Pyschonauts and Costume Quest developer Double Fine Productions wanted to create a game in the public eye—and with their help. To do this it created a campaign on Kickstarter and with amazing speed, the support from fans came through.

Tim Schafer and Double Fine Productions have surpassed their goal of a $400,000 goal on Kickstarter with almost $700,000 raised at the time of this writing. Not only that, but a spokesperson from Kickstarter revealed that this project is the fastest-funded in the site’s history. Wow.

Double Fine is going to create a new point-and-click adventure game more akin to Tim Schafer’s roots.

The company wanted to skip the influence of publishers, or investments firms, thus this Kickstarter campaign. This allows Double fine to create the game its way, and release it when it is ready, and not be under pressure from a publisher.

Backers of the project get access to a video documentary series based on creating the game. Also, backers can post thoughts about the game on an exclusive online forum, and gain access to the beta test of the game. These are the low tier prizes that can be awarded for only donating at least $30. More prizes for higher donations are available on its Kickstarter page.

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Eleven years ago on my birthday, American McGee, a game designer introduced the world to his own dark, sinister version of Alice in Wonderland; American McGee’s Alice which developed quite a cult following, along with a fair amount of critical and commercial success. His grim, macabre version of Alice took place a few years after Through the Looking-Glass. Alice narrowly escapes her burning home, only to listen to the cries of her family as they’re incinerated while trapped inside. She then retreats back into Wonderland, albeit not the wholesome and light hearted version we’ve previously known as a coping mechanism. The original game left many questions unanswered, and American McGee and his studio, Spicy Horse finally decided to answer them, while bringing Alice’s story to a close after lengthy hiatus.

Is it worth your time and money to return to Wonderland again, and discover the truth behind the death of Alice’s family? I certainly think so. Madness Returns [which is set exactly a year after its predecessor] opens with Alice mid therapy session with her psychiatrist, Dr. Bumby, who encourages her to let go of the painful memories and guilt she harbors over the loss of her family ten years earlier. The game boasts some really great cinematics, with selectively colored black and white ink sketches not unlike the actual drawings you’d see in Lewis Carroll’s source material. Alice is finally free after spending 10 years in Rutledge Asylum, but is still left wondering about the truth behind her family’s demise. The game’s rendering are MUCH improved over the previous installment, but don’t see their true potential unless you’re playing the PC version, on a very game worthy PC.

Alice is beautifully rendered herself. From her varying range of dresses, to her flowing hair, the character model is exquisite. The costumes in the game are beautiful, and Miss Liddell has a plethora of dresses to choose from, a new one for each area. Her animations are smooth, and her hair has some of the best physics I’ve seen in many a game. Unfortunately, only some of the environments match Alice herself in their aesthetics. The first Wonderland area of the game, The Vale of Tears was rich in color and detail, while one of the later areas; A Samurai themed world later in the game looks pretty unpolished throughout. It’s textures are bland and didn’t seem to have much care put into them, while the colors are extremely pallid. When recreating something like Wonderland, it’s disappointing that the developers didn’t devote more time or imagination to every area, as the source material certainly gives a lot for creative freedom. The immersion, while great in some regards wasn’t entirely consistent either. You might find yourself faced hitting quite a few invisible walls in Madness Returns. What annoyed me the most was the inconsistencies with the walls as well; In the Queensland was able to jump up on ledges in one of the Chess rooms, but unable to in a subsequent room of identical design.

That being said however, I felt that these intrusions didn’t detract from my enjoyment too much; Madness Returns has very solid platforming mechanics without being tedious. On a personal note, I’m actually quite picky about what platformers I’ll dedicate any of my gaming time too; I find many to be clunky and either too redundantly straight forward, or overly convoluted in an attempt to create depth. I found that Madness Returns found a really fantastic balance between the two; the platforming challenges the player is face with felt rewarding, and required some planning, without being frustrating or overly simple. When you do make a mistake, the game’s auto-save feature puts you back right where you died; which prevented the game from becoming repetitive. Madness Returns integrated the lore of Lewis Carroll’s work beautifully as a game experience as well; Alice will have to use her “Shrink Sense” (Shrinking Violets, “Drink Me” Shrinking Potion) to reveal hidden platforms or pathways throughout the level. There are breakable obstacles with her very appropriate Teapot Cannon sub weapon, as well.

