Wadjet Eye Old Skies - time travel adventure game from Wadjet Eye, now 2D again

[MRY]

to the World Trade Center on September 10, 2001

 

[Infinitron]

to the World Trade Center on September 10, 2001

He's a New Yorker, isn't he? Don't be holier than the pope!

 

[MRY]

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

I don't know if any of his friends died in the attacks (one of mine did). In any event, gallows humor is fine (and sometimes the only way to get by in an oft-awful world), but there's a certain tone deafness to a bullet point like this: "Seven eras of history to visit! From the speakeasies of Prohibition to the gangs of the Gilded Age to the morning of September 11th." It is almost as unproductive to explain what seems gauche as it is to explain a joke, so I won't try. To me, that bullet would be perfect as a gag in, say, a Will Ferrell movie about a clueless marketer, and it's almost unbelievable to encounter it in earnest in real life.

 

[Alpan]

It doesn't read like gallows humor... 9/11 is undoubtedly the strongest claim the 21st century has to a world-historical era-shift so far. So I can understand that line of reasoning if he wanted to emphasize the event's significance.

The "history is up for grabs" blurb seems somewhat more and unnecessarily crude, though.

 

[MRY]

If it were gallows humor, it wouldn't bother me. I just read it as more like: "Visit exciting moments throughout history! The shootout at the OK corral! The flight of the Kitty Hawk! The death of thousands of people in a horrific terrorist attack! Wilt Chamberlain's famous 100-point game! It's all yours to see first hand!"

 

[Alpan]

I would agree with that, esp. with respect to the blurb.

It's a weird dissonance between the usual happy-go-lucky WadGilbert Eye store page and implication of serious subject matter.

 

[Keshik]

Yeah that really is Jesse Faden.

 

[ItsChon]

Didn't even notice anything off with it till it was pointed out. Its been 21 years, I think it's time to move on.

 

[<3sRichardSimmons]

Didn't even notice anything off with it till it was pointed out. Its been 21 years, I think it's time to move on.

Almost as bad as Auschwitz survivors, right? It’s been 80 years! Get over it!

 

[Viata]

Didn't even notice anything off with it till it was pointed out. Its been 21 years, I think it's time to move on.

I'm pretty sure only americans still care about it. But sometimes they also ignore it, compare what they thought about muslims around the time 9/11 happened to what they think about them now.

 

[Infinitron]

Been fiddling with some voiceover in preparation for launching a demo for Steam Next Fest. Here's a little preview of our two leads (Fia and Nozzo, played by Sally Beaumont and Edwyn Tiong) having a silly little conversation while time travelling to the distant past (for them) of 2024. I'm happy with how this turned out. The dialog incorporates lip syncing, facial expressions and gestures. A faff-and-a-half to implement but satisfying to see in motion.

 

[Trojan_generic]

The 9/10 is kind of an unnecessary spoiler for where the game ends.

I once read a book where the plot ended on 11 Sep 01 morning, and the secret that had been guarded the whole book was supposed to be revealed at WTC that day. Now that was a shitty ending, so I expect something similar for this game. Now I would not anyway be able to play the game without thinking that all that happens in the game is somehow tied to the 9/11 events.

 

[Infinitron]

Under development for PC, Nintendo Switch, Mac, and Linux!

Time Travel is real and history is up for grabs! In this point-and-click, you play Fia Quinn, a time agent for the ChronoZen agency. Your job is to keep close watch on seven travelers who have the desire (and the bank accounts) to sightsee in the past. Some are simply curious. Others have unfinished business to resolve. And they’ve all put down a lot of money for the trip, so it’s vital that you keep them happy while ensuring they follow the rules. But what could go wrong? It's only time travel, after all.

Developed and published by: Wadjet Eye Games
Music by: Thomas Regin
Voiceovers by:
Sally Beaumont
Maya Murphy
Ivy Dupler
Tom Schalk
Ben Britton

 

[fantadomat]

lol looks like sjw shit,it seems i won't be touching anything from wedjed eye in the future

 

[Dodo1610]

Save the date! Next Fest will take place June 13-20, 2022 @10AM Pacific. QUOTE]

 

[Modron]

Demo is available a couple days early hup to it.

 

[MRY]

Its puzzle is based on the Primordia use-rag-to-collect-dripping-oil sequence, and even one-ups it for wackiness (now the oil is dripping from an air conditioner!), which I thought was a nice homage.

 

[Keshik]

Demo was fun enough, enjoyed being a bit of a dick to the guy at the end letting him know I undid his work

 

[Gambler]

As far as I'm concerned, the demo is a mixed bag. It lacks interactivity and that makes the whole thing seem more bland than it should be. You have all these meticulously drawn locations, and yet they are barely more than a handful of animated backgrounds with a few tooltips. You don't have to closely look at them or try to figure anything out. The puzzles are very basic, the interactive items are few, and the descriptions are not very exciting.

I like what they did with travel between locations. That's a clever solution to the old problem of making characters banter without making them static.

Edit:
Also, the main character is bland with an extra dose of bland. Seems to have no depth or personality.

