Awesome Idea: New Hitchikers Game!
Before we start let me make it known that yes, there is already a game of Hitchikers guide to the galaxy which i have finished and enjoyed alot.
Anyways, I was at the movie theater today and it turns out that after a good 20 years they seem to have finally made a movie of hitchikers guide to the galaxy. After doing my little dance of joy i came up with the thought: Telltale should make a hitchikers game! Imagine it, it could be based on either the books or the radio script and could have as many voices as possible from the TV and radio series and would freakin' rock!
After visiting the official movie website (clicky! ) I have grown a few doubts about the movie (stuff like how Zaphod only has the one head and two arms and how they seem to have made their own little story about Arthur and Trillian falling in love etc.) but i still think that Telltale could make an awesome game of it anyway.
Anyways, I was at the movie theater today and it turns out that after a good 20 years they seem to have finally made a movie of hitchikers guide to the galaxy. After doing my little dance of joy i came up with the thought: Telltale should make a hitchikers game! Imagine it, it could be based on either the books or the radio script and could have as many voices as possible from the TV and radio series and would freakin' rock!
After visiting the official movie website (clicky! ) I have grown a few doubts about the movie (stuff like how Zaphod only has the one head and two arms and how they seem to have made their own little story about Arthur and Trillian falling in love etc.) but i still think that Telltale could make an awesome game of it anyway.
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The Internet is way too excited (negatively) by that review from planetmagrathea.com. In the weeks leading up to its release, were the fan predictions made (in the forms of huge complaint-filled hatefests and laundry lists of omissions) by LOTR fans proclaiming the first film an utter travesty and failure true at all? Of course they werent. Granted, the lists of things they said were gone were in fact gone, but on the whole did they ruin the film? No. Maybe people should be taking principal piece of advice offered by the Hitchhikers Guide itself and don't panic.
At least until it comes out and blows or something. But then it's too late to panic, I guess. Score another for Jake!
Anyway, I think that there is no need to complain about the movie. This is exactly what Douglas Adams would have wanted. He sold the rights for Hitchhikkers several times. At one point Disney owned the rights. You can't tell me you wanted Disney to make it, they would put it in to the AJAX brand craptacular movie making machine. It would be all American actors, and the story would be thrown out the window. Who knows, they might even try to put a moral into it. ( shudder)
The thing to bear in mind is the Adams was writing this movie script when he died. It was completed by someone else but on the whole it is mostly how Adams wanted it to be. (at least script wise, god knows how that compares to the final version).
If anyone has seen the "book" versions of the trailers, you get a sense that it is capturing the broader feel for HH's. I'm looking forward to seeing it and I know that it won't be the same but like Lucas HH's has never been a static story for Adams. He was always tweaking it.
But back to the idea at hand, having TellTale make the new HHGTTG game would be awesome, but I doubt that any games that spring from the film buzz will be adventure games.
They'd be platformers. REALLY LOUSY ONES.
Because making good games based on large, successful franchises doesn't happen often at all.
I suppose in some way Douglas Admas dying could be seen as a good thing...
Some of the concept art was quite great, but I am not too sure about the story line. Towelin Monks?
It is also a bit hard to imagine an "action-adventure" with Arthur running around hitting things with a towel.
What do you think "Buena Vista Pictures" is? It's Disney. But yes, Disney Distribution and Disney development are quite different. In fact, it matters a lot just that the movie doesn't have the word "Disney" on it. Disney means "family home entertainment" as in code words for "lame watered down crap"...at least, that's what it's become. Some of the old animated films were fantastic, but that's about it.
Still, I can't help feeling that the movie would have been better if Douglas Adams was still alive. God rest his soul.
BTW, has anyone mentioned Starship Titanic? That was made by Dougls Adams.
On the downside, because there would be a massive drive to use the radio series voice cast, any game developer would probably have to licence the actors images, and possibly licence sets/costume designs from the tv series. Im not saying these things are compulsorary, but would almost certainly throw a shadow over production costs.