In addition to the Teapot Cannon, Madness Returns boasts a creative arsenal of weapons, which can be used in a variety of situations and manners. The signature Vorpal Blade from the first game returns as your primary weapon of choice. Other weapons from the previous installment have been replaced; but with creative and fun counterparts. You get a Hobby Horse for powerful, wide range attacks. A Pepper Grinder, to shoot enemies from afar with; The Clockwork Bomb, which comes complete with a pocket watch detonator, and the Umbrella, which you can deflect projectiles with. Rather than forced rigid combat aspects, players can use any of these weapons to combat enemies. You can choose to keep your distance and take down opponents with your Pepper Grinder, or beat enemies into submission with powerful Hobby Horse strikes. These weapons are of course, only present in the Wonderland portion of the game however, which is the majority of the game. The plot shifts according to Alice’s on goings in Victorian London, centered around the Whitechapel District.

After her release from Rutledge Asylum, Alice is trying to live as normal of a life as she can. Under certain circumstances, she finds herself falling back into Wonderland, which is apparently in grave danger. An “Infernal Train” poses a threat to Wonderland, complete with an eerie, abandoned station in every realm. Alice discovers saving her sanity can also save Wonderland, so she sets out to do so, along with discovering the nature of the train, and what it symbolizes. As Alice ventures through Wonderland’s twisted scenery, she discovers memories revealing hints about the truth behind her families’ deaths, and her descent into madness. What occurs in Whitechapel impacts Alice’s hallucinations and descents into Wonderland. Without wanting to spoil much, while I enjoyed the plot, I felt it the narrative was a bit scattered and erratic, yet haunting and engrossing. This may have been intentional on the part of the creators, to reflect Alice’s own insanity, which I can respect. The Cheshire Cat’s cryptic bread crumb trail of hints is present in this game too, and works nicely in tandem with the memories you discover. Some parts of it are deliberately vague, and while each character you encountered in the original game seemed to represent something, it’s difficult to discern what some of them symbolize now, yet some of these figures also tie in nicely with details we already know.

Game play feels similar to a Zelda title, which is enjoyable in most regards. Alice’s Will meter is now gone (since weapons don’t rely on Will, and only the Pepper Grinder and Teapot Cannon have cool down restrictions) and her HP is now represented by red roses, not unlike heart containers. Combat is centered around finding enemies weakness’, striking at the correct time and dodging with your extremely pretty butterfly teleport. The combat is built on EA’s Unreal 3 Engine, which makes it pretty solid to play overall. The combos are fairly basic, you can transition from your Vorpal Blade and chain into your Hobby Horse. But if you were expecting a combo system on par with games like Bayonetta, you won’t find that here. Alice is also unable to attack while in air; a decision I felt could have made the game more strategic if included. And while its predecessor was more tailored for playing with a mouse, Madness Returns seems geared for a controller, and I felt maybe a little more development in combat could have supported the newer control type too. There are also quite a few mini games, primarily puzzles scattered throughout Wonderland as well. A lot of these are actually optional, but some of them are pretty fun and provide a nice reprieve from the denizens of Alice’s mind. The Oriental Grove chapter features a fun 2D side-scrolling mini-game that feels like a throwback to older adventuring titles, with a very interesting water color art style.

The talented Chris Vrenna of Nine Inch Nails, who composed the soundtrack for the first game has also returned. I felt the music in the previous installment was better than this one, but still enjoyable and supported the atmosphere and tone of the game nicely (Especially in the House of Cards area in the Queensland.) Most of the [appropriately talented] original voice actors have returned as well. What really makes the game a solid package for me is the free copy of the original American McGee’s Alice. Exclusively available on the PC when it was released, gamers like myself can finally enjoy it on a home console (either PS3 or 360, each version of the game will come with a voucher.) I will admit, the controls don’t compliment a basic controller too well, but the game is still very fun to play, and completes the experience for those of us who didn’t have gaming PC’s in the early millennium.

