Tendo City

Seriously, why won't Lucasarts release their adventure games for the DS? The system is perfect for them.

Thanks for listening to my micro-rant.

Love,

OB1

Lucasarts has new management that couldn't care less about its back library, corporate heritage, or past genres they did well. Only one thing matters: How to make the most quick bucks. You know this. It's very sad, but it's the facts.

At least we'll be getting Another Code. Well, I guess we'll be getting it anyway...

It would be cool is LA released some of their old adventure games on the DS.

Lucasarts won't even release NEW adventure games that were mostly finished, much less remake old ones...

Sadly, that's the truth.

They wouldn't have to remake the games, just port them. Of course, they'll have to re-do most or all of the code, but the graphics work doesn't need much changing at all, if any. The dual screen/touch stuff doesn't even have to be special.

For MI, just keep all of the action on the bottom screen and use the top for inventory and the like, and reverse that for Grim Fandango.

For the first three, a touch screen thing would be great for obviuos reasons. MI4 and GF used a controller anyway so honestly the DS doesn't offer much except, as OB1 suggested, an inventory screen that's always there.

Too bad Lucasarts just doesn't care...

Ya know, in the post-Lord of the Rings movie era we now live in, I really think SCi should port over Kingdom O' Magic. Honestly, even after playing two Monkey Island games, I still think it's the funniest game I've ever played. I think the game could really do without the fighting element... or at least totally redo that... and some of the puzzles really aren't that special, so as a pure adventure game it's not the best I've played by far, but the comedy is completely solid and was more than enough for me to play it repeatedly. If they actually remade the game with some of the puzzles redone and a solid replacement for the fighting system, then they would have a game that would sell by ridiculous margins I'd think... well to people that like puzzle adventure games.

Actually, for GF having an inventory screen that's always there would make no sense at all. After all, the inventory is in Manny's coat! How is he walking around and interacting with things while also fumbling with all the junk in his coat?

It'd work great in any other adventure game, but not that one...

Quote:They wouldn't have to remake the games, just port them. Of course, they'll have to re-do most or all of the code, but the graphics work doesn't need much changing at all, if any. The dual screen/touch stuff doesn't even have to be special.

It'd be a lot of work, OB1. You've got to know that.

Perhaps you misunderstand. The idea is that you have the inventory SCREEN at the bottom, not that he's literally dragging around a giant billboard full of items just below him. So in other words, instead of having to pause the game and select from an awkward "flip through my inventory slowly and tediously" thing, you just click on the item on the screen and it's selected. In the game, it would still show Manny picking the item out of his coat and all, because that's where it would be, but you'd be able to select it a lot quicker. Gone would be the silly "scroll through one item at a time" thing they had in the original (even if the idea of him rummaging through his coat while you select is... cute... it's hardly something I was all that fond of).

Exactly, DJ. You have to think about what makes the most sense, and what makes gameplay easier. Not wanting to use a second screen in GF simply because you think that there needs to be a coat or that if there does need to be a coat that contuinity should take precedence over practicality is just bad game design.

No, you misunderstand (DJ). One of the points in GF was to have an immersive experience. Hence the complete lack of any on-screen interface (other than text boxes and lists of possible conversation topics), the direct controls, and the fact that your inventory is in your coat -- it's all to increase realism and immersiveness. Put in a standard adventure game 'item list' screen and you hurt that, and it'd be bad for the game.

Sure, it's a bit slow sometimes to scroll through one item at a time. But you never get huge numbers of items, and can scroll them at decent speed, so it works fine, I think. And remember -- they didn't use that inventory system because it was the fastest possible on to use. A standard box which you could scroll around would be that. They did it for immersion.

If that's such a big deal then the solution is simple. Just make the lower screen his torso, and if you switch stuff in the bottom screen then they can play a rough animation in the top. When you're not using the bottom screen then his jacket is shut. Simple.

That could work... might look funny, but it could work.