 

[Gambler]

One more thing. Using hover tooltips for all item descriptions was a horrible design decision. It's not hard to see what kind of thinking was used to create this, but it's faulty thinking. Yes, you save a "pointless" click to get a description, get rid of yet another UI principle you have to explain to noob players, etc, etc. Problem is, it removes yet another intentional element of interaction from a game that has very few of them already. Plus, you end up with basic cursor movement creating moving boxes of text that then disappear. While traditional mechanics (like right-clicking to get descriptions) focused player's attention on an object, this mechanic does the opposite and distracts the player.

 

[Darkozric]

Great, that's what we need the most right now, another honk honk wadjeteye disasterpiece. I wonder how many abominations they have to release until they dissolve like Telltale.

 

[HorribleHombre]

Making slightly different versions of the same game over and over works for AAA companies, why not an indie studio?

 

[Infinitron]

Behind the scenes video of Sally voicing Fia Quinn, the player character of our upcoming time travel game, Old Skies.

 

[Infinitron]

https://www.pcgamer.com/unavowed-de...st-how-messy-going-back-to-the-future-can-be/

Unavowed dev's new time travel adventure shows just how messy going back to the future can be​

We're going back, and forward, and back again, and you get the picture.

Old Skies is the upcoming time travel point-and-click from Wadjet Eye Games. Dave Gilbert originally created Old Skies for a game jam anonymously after the release of Unavowed. The designer was considering his options for creative outlets after many, including PC Gamer(opens in new tab), thought his previous work rocked. So after completing his brief look into time travel, and seeing a reasonable ripple of attention, he was happy enough to take the concept and create a full game following the adventures of Old Skies' star, Fia Quinn.

From the moment I drop into the demo of Old Skies, it establishes Time Agent Quinn's personality. She's confident, humorous with a sarcastic undertone, and suitably weary of the management (or brass) at her job. Despite her unconventional work, her tone is almost familiar to the player like an old friend and that's always a good start for a point-and-click. Especially when I'm a Grim Fandango's Manny Caleva type of girl.

Perhaps that's helped by her handler Nozzo, whom she can have a casual chat with whenever she's stuck. Rather than murmuring to her at every turn, Quinn has a conversation—a pleasant change from most point-and-clicks.

In Old Skies Fia will be transported to several different time periods to essentially babysit some extraordinarily wealthy individuals. Time travel is now a commodity for the rich, who can travel forward or back in time with supervision, and even pay to save the lives of friends or family members if that person's influence on history is small enough. I began my journey with Quinn in a New York construction site in the year 2024. Her client is a Dr Joe Anderson, a brilliant scientist who is responsible for medical tech advancing so far to push the average human life expectancy past the age of one hundred. So you can say his influence on humanity is pretty hefty.

Anderson's mission is simple enough. Take the scientist to a local diner for some food and then bring him back in one piece. Easy. Or it would be if Anderson didn't have an ulterior motive in mind and escapes out the back of the diner leaving you with the bill and a potential time travel disaster on your hands. I'm not sure which is ruder.

The demo for Old Skies surprised me in its depth. Within only an hour, I felt like I fully understood Fia Quinn's personality, her relationship with her company and trusty colleague Nozzo, and ultimately what's at stake as a Time Agent. A mission that starts out as simply as a man reminiscing about his young adult appetite becomes a drawn-out chase sequence ending up on a rooftop and a delicate moral decision.

Here is that question. Do you tell someone the truth even if it hurts, or leave them in blissful ignorance? Is it better to lie or to let someone in their last moments know the truth? Neither will feel good for Fia Quinn or yourself, but it's these sorts of questions that will show just how painful time travel can be, especially for those who have to protect the timeline.

As for those time travel puzzles, well, this demo only showed us a few logic puzzles, but Gilbert previously mentioned puzzles get a little wackier with time travel in future missions. Do you know someone needs to trip for you to best them? Well die, rewind time, and then place a banana peel there for the next time around. You get the idea.

I've always enjoyed point-and-clicks because they give you some of gaming's best puzzles and characters in combination. Although the demo of Old Skies had a few brain teasers to trial, I was mostly impressed with the games' inhabitants. It exhibited expressive voice acting and writing that clearly showed its casts' personalities.

One young woman appears in a single scene of the demo but as a time traveller you know her fate. She's plucky and smart and just a few years away from death. It hurts, you've known her for five minutes and you're already mourning the loss of this brilliant woman. But while she's there, and you're having a conversation with her, she's a joy to talk to, and so you savour it.

Dr Joe Anderson is also a complex character. You find out very quickly he's sick, and despite his own ability to extend the lives of his patients, he'll die quite young. It's unfair and so all he wants, or at least all he tells us at first, is to enjoy a greasy meal like he did as a teen. When his true motives are exposed, it's not that he's a bad man, or a terrible person. In fact he's morally trying to achieve a good thing, but the potential consequences of his actions are bad. Very bad. And so much worse than the good he's trying to achieve. Again, it's not fair. He's a good man addled with bad luck despite the masses of talent he has been given.

Although Old Skies won't have massive branching narratives where you can decide who lives or dies, it'll have key decisions. Fia Quinn must protect the timeline no matter what. But I have a feeling she one day might break her company's code and delicious chaos will ensue. Without a time machine, I guess we wait to find out.

 

[Infinitron]