Overall, I feel Alice: Madness Returns, while lacking in certain departments is still a quality title. I feel that some of the issues present don’t detract from the unique experience the game offers you; a very solid platformer with some interesting weapons and a variety of game play mechanics, complete with mini-games. There’s even a set of DLC dresses and weapons available for the game as well. I definitely enjoyed the game, but it’s source material offers so much creative freedom, I felt they could have done even more with it. It has some brilliant ideas and concepts, but could have executed them in a more polished, refined fashion in some departments as well. I would still highly recommend this game to any gamer looking for something to shake up the monotony of current generation games that are afraid to try anything new, or fresh.

Little Cave Hero is a sort of throwback to pixellated games of my youth with a twist of sociality. Your town has been ravaged by monsters and it’s up to you to put it back together and build it back up to help make the mayor look good again. The games starts players out getting used to mining the caves for treasure, completing missions for the mayor, and rebuilding the necessary components to start the town running and pump up population. At first, I wasn’t sure how I felt about the exaggerated pixelation of the game, but before too long, it grew on me. Now when I play, I find it endearing and nostalgic.

The beginning of the game feels good. The character of the mayor is humerous, and spouts some witty remarks. The missions come fast and are completable in a reasonable amount of time, which adds to a sense of accomplishment. Jean’s town, which is the stable, even if you have no friends who play, you have this friend and this friend has been playing since inception so the world is inspiring sort of town, gives a glimpse of possibilities of what’s to come and the different things that can be done when rebuilding and repopulating.

Like many games, especially in the Facebook arena, leveling up in the beginning happens quickly enough to keep playing a little longer (as energy gets replenished when leveling up). Once that starts to slow down, the familiar feeling of the Facebook limits sets in. Without many friends to visit to collect additional energy, playtime is occasionally disappointing, especially because it takes sometimes a lot of energy to finish caves or challenges. But paying attention to the XP bar helps keep strategy in line to level up and be able to play longer. Building the town up, fortunately, and redecorating or moving things around, getting production of wood, refining ores, etc. are things that don’t take up energy. However, they don’t add too much play time because the production takes time, and often one thing needs producing before others can be produced. If there are more friends added to your population, however, the building/producing time decreases, which would help quite a bit.

The game is entirely click and play. Click where the hero should go, what the hero should break through, monsters the hero should attack. This makes it simple and accessible for multiple connections and gadgets. Sometimes the towns become mazes and there are characters and creatures that get in the way. So little hero just stops. If this happens in the hero’s own town, though, anything, even critters and characters can be moved anywhere in the town with the handy editing tool. The editing feature not only helps get heroes unstuck, but also organizes and reorganizes the town, enables selling and rotating of items to get the look just right.

There are a few other ways to help make each hero’s town unique, from purchasable decorations, fencing, roads, and even animals, to the edit feature which allows just about anything in the town to be moved, rotated one of two ways, or even sold. But the thing that allows for the most individuality is the design studio. In the design studio, players can make and customize decorations such as an apple, snail, lion, bookshelf, bed, or anything they can build. This, I believe, is the thing that adds the most time possibility if more time in the game is desired. These items are also savable and can be placed in the town at any time.

The social aspect of the game includes the ability to share gifts with friends, which initially seems possible only when the game first loads, but now I see a little gift icon on the side of the screen while playing, which does open up the option. Also, visiting friends and talking to their icons gives some xp, coins, and energy. Once energy is full, though, it doesn’t add more and the “visit” is wasted. There are some maintenance actions that can be done to earn more coins and xp in friends’ towns as well. Presently, I have only friends who seem to play the game very occasionally, so the social aspect is not incredibly high.