Still, I don't see why the DS should get this game... it isn't suited for mid-90ies-on PC adventure games. The storage medium is just too small. What do you do, remove most of the speech from all these games?

Isn't suited?? What do you call Another Code? Some Japanese companies are even planning on releasing graphic adventure games for the DS in the U.S. for the very first time. The system is perfect for the genre.

And Grim Fandango was on two 630 MB cds. Compress the sound and it'll easily fit onto a 1Gb DS card.

They go up to that size? Yeah, that sounds about right... Yeah ABF, I'm pretty sure all the audio could easily get on there, even if they didn't make it that big, thanks to the lovely MP3 compression standard.

OB1's answer of showing the inside of his coat would work pretty well I'd think. I mean, you could basically show all the items distinguished enough that you could just click on them, but they would all be a jumble inside his own rib cage. Heh, and when you walk around you can see all the items shifting around on the bottom screen. Showing a really quick animation of him taking the item from his coat would work just fine...

With image and video compression being what it is now, I don't think they'd have any trouble fitting everything on one DS cart. Just look at what Angels Stuios did with RE2 on the N64, they including all the CG, the voices, and the music. And that was several years ago, besides.

I think OB1's idea of the bottom screen having his torso [i.e. the inventory screen from the orignal game] would probably work well. It might look a bit odd, but it wouldn't detract from the game or anything.

Maybe it could be a map or something as default and when you touch the screen it switches to the coat.

Quote:And Grim Fandango was on two 630 MB cds. Compress the sound and it'll easily fit onto a 1Gb DS card.

Uh... but 1Gb is 125MB! That's tiny compared to two CDs with a total of 1,300MB! That means 10x compression, OB1... doable, but quite noticable to anyone who plays the game.

And while you can compress sound some, squeezing that game (or just about any adventure game made from about 1997 to the present... not many are even just ONE CD (and even one CD is significantly larger than a DS card)!) onto such a small space... well, it could probably be done. After all, they fit Resident Evil 2 onto a 64MB cart. But there'd be lots of compression and much worse sound quality. You could save some space by not having to have the CG as high resolution on the DS screen (it is smaller, after all), but still... the amount of space on a DS card is kind of small.

Ah yes, that's right. My conversions were all messed up there. And it's 128MB. ;)

Still though, it is perfectly possible. Like GR said, they fit a two-disc PSX game onto a 512Mb cart, so it's definitely possible.

There was a later one-CD version of RE2 I think... compressed some, clearly.

As for games like these... it'd just mean a lot of compression. If you can live with that you could do it. But I wouldn't really recommend lots of voice acting on DS games. The carts are just too small. CG backgrounds you can do, since graphics compression isn't as noticable on that small screen (or if it is, at least you can shrink the resolution!), but sound... that's more noticable, especially with headphones...

DS cards are bigger than N64 carts. A two-disc PSX game was done on an N64 cart. Case closed.

But it'd have compression just as bad as RE2 did on the N64! That IS a problem! It would not be an ideal, or perfect, port.

Two things: Sound compression has gotten inifitely better since RE2 for the N64. And you wouldn't have to do FMV, just use the in-game engine for cinematics. Problem solved.

FMV? Games like Grim aren't big because of FMV, they're big because of CG and voice... and yes, you can compress both and compression methods are getting better. But you can't avoid problems when you need ten times compression and it definitely wouldn't look, or sound, as good. Oh, it would be playable, but you can't say it would be exactly the same.

And anyway, as I said the DS isn't really suited for direct-control adventure games... it'd work much better with indirect-control ones like Curse of Monkey Island. Grim is best with an analog stick. (I played it on a D-Pad, but I remember that when I later got a analog-stick-equipped PC gamepad I noticed how much better Monkey Island 4 was with analog when compared to digital... no need to hold that run key! :))

CG? 2D backgrounds are 2D backgrounds. Pre-rendered 3D does not make them take up more space.

Grim works just fine with a dpad. If you can play Mario 64 somewhat well with a dpad then you can play Grim Fandango perfectly well with a dpad.

Quote:CG? 2D backgrounds are 2D backgrounds. Pre-rendered 3D does not make them take up more space.

Resolution and image quality are what matter there and both can be cut back to save space... but it makes things not look quite as nice.

Quote:Grim works just fine with a dpad. If you can play Mario 64 somewhat well with a dpad then you can play Grim Fandango perfectly well with a dpad.

I'm sure Grim works better with a d-pad than Mario 64 would... you need less precision. But my point was, it's better with analog.

Really, Grim Fandango would be a good game to be released on consoles... but I'd want to see it on the major consoles, not handhelds.

So it wouldn't be a perfect port. Don't buy it then, you whiny bastard. I'd be more than happy with my not-quite-perfect GF port thank you very much.

You just like to argue for the sake of arguing. You're actually arguing against a handheld port of one of your favorite graphic adventure games. What the fuck is wrong with you!!

Because I think the DS wouldn't be the best platform for the game... and it's all hypothetical anyway. Lucasarts won't be making any adventure games anytime in the forseeable future.

What would be the best platform for the game then? A home console? Yeah that makes sense, release an ancient, technically archaic PC graphic adventure for the PS2 or XB2! You should work for Lucasarts' marketing, I'll tell ya!

No, it would have made sense to release Grim Fandango on home consoles five years ago. :) Now it's a bit outdated and you'd have to redo the 3d models, anyway... CG backgrounds don't age as badly.

Did Grim have analog control anyway? I used my Sidewinder to play that game, and before setting that up, I was using my keyboard.

A Black Falcon Wrote:No, it would have made sense to release Grim Fandango on home consoles five years ago. :) Now it's a bit outdated and you'd have to redo the 3d models, anyway... CG backgrounds don't age as badly.

But you just said "the DS wouldn't be the best platform for the game". So, pray tell, what would be the best platform for the game today?

Sounds like his argument the whole time is that no platform would really lend itself to the game...

No matter, the games can be changed until they fit the system though. In this case, not much need be done. Since I played it using a standard d-pad before anyway, and since the imagery in the game is about N64 level as it is (honestly they don't need to be improved... well not to me anyway, the simplistic look was part of the art style, just smooth it out a bit and have smoother animation and it's fine), I'd say the DS could do it easily. Some scenes, they would have to increase the size of smaller things... well it's possible they might have to do it, I dunno... Anyway, not much need be changed, and audio compression is pretty good these days. Lossless compression IS possible, that's how Zip files work (if a single bit was lost in the process, you couldn't compress programs at all, they'd glitch or just plain crash after decompresion), but lossless means very little compression. For very high stuff, ya gotta lose some data. However, they've got the ratio of what you lose to what you save in space down to a pretty good level these days. I'd say they could compress all the audio without loosing much. Oh and, OB1 from now on don't list bits for cart sizes :D. I mean, at one time, the SNES/Genesis days, that was the standard measurement of carts, but that was done purely to impress people with large numbers and was an act of deception more than anything. These days, doing that just smacks of being an advertising +2 bastard sword. But, no matter it was just a mistake... Same one I made reading that and not noticing the capitalization of the b :D.

But yeah ABF, if you really think the whole suit thing would be silly, it's not like they have to do one OR the other. They could do both, easily. Just assign like... X or something to the equipment switch command. Program it so pressing that gets you the ol' shuffling through your inventory thing. Use the screen when you don't feel like doing that. I think the screen's normal setting should actually be like, I dunno, the stuff you normally only see when you pause the game. Like, the whole thing is made up of save... load... so on...

Assuming the system can handle it, they could show panoramic vertical scenes that normally scroll as one large screen. They had those in Grim right?

Hey I said Gb, not GB.

LA could do it if they ever wanted to. The problem is that they don't.

I believe I stated I mistakingly didn't notice the capitalization.

Yeah... I kind of thought that you might read it as GB. The N64 really did mess up that stuff for some of us.