When the Kickstarter backer exclusive gameplay debut for the spiritual successor to The Neverhood hit the web, developer Pencil Test Studios sent out a hi-res version to share with the class. Here’s our first look at Armikrog in action.
Featuring the unmistakable art style of The Neverhood creator (and Earthworm Jim character designer) Doug TenNaple, Armikrog‘s gameplay is looking just as creative and delightful as its visuals.
Recognise the voices of the main characters? The tall, skinny one is Michael J. Nelson of Mystery Science Theatre 3000 and now RiffTrax fame, and Beak-Beak is veteran voice actor Rob Paulsen, who’s voiced everything from Pinky from Pinky and the Brain to Raphael in the original Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles cartoon.
It’s like they’re making a game just for me. Actually they’re just making Armikrog for Wii U, PlayStation 4 and PC operating systems. It’s due out early-ish next year.
Comments
16 responses to “I Can’t Wait To Play In This Fantastic Clay-Animated World”
Awesome, was a big fan of both Neverhood and Skull Monkeys with their still unique visual aesthetic. Skull Monkeys had some of the best songs in a video game ever!
Kind of torn about if I’ll get this, on one hand I loved Neverhood, on the other hand I’m now aware of what a d-bag TenNaple is.
Well it isn’t just made by TenNaple. There’s a whole team involved
However I completely agree TenNaple has some pretty strong, misguided, right wing opinions but his art is the best. He made me love drawing when I first saw Earthworm Jim and I’ve been following and loving his art ever since.
Related there’s an interesting comment by Neil Gaiman about how art isn’t the artist
http://journal.neilgaiman.com/2006/06/in-wee-small-hours-of-morning.html
(It’s in the middle)
I’m aware of that, but they did choose to use him to market the game and let him represent them.
And there’s also a difference between enjoying someones work and giving them money. As it stands I’ll probably wait for its inevitable inclusion in an indie bundle in a couple of years.
edit: grammar
it’s the original Neverhood/skull monkeys crew making the game, that’s how they pitched the kickstarter.
I very nearly pulled my kickstarter funding because of him. I didn’t because I didn’t want to stop the rest of the team doing something they loved and making something I wanted.
I’m looking forward to the game, but this was the last time. Unless he has some sort of miraculous redemption, I’ll never pay money for something with his name on it again.
Surprised to hear about all this hate towards TenNappel. Sure, he has very strong and rather old-fashioned opinions that are not very popular nowadays, but I have never seen him using them to be a jerk to people in particular.
He has openly and loudly denigrated gay people, given money to anti-gay lobby groups trying to keep same sex marriage illegal and he just kind of an all round shitty dude.
He outright said that he thinks America is some sort of super awesome freedom machine. Then in the same conversation he was asked why he doesn’t care that people’s rights are being violated in America. He responded with “Millions of people’s rights are being violated. Take a number.”
Hrm. He sounds rather more unpleasant than I’d realised. When I was looking at backing the Kickstarter, the only example I found was him being a dick to someone in the comments of one of his comments, and I decided I could probably live with that.
Meh. I’m pretty fine with separating the artist from their work. Otherwise there’d be whole slabs of games/movies/books to write-off.
I’m ok with it until the money I give that artist goes directly to funding the hateful shit they preach. It’s the same reason I won’t touch anything Orson Scott-Card writes.
I suppose we differ there a little. I leave it up to myself to decide if I consider my payment to be funding for the creator, or simply a transaction for my personal gain. eg. Orson Scott-Card – I’m paying for some sci-fi, not the creator’s wage.
I’m not going to tell people what they should and shouldn’t buy. It’s always your own choice at the end of the day.
For me, where the money goes is important. I’d rather throw my money down a drain than buy something from Gloria Jeans. I won’t buy from Card, and after this I won’t be buying from TenNappel. I do this for a lot of stuff. It’s a lot of work and it often means I can’t get things I like (I haven’t bought a Nestle product in ten years), but I have a real issue with rewarding bad behaviour. I won’t associate with people who are racist, sexist, or Randian Captains of Industry. Likewise, I try to minimise giving money to people or companies that I find morally bankrupt.
The issue I find with this kind of personal boycott is that at your individual level, the loss of your business is not affecting the multinational giant (and seriously how long should we punish Nestle for the fracas of the powdered Milk decades ago, under a different administration?) but affecting the thousands if not millions of innocent, honest, hard-working people that stand between you and the purportedly shadowy executive board of chiefs that you want to boycott. From the small store owner to the machine operator at a production plant, around 99% of the $2.00 you refuse to pay for a can of condensed milk would go to them and not to malevolent CEO Mr. Sauron Satanicus.
Oh, Nestle have moved on to even bigger and better things. They are now emptying the underground aquifers that feed third world nations, drying up wells in remote villages and causing massive crop devastation from rising salinity. Among other things.
Nestle are fucking evil. Simple as that. Their current CEO not only said that water is a product, not a human right, but then couldn’t understand why people were so mad about it.
It doesn’t matter that my money doesn’t make a difference. It’s a drop in the ocean, but if the rain stops, then that’s a different matter. If 10% of the people in wealthy countries decided they didn’t want to reward companies for destroying the earth and killing poor brown people, the practices would improve. I can’t expect others do do what I won’t.
The problem with having principles is that you need to stand by them. Even when they are inconvenient. Even when they hurt a little.
I backed this – can’t wait for it.
http://i.gyazo.com/dd9f8dc68f0f1106e424e4c7c75b5f64.gif