All in all, I like playing Little Cave Hero. Though it does have a similar feeling and premise to other social games, the variety of activities keeps it interesting. It is, however, an easy game to let fall by the wayside as sometimes it takes more effort to keep up with than the reward feeling of playing it. It’s cute, entertaining at times, and has potential. I would say give it a shot, especially if you have friends that already play, or would be willing to play. Note that the game is still in Beta. It will be interesting to see

That’s right, Legacy Interactive and CBS have announced development of an adventure/hidden object game based on the iconic 1960′s TV series, The Twilight Zone set to launch in the beginning of next year for PC and Mac. In this original adaptation of the series, players will take on the role of an actor who somehow gets trapped in a TV show, playing a recurring character across many episodes.

“Legacy Interactive is thrilled to be collaborating with CBS Consumer Products and developer Spark Plug Games on this amazing franchise,” said Ariella Lehrer, President and CEO of Legacy Interactive. “Who doesn’t remember episodes like ‘Time Enough at Last’ or ‘Nightmare at 20,000 Feet?’ Beloved by baby boomers worldwide, Legacy hopes to bring the same chilling intelligence, social relevance, and supernatural themes to our Twilight Zone video game.”

The Twilight Zone will be the latest addition to Legacy’s popular “Hollywood Hits” game series that includes Murder, She Wrote, House, M.D., Ghost Whisperer, Criminal Minds and Psych and will be available for download from LegacyGames.com and at top retailers nationwide.

Since we are celebrating Earth Day this week, let’s take a look at Oceanopolis, a recycling game from Greenopolis, a company dedicated to raise awareness and provide information to “Help you to recycle easily, help to save our natural resources for our children’s children, track conservation through recycling and re-use, and educate and reward conservation.”

The game Oceanopolis itself places players on their own island for which they are responsible, collecting recyclables, rescuing troubled animals, watering trees, cleaning, and decorating. Cans, plastic and glass bottles appear constantly which need to be collected and recycled (islands come complete with Dream Machines for recycling). Animals with bottle caps stuck in blow holes, or with plastic bottles on their feet also drop by to be examined, rescued, and returned to the wild. The level of difficulty here isn’t very high, just pointing and clicking to pick items up and recycle them. There are missions to be completed, but this makes the game appropriate for the whole family. And there is something satisfying about cleaning up the planet, real and virtual.

Of course it’s a bonus to have other friends playing for help and gifts. Everyone wins when we all take care of each other!
So head on over to your own private island and lets raise some recycling and conservation awareness this Earth Day! Play Oceanopolis!

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The Next Big Thing is a cinematic new adventure game from the makers of the Runaway trilogy featuring unique and intelligent puzzles, captivating characters on both sides of the spectrum, and a fun sense of humor. Players will join Liz Allaire and Dan Murray as they set out on their crazy mystery solving adventure filled with rebellious movie monsters, teleportation cabins, science labs, pyramids, and more monsters.

This game promises to be wacky and witty, one of my favorite combinations, and will appeal to adventure gamers and movie buffs alike. I am looking forward to this one.

Don’t wait, download the demo or preorder your copy today! And Visit the official website for more images and video!

Oh my, zombies just keep on coming in all shapes and forms. In Zombie Lane, the main objective is to fight zombies and keep them out of the neighborhood… which needs to be continually rebuilt from the damage they do. This game has a lot going on, which I thought initially would discourage me from returning to it, but the hints, easy start, and tutorial aspects help quite a bit without constantly interfering. I love the customizable avatar, for some reason, that is usually pretty important to me. There, of course, could be more clothing and such to choose from, but being able to have one that looks how I want her to look is aces.
Fighting most of the zombies comes easy armed with just a shovel, allowing players to collect helpful items to rebuild their homes, craft stronger weapons, share with friends, and advance through the game. So far, and maybe this is because another of my friends started playing a while before I did and sent me a bunch of donuts, the free aspect of the game is sufficient to be challenged and amused for long enough for the average procrastinator (okay, or zombie killing enthusiast), but having friends to share with and help out helps quite a bit. Plus visiting friends gives both an opportunity to fight without using up energy and yields more helpful goodies.
So, add me and let’s neighbor up and fight the zombies together! Enter strategies below for balancing zombie killing with neighborhood rebuilding… maybe I’ll send you some goodies in the game!