV series, more in the vein of a "bad film" clubs.

Therefore many do not know of the great ones (including but not exclusive to Tex Murphy). FMV is not such a taboo word to everyone if they didn't go to see those "bad movies". Games like Gabriel Knight 2, Toonstruck, Black Dahlia are well respected as well. If Jane had done a Kickstarter for another FMV game in the vein of GK2 I feel it'd of not been seen as a bad thing either. Her current Kickstarter has had lots of people discussing GK2 and some of her updates have paid homage to it. She mentioned in a QandA during the Kickstarter she would do FMV again too depending on the game. I respect CJ and AC for not wanting to let FMV roll over and die because of some poor B-movies.

Chris Jones & Aaron on FMV in the games

Chris Jones: We understand there were games which completely missed the point of why, in our opinion, FMV can be a legitimate family member to games. Which is to really take advantage of being able to show a full range of human emotion, relationships and interaction. Technology allows us to do FMV better and faster than ever before. The use of live actors is something that is still widely seen and fully accepted in film and cinema today, games can become an extension of this again. Though CG can show emotion too, especially with todays technology, we still feel there is that opportunity to return a real human element and bond between characters and the audience using live actors to portray depth of character to the maximum degree human being to human being. What we're going for is a real alternative for people, a chance for them to have a game that is in essence going to be different to what they have seen for quite awhile.

- from RetroNick interview

Then of course there's also Aaron's recent article on FMV:

We’re proud of our classic FMV games and I hope we can introduce a new generation of gamers to our way of doing things – maybe even change their minds about everything they’ve heard prior to experiencing a new Tex Murphy.

http://www.adventure-treff.de/artikel/f ... 4&lang=eng

FMV May Even Attract Backers!
At the end of the day it'd also of been detrimental to pander too much to those who have a bad impression of FMV and won't give it even a consideration by the mere mention, all they'd have to do is go to the Kickstarter page and watch the pitch. If the pitch hadn't shown FMV then most of the most memorable moments would of not been represented. I noticed within the first day or 2 they had to add to the FAQ "Will the new game be FMV?". Obviously they got a lot of questions about this, despite the pitch some wanted more confirmation that it wasn't just a homage to the old games and actually represented that live actors would be in a new game. There are popular gaming news sites like ScrewAttack who specifically decided to promote the Kickstarter because it would be a return of the kind of FMV games they had loved.

Technicalities within Adventure / FMV
However! Having said all that I totally agree it does go far far further than any other FMV game when it comes to the gameplay side. It doesn't mean it can't be considered in the same genre as the others though. AC and CJ say they they were early pioneers of the genre. It is just that noone else in the genre followed through with their example. Including GK 2, Black Dahlia etc. which were traditional point and click adventure style - not really a bad thing though, just different to Tex. If going into semantics some might consider if Tex was also more than an adventure game since it wasn't the traditional point and click people expect when they hear "Adventure Game" e.g. Monkey Island etc. But it is of course very much Adventure as the popular idea doesn't really define the genre as a whole. Similarly a popular idea of FMV shouldn't mean they have to be wrote out of existence. Plus FMV Adventure Games didn't really have a single defining method of gameplay - you play something like Black Dahlia differently to Gabriel Knight 2 (firstly due to the different perspective).

Gameplay IS Important! Let's Make it Prominent!
I don't personally feel they should skirt around the FMV aspect. But I do also feel strongly that the Kickstarter page is severely lacking and missing a big appeal of the games until it has a big feature video all about the gameplay which set it apart. Currently newcomers are going to miss out on really knowing how these games drew you in with the way you solved cases. I've submitted ideas to them and also transcriptions or copy-paste from their past interviews which talks about the gameplay. I hope that there will be something put together for the Kickstarter page in the future.
http://www.unofficialtexmurphy.com/mess ... 268#p49268

So yeah I really am as eager as everyone else for the Kickstarter to expand past the FMV aspect with a focus video on the gameplay. As the free roaming 3D environments, investigation rummaging, interface, game modes, hints system and such were all extremely important too in making it unique and appealing.

Sai wrote: But FMV games are different to the film industry in that the B-Movies got more marketing than the oscar winners early in in their life. People like to laugh at bad movies even in the film industry so they spread well, there are even clubs dedicated to watching them and of course many love MST3K.

I'd argue that there are those of us who love some FMV games because of their terribleness as well. I'm nostalgic for Digital Pictures because those 'games' were some of the few that managed to be so bad they're good, Like a Manos: The Hands of Fate (MST3k).

Tex is one of the few that used FMV and was good, and Tex is THE only game/series that used it well interactively. Phantasmagoria 1 and 2, GK2, Toonstruck and the Wing Commanders after 2 all did a fine job of integrating it, and they were good games, but none made the game feel like it connected to the FMV.