Nonetheless, I'd love to see it.
A new game based on Hitchhiker's would be cool but I don't see how it could be anything but a letdown without Douglas Adams (R.I.P.) at the helm.
Half the problem with the movie of Hitchhiker's Guide was that it deviated from the original story so much, despite being based on a screenplay by Douglas... god knows how badly an entirely new story would go down with the fans.
The last problem would be the lack of British talent within its creation. Although, Telltale did manage Wallace & Gromit okay so I guess that's not such an issue.
That's not entirely true. The book version also deviated from the original radio series (still the best version) in numerous ways, and the book version is the one that most people remember. Douglas knew (and he was right in that sense) that it's pointless to keep telling the same story over and over, but that you have to tell the story that's most fitting for the medium you're telling it in. A lot of stuff from the book/radio/tv series/comic/computer game version of the story wouldn't work in the movie version or any of the other versions, and vice versa.
The real problem with the Hitchhikers movie is the love plot between Arthur and Trillian (which was something Douglas himself wanted to do), some weird alterations to existing jokes, sucking the actual joke out of them (like the Arthur going down into a cellar-bit, if you're not going to finish the joke, leave it out.), and a bit of oversimplification of the Hitchhikers-world. They didn't quite hit the same level of charm all the other versions had. The movies did do a lot of things right (the casting was excellent, I loved Ford and Zaphod, much better than how they appeared in the tv-series.), but just not enough to make it the legendary movie it could/should have been. But I can't blame them for trying some new things. Creating original stuff, giving familiar things a new and unexpected twist is something that Douglas was most famous for. A lot of the changes people don't like in the movie are changes that Douglas made.
People wanting more Hitchhikers could check out the new Hitchhikers-book Colfer wrote. I don't know if I'll read it yet. New radio series, tv-series, movie or computer game (made by Telltale) - yes please. New book without Douglas - I don't know...
As far as a game goes, I'd like to see it focus more on Restaurant through Mostly Harmless. Call me crazy, but I always thought the original story was the weakest.
While I enjoyed the movie a lot, I can't help feeling that if Adams had lived, further drafts would have fleshed out a lot of his changes and made them funnier and (possibly) more accepted.
I went into it knowing this, and well...let's just say I came out of it with the realization that just because Douglas Adams changed it, doesn't mean it doesn't suck.
Something that the movie did was not just change story facts. They took out the humor and the charm. They seemed to be TRYING, sort of, in a way. They just...failed.
I'd prefer not to, thanks. See, I have my novels, and I'm not adding fanfiction by the author of barely-entertaining children's fantasy to its place.
CHAPTER ONE
The story opens just after the main events of the third novel, before the Epilogue in which Arthur decides to leave the Heart of Gold and they meet the journalist and Prak.
Zaphod is toasting "their"/"his" great success at defeating Hactar and the Masters of Krikkit, and saving the universe, when the ship is attacked by a chapter of the Galactic Rotary Club, who kidnap Trillian (something that happens 'offscreen' between the two radio series).
The others pursue the baddies, but the Heart of Gold instead materialises in a mysterious cold white cave (as in the second radio series). The player takes control of Ford Prefect, who has to tackle the problem of saving Zaphod without himself plummeting to his doom (you can't) and how to persuade a giant bird to take them to ground level.
Ford and Zaphod seek shelter in a derelict military base (not simply a spaceport as on radio, as it's necessary to take out the bits used in other parts of the novels) and discover that it contains a cache of dangerous weapons, forgotten when civilisation collapsed on Brontitall. The player takes control of Ford in a long flashback set on alien worlds with alien environments populated by... um... spacemen, which somehow has something to do with the main plot. I dunno, btu this would be one of the chapters that really deals with the whole alien stuff, whcih has always been difficult to do visually in Hitchhikers for practical reasons.
