Adventure Game Fan Fair update: Demos and special exhibits unveiled!

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Site announcements by Adventure Game Hotspot staff
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Less than two months to go until the Adventure Game Fan Fair! (Wait, you still don't have tickets? Better act fast before they're all gone! We're down to double digits remaining, and dropping in a hurry.)

The final lineup is starting to click into place, and it’s looking more and more like a grand time will be had by all. We recently announced the special guest panels, but the convention isn’t all about sitting and listening, no matter how legendary the speakers. We’re all gamers, so we also want to get hands-on and PLAY things! So good news: we’ve got you covered there too, and better yet – the developers will be there as well! (Or at least, sort of, in some cases.)

Check out the list of games below that visitors can sit down and play first-hand, or at the very least discover exclusive new material not yet publicly released, all the while chatting directly with their creators. You can’t get THAT demo experience sitting at home!

Not all games will be available all three days or at all hours, but there will be ample opportunity to spend time with them throughout the course of the weekend.

Colossal Cave

Cygnus Entertainment

Unless you’ve been lost in the real Mammoth–Flint Ridge Cave System in Kentucky for many years, you know by now that Sierra legends Ken and Roberta Williams returned from a decades-long industry hiatus to “re-imagine” Will Crowther’s Colossal Cave (also known as Adventure or ADVENT). Roberta herself was inspired by the original 1976 text-only game, and was eager to not only bring the namesake pioneer of the adventure genre to a whole new generation, but to honor its legacy by reproducing it as a fully 3D graphic adventure. And boy, did they! Spelunking the magical cave in search of treasure now feels like you’re really there for the first time. Even after releasing the game, Ken and Roberta have worked tirelessly to update the experience for modern gamers, while still retaining the essence of the venerable original.

You may have already played the new version of the game, but what’s especially cool is that you can experience it one of three very different ways at the Adventure Game Fan Fair: either on a flat screen at the Colossal Cave booth, or… well, we’ll save the last two versions for a very special surprise at the end. Read on!

The Crimson Diamond

Julia Minamata

Anyone with fond nostalgic memories of Sierra’s early EGA text parser games of the late 80s has been salivating over The Crimson Diamond for several years now. Presented in gorgeously detailed 16-color pixel art and inspired by the classic Laura Bow series and teen detective Nancy Drew, the early twentieth-century northern Canadian mystery by Julia Minamata follows young geologist Nancy Maple as she investigates the discovery of a massive gemstone. With a lodge full of quirky and curiously suspicious characters, an intriguing historical setting, and Minamata’s own extensive knowledge of geology, the real treasure looks to be the game itself, which is getting ever closer to completion!

Fogtown (World Premiere)

Fogtown LLC

Step aside, Sherlock and Watson – make way for Fogtown’s hilarious Sherblock and Blockson, finger puppets! Sherblock is a brilliant but easily (some might say compulsively) distracted detective, aided by his loyal friend and scribe, Blockson. In one of their earliest cases, together they encounter a rollicking, madcap mystery occurring right under their own roof. Originally conceived as an animated TV show by an experienced team of comedy short film veterans, this spinoff adventure is like an interactive puppet show in which you pull the strings. (So to speak – Fogtown’s eccentric characters aren’t THOSE kinds of puppets.) You’ll still get to explore gorgeous hand-crafted environments, collect inventory and solve puzzles, but rather than directly controlling the protagonists, you'll regularly make choices that branch the story into fun new directions. The Fogtown demo is premiering exclusively at the AGFF, so be one of the first to get a little taste! (Literally – you’ll see what we mean.)

Home: A Story of Light

Think Picture Studios

The streets of Victorian-era London were surely no place for a young boy, even one accompanied by his devoted pet mouse. But such is the unexpected lot in life of the protagonist of Think Picture Studios’ Home: A Story of Light, a warm yet melancholic point-and-click adventure evocative of genre classics. Home centers around 12-year-old Grayson Swan, the lonely, sheltered son of a famous inventor, who is mysteriously uprooted and sent to live in the Yorkshire countryside with his estranged aunt and uncle. Then suddenly, he and his rodent companion find themselves on the move again, thrust into a perilous journey that will challenge Grayson to contemplate what “home” really means. With gorgeous hand-drawn animations and a simple, modern interface, this game promises a dynamic interplay that will see players swap between Grayson and his pet in order to solve puzzles as they explore the bucolic countryside and rain-drenched streets of the big city. Blimey, that sounds good to us!

