Schafer and Gilbert discussing adventure games

[Cez]

This is really, really interesting:

http://www.joystiq.com/2012/02/24/double-fine-kickstarter-adds-new-rewards-schafer-and-gilbert-ta/

There's a really good question there. Do we really love adventure games, or do we love the nostalgia of adventure games?

Really good insight. No to Pixelhunting -interesting how they see things nowadays. I agree a lot with what they say.

[MusicallyInspired]

The only thing I disagreed with I think was that "shorter and more focused is better".

[wilco64256]

I do agree that once you start making games you also start to over-analyze the other ones that you play.  It's kind of like finding the man behind the curtain, they're still fun but some of the magic or whatever is gone from the experience.

It's funny that he refers to Limbo as an "adventure" type game.  I'd call Limbo a platformer (and an excellent one, very well done).

Excellent point about how once you put down a game it's really unlikely that you'll pick it back up again.  Back in the day I'd only get a new game maybe two or three times a year so I'd stick with the same game for a long time, but these days I probably pick up new stuff at least a couple times a month (most of it just gets added to a stack of "pending" games).  Like I set aside Dark Souls to start playing Skyrim, and even though I finished Skyrim I just haven't picked up Dark Souls again.  I probably will at some point, but there are games where I've done that and I just don't think I ever will pick them back up again.

I love how he says he would actually mail copies of the game build to his uncle for playtesting.  We've come a long way since then.

On the shorter = better thing it's kinda hard to say for sure.  I do agree that sometimes adding puzzles to the game just for the purpose of making it longer can be bad, and a 40-hour point and click adventure game would probably never be finished by the vast majority of the people who bought it.  Really the main games that pass the 20-30 hour mark these days are the complex RPG's like Skyrim, Kingdoms of Amalur, etc.

[Cez]

I prefer my games short these days. I don't have the patience (or time) to sit through very very lengthy games, and I save that experience for RPGs.

To me, Uncharted length for most games is perfect. I sit down with the game a couple of days, enjoy it to the max, and then I'm done with it. Most games start to wear thin after a bit.

If they could do episodes, that would probably be even better. I normally just wait until the whole thing is out, and then play one episode every one or two days.

[Datadog]

I agree. These big long padded games just feel like time-wasters these days. I finally got around to playing the so-called "Game of the Year" Fallout 3, and about 40 hours of the game involve me jogging through an endless desert and digging through crates. And any actual mission is somehow padded out with corridors upon corridors of seemingly bullet-proof enemies. Every aspect of the game is designed to devour my time.

At least with games like Uncharted, Call of Duty, and God of War, the game is paced well-enough to keep me engaged from beginning to end. And if a game is short and quality-driven enough, I'm more likely to replay it on a regular basis. Because of the fun factor alone, I've already clocked more hours on "Brutal Legend" than I ever did on "Dragon Age".

In the case of adventure games, almost all the best ones only take under 10 hours to finish. Even Ron Gilbert's "Secret of Monkey Island" is barely four hours from beginning to end, and that's a classic.

[Lambonius]

I don't mind necessarily an adventure game being short--if short is in the 8-10 hour range.

There's a big difference between "short" and easily completable in a single sitting.

And I hate episodic adventure gaming.  I HATE IT.  Artificial boundary restrictions, limited interactivity, obnoxious, unresolved plot threads, etc.  All of that bullshit has plagued every episodic adventure game I've ever played.  f*** you, Telltale.  

f***.  YOU.

[MusicallyInspired]

In the case of adventure games, almost all the best ones only take under 10 hours to finish. Even Ron Gilbert's "Secret of Monkey Island" is barely four hours from beginning to end, and that's a classic.

Yeah, if you know all the puzzles, maybe. It was a 40 hour game back in the day. It took people months to beat. Certainly not 4 hours.

[Lambonius]

In the case of adventure games, almost all the best ones only take under 10 hours to finish. Even Ron Gilbert's "Secret of Monkey Island" is barely four hours from beginning to end, and that's a classic.

Yeah, if you know all the puzzles, maybe. It was a 40 hour game back in the day. It took people months to beat. Certainly not 4 hours.

Yeah, seriously.  Anyone who finished any classic adventure game in under 4 hours on their first playthrough raise their hand.

[Bludshot]

While I never played Portal 2, I think the original Portal is a great example of "short and focused."

But in regards to games like Fallout 3 and Skyrim, I don't think those games are long so much as they are constant. I played Fallout 3 for a long time just because I enjoyed romping through the wasteland just in many small doses.

[MusicallyInspired]

The final tally:

$3,335,265 raised on Kickstarter from 87,138 backers with an extra $110,000 donated outside of Kickstarter bringing the total to:

$3,445,265

EDIT: Went up a bit.

$3,336,371 + $110,000 = $3,446,371

[KatieHal]

*faints*

The Wasteland 2 kickstarter has begun--already over $600K: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/inxile/wasteland-2