Vote of Confidence: Broken Age

Vote of Confidence provides a look at games that have finished their initial crowdfunding period, but are still open for pre-orders or donations.

Overview

Broken Age is a 2D point 'n' click adventure in the style of the old Lucas Arts games in development at Double Fine Productions. The project is being led by Studio helm Tim Schafer, whose previous credits include being a writer on The Secret of Monkey Island, co-designer on Day of the Tentacle, and the lead designer on Full Throttle and Grim Fandango.

Broken Age started life as Double Fine Adventure on Kickstarter, where it stirred the heart of classic adventure gamers and managed to reach its funding goal in a matter of hours before going on to raise $3.3 million. The game is currently estimated for release in 2014.

Synopsis

The story revolves around two protagonists in living in different worlds, one science fiction, the other fantasy. A coming-of-age story, the two teens are trapped in situations they wish to escape, but doing so has consequences.


Why You Should Care

Well, for starters the game is being written by Tim Schafer. His witty dialogue and quirky style is an undeniable feature in the classic Lucas Arts adventure games he worked on, along with his own studio's platform adventure Psychonauts. His writing manages to be laugh-out-loud funny, subtle and laced with touching emotional moments when it needs to be. He has a real flare for writing endearing characters and creating bizarre worlds that follow their own set of rules, and what's been shown so far on Broken Age looks to be living up to that expectation.

Then there's the art style, led by Nathan Stapley. Nathan's vibrant, quirky, soft-edged painterly style seems a good fit for the game. Check out the trailer below to see it in motion.

Here's the teaser trailer, showing off the gorgeous art style.

A pre-order for the game also comes with access to the Double Fine Adventure documentary. A new episode is released roughly every six weeks or so, offering a look into Double Fine's creative process and a glimpse at the ups and downs of game development. It's an earnest lay-of-the-land that covers much of the process and is thoroughly absorbing. Ten episodes have been released so far, ranging from about 20 minutes to 40 minutes each.

The first episode of the documentary has been made available to the public, covering the initial funding period on Kickstarter. It's linked below, and gives a good impression of what you'll get from the further episodes of the documentary.

Double Fine Adventure - Episode One: A Perfect Storm for Adventure

My Opinion

Double Fine have made some great games over the years, but they haven't quite reached the sparkle of those old Lucas Arts games for me. Closest of them all was Psychonauts, although I hold a special place for The Cave, but that's for another post! Broken Age looks to be flying much closer to those old Lucas Arts games than anything they've done so far, perhaps due to the nature of the game itself being a Point 'n' Click adventure game. This Kickstarter has given Double Fine the opportunity to directly develop a game that Tim Schafer is clearly eager to make, and the fans are eager to pay for.

For me personally, I'd say the price of admission is worth it for the documentaries alone. Add on top of that the handful of 'Side Quests' that offer lengthy one-on-one interviews with members of the team and you've a considerable amount of footage to go through.

Whilst some have had concern over budget problems, that really is to be expected of most Kickstarter projects and shouldn't come as much of a surprise to anyone who understands the nature of creative developments working against a budget. Pledging to a Kickstarter or any other crowdfunding project there is always a risk, the project may never see the light of day, even if funded. You remove the publisher from the equation and the consumer takes the risk instead, that is the nature of the beast.

One thing is clear though; Tim knows what is resting on this project... Not only his studio's potential financial freedom from publishers, but the trust of his 90,000 closest friends.

Further Reading

You can find out more information and, if you are so inclined, place a pre-order through the official website at http://www.brokenagegame.com/.

Tim Schafer is on twitter as @TimofLegend.
Nathan Stapley is also on twitter as @NatelBagel.