The Last Ark

Terabbit Studios

Adventure game heroes are the good guys, right? Well, you might want to check your empathy at the airlock for the The Last Ark, the debut effort from Tex Murphy veteran Mat Van Rhoon and his new indie company Terabbit Studios. In the future, humanity must abandon Earth and set out on a journey across the stars in nine giant arks. The only problem is the artificial intelligence that governs the arks – to be controlled by YOU – is out to extinguish the ships’ inhabitants. Arrange accidents, manipulate systems, promote mistrust between the humans, and above all, don’t get caught. Navigating real-time 3D environments, full-motion video sequences, and random events that keep you on your digital toes, can you make the choices necessary to wipe out your charges? (Note: No artificial intelligence was used in the making of this game – you know, just in case.)

Perfect Tides: Station to Station

Three Bees

Writer/designer/webcomic artist Meredith Gran captivated the world in 2022 with her unassuming, brilliantly written narrative adventure Perfect Tides, about a young woman dealing with the very real, very relatable trials and tribulations of being a teenager. Now Mara Whitefish is back, a little older and a whole lot farther from home. In the bigger and more ambitious sequel, Station to Station, we join Mara for another year, this time as she navigates school as a burgeoning writer in the big city in 2003. Experience the turbulence of her late-teen years in over 60 new environments. With a heaping helping of nonlinearity and a branching narrative to choose from, there is no shortage of story to explore as you see fit. Either help her to grow as a writer or hold her back; the choice is yours in this highly anticipated new intimate tale from Threes Bees.

The Phantom Fellows

The Phantom Fellows

Most ghost stories are scary, but indie developer (and Classic Gamers Guild podcaster) Paul Korman believes that just because you’re dead doesn’t mean you can’t have a sense of humor about it. Not that everyone is dead, but in a game called The Phantom Fellows, you can be pretty sure a lot of them are. The name actually comes from the paranormal investigation service run by a “breather” named Oliver Cobblestone, who is somehow able to communicate with a lone “floater” named Englebert Picklebender. Together they team up to investigate seven days’ worth of mysteries throughout the town of Elderberry, Colorado, all while some malevolent entity has its eyes on Oliver. With its unapologetically old-school design sensibilities and a fully interactive town to explore, presented in beautiful pixel art and laced with spectral ghost effects, you’ve got to check out the updated demo first-hand. Just be careful not to laugh yourself to death!

President Rocket Game

Gloho Games

When climate catastrophe is on course to destroy the world without immediate intervention, what’s an archconservative ex-president to do? Team up with a militant climate activist to the save world in Gloho Games’ President Rocket Game, of course! Just don’t expect them to do so willingly. In this comical parody that pokes fun at… well, just about everything wrong with today’s society (though surely any resemblances to real persons is entirely unintentional – cough), you must guide Lloyd “The Prez” Kinski and Liv Lundgren in exposing a conspiracy that threatens to derail mankind’s last-ditch effort to save itself. It won’t be easy, but it sure looks like it’ll be a lot of laughs as you venture through retro(ish) pixel art graphics on an absurd, choice-laden, puzzle-solving quest. With ways to die. Lots of ways to die. Hilarious ways to die. There may even be achievements for doing so.

Read Only Memories: NEURODIVER

MidBoss

MidBoss dazzled us back in 2015 with their Japanese-inspired, cyberpunk-infused narrative thriller 2064: Read Only Memories. Now, nearly a decade later, comes the highly anticipated return to Neo-San Francisco in Read Only Memories: NEURODIVER. While the quirky, eclectic world and distinctive anime-styled visual design will be instantly familiar to returning players, you need no prior familiarity as the sequel tells a whole new story with a brand new playable protagonist. This time you control ES88, a psychic detective investigating the minds of an unsuspecting citizenry. People’s memories are being corrupted by the Golden Butterfly, a mysterious entity flitting from one consciousness to another, and it’s your task to identify and capture the villain before more people are victimized. The full version of this visual novel-styled "psy-fi" adventure game was recently released, but this is your one chance to play it with the developer by your side!

Summer Daze

Transolar Games

Lori and Corey Cole may be best known for their beloved Quest for Glory series with Sierra, but as Transolar Games they’ve been deeply invested in a whole new fantasy world since 2018’s Hero-U: Rogue to Redemption. While that game shared many of the same hybrid adventure-RPG elements as Quest for Glory, the Coles decided to focus more on the narrative elements for their interactive storybook spinoff, Summer Daze: Tilly’s Tale. Set at the same Hero University, the game followed the exploits of Tilly Appleberry, a fun-loving student training to be a Rogue, presented in a beautifully illustrated graphic novel style. For an encore, attention will shift to a new student protagonist named Ifeyo Kinah, a wizard from Yorba with a meerbat familiar named Jafafa. The Coles haven’t publicly revealed much about the next game so far, but drop by the Transolar table and you can learn all about this charming fantasy series!