CHAPTER TWO
This time the player controls Zaphod in a second flashback, whcih effectively plays through and expands upon "Young Zaphod Plays It Safe", giving he player further information about the weaponry.
CHAPTER THREE
The player takes contorl of Arthur Dent, and effectively plays throgh his parts of Brontitall segment of the second radio series. At the end, he, Lintilla, Marvin, Ford and Zaphod are reunited at the military base (the "reality is on the blink bit" could be quite good in a computer game) but baddies swoop down and steal all the universe-destroying kit.
CHAPTER FOUR
The player takes control of Trillian, in the second alien stuff segment of the game, who has to avoid being forcibly-married to the head of the Rotary Club who admires her wisdom for her dealing with Hactar. Either this chapter, or a fifth one, would tie the story up in a neat bow, explaining who is after the weapons and why and how they are stopped. Perhaps they aren't? Perhaps some of the Humma Kaluva/Point of View gun stuff from the movie, which doesn;t really get developed, could be used if the sequel does, finally, ultimately, fall through.
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Although "And Another Thing" hasn't exactly impressed me (although I might feel differently in twenty years' time when I auction off my newspaper-proof copy of the first half of the novel), I feel relaxed about other authors writing for the series. Partly because this has already happened - on radio, on film - and partly because "official continuations" or sequels are, frankly, a helluva lot more common than most Hitchhikers fans seem to think. Also, and let's be fair, Douglas Adams openly admitted that his greatest talent was for procastrination. Part of the reason that the floodgates opened after his death was not that all his friends and family and agent are ghouls, but the fact that other people had to shoulder the responsibility simply sped things up. Furthermore, the big graphic point-and-click computer game he was invovled with, "Starship Titanic", is generally considered tohave been a disaster, for a variety of reasons. Were he alive today and hired by Telltale, or vice versa, to write a new Hitchhikers game, it wouldn't have the same level as fun as we are used to from this game producer, and it would also be released ten years late.
Are we talking about the same franchise here? Hitchhiker's Guide is incredibly well known. Especially amongst gamers.
You mean the book that has sold over 16,000,000 copies?
Nah, not many heard of that one...
How about a new The DIG, no? Okay, it at least was worth a try...
Unfortunately it would be such a difficult undertaking, either to introduce new elements to existing stories (to create puzzles which the player doesn't already know how to solve!), or to write a completely different story set in the same world. Also there would be the massive pressure of having to "get things right" to satisfy the fans and to know they had done things as Douglas would have wanted... It's a license that, even if it were feasible to acquire, most sane developers would be shuddering in their boots at the prospect.
But then... I'd probably have said something very similar for Monkey Island. Clearly, Telltale are not 'sane'.
However I think in general that a comedy sci-fi adventure game would be a great departure. I can't think of anything in that genre at all. The Dig and Beneath a Steel Sky were primarily serious adventures rather than comedy. (I'm not counting anything by Sierra because I've never played them, and I got the impression they were nothing like as funny as Lucas games)
So my recommendations for other licenses to look at for a game adaptation would be:
- Harry Harrison (The Stainless Steel Rat) - http://www.harryharrison.com/
These books are truly great and really entertaining. Also, at least in the books I've read, the main character (Slippery Jim DiGriz) and storylines would translate perfectly to point-and-click style adventure.
- Futurama
Please. Actually. Make up for the terrible games this license has so far spawned.
- Lunar Jetman
This was a classic computer game, however it spawned a long-running comic strip in Crash Spectrum magazine if anyone remembers, here's an example: ftp://ftp.worldofspectrum.org/pub/sinclair/magazines/Crash/Issue39/Jetman/CR39Jetman01.jpg
I can't think of any others right now...
- Red Dwarf.
'Nuff said.
But Douglas Adams worked on that,and also, the game is totally impossible.
Incidentally, there is an onlineproject to turn their version into a point-and-click game. I don't know that this is an official thing, but if it was, it'd put the kybosh on Telltale doing anything, I imagine.
(And the television series was great)