As Yet Untitled Dinosaur Game

No, Mine! Studios

Dinosaurs are on the loose in Tacoma! No no, we’re not talking about us old-school adventure game fans converging on the city in July, but real (cartoon pixel art) dinosaurs in No, Mine! Studios’ debut adventure. It’s still without an official title (you can’t rush game evolution), but it’s an adorable-looking side-scroller dealing with some surprisingly mature themes like power, knowledge, gatekeeping, and accessibility – but with dinosaurs! There are no humans to be found, only dinosaurs and other prehistory dino-adjacent creatures like trilobites and dragonflies, but the setting is based on “real spaces in Tacoma, both historical and modern,” meticulously researched by designer and local resident Suzanne Skaar. Navigating the city will represent a significant part of the gameplay, with some light platforming involved in overcoming physical obstacles. The goal, however, isn’t a high degree of difficulty but rather an experience that is “as fun and accessible as possible.” In 2021, the project was accepted into the Tacoma Artists Initiative Program, making Skaar the first artist to receive funding from the Tacoma Arts Commission for a video game. Come see for yourselves to find out why!

War of the Western Deep (World Premiere)

Sunsgrove Studios

At first glance, War of the Western Deep, the debut adventure from Sunsgrove Studios based on the webcomic Beyond the Western Deep, looks like a standard adventure game – albeit a jaw-dropping, hand-drawn one inspired by classics like The Secret of NIMH, with anthropomorphic animal characters animated at 24 frames per second for a cinematic feature film quality. But still, a traditional point-and-click adventure, as you control a royal courier named Mirren on a crucial quest to deliver a letter from the king that may ease tensions among the realm’s northern neighbors. You’ll explore the nonlinear environment, collect inventory, solve puzzles and talk with other fully voiced characters. And then you’ll draw your weapon for some combat. Eek! Yes, adventure fans, there’s some real-time action in this stunning hybrid title, though its purpose here is for tension and variety rather than a significant twitch-based challenge, with a forgiving restore function to get you back on your feet. Besides, what's a premature demise or two when dying looks this good?

Wildwood Down

Crashable Studios

Any conversation about Crashable Studios’ Wildwood Down starts with its most important feature: the main character Daniel is inspired and voiced by his real-life counterpart, a good friend of the developers with Down syndrome. The younger game version of Daniel is a high school student on a day trip to the boardwalk in Wildwood, New Jersey with his sister Becca and some friends. What should have been a fun day out quickly turns dark when Becca disappears, presumably at the hands of a serial killer on the loose! Don’t be fooled by the serious subject matter, though, as the mystery has its funny side too, promising a “side-splitting comedy horror” experience with a unique art style that blends 2D sprite animation into a real-time 3D world. The real Daniel will be at the Adventure Game Fan Fair, along with the developers, so be sure to drop by and find out just why he was the perfect choice for a game protagonist!

Remote Representation

Our intention was to have all adventure game developers attend the Fan Fair in person to demo their games, but the world is a big and expensive place, and sometimes that just isn’t possible for everyone. But in this wonderful modern age of technology, that doesn’t mean a few of them can’t still be there! Or at least, their voices and shiny faces beamed in live to chat with guests about their games even from halfway across the globe.

Sleepytime Village

Lightfoot Bros Games

First things first: For Sleepytime Village to become a reality, it needs one last big push to get it across its Kickstarter finish line before June 3rd! We’re confident it will, though, so we’re pleased to have the Lightfoot Bros chime in from jolly ol’ England about their promising new adventure. A much different game than their last title, The Mystery of Woolley Mountain, this game is an interactive adaptation of writer/artist Steven Horry’s graphic novel, about a negligent father who falls asleep after a long day of work, only to awaken in a colorful storybook world. Accompanied by an unseen narrator, he must search this wondrous, beautifully rendered 2D land to find a way to escape. Just remember: not all storybooks are pleasant ones, but the lessons they teach us can be the most valuable.

The Drifter

Powerhoof, Dave Lloyd

We’ve all learned the hard way that death can bring the fun times in adventure games to a screeching halt, but in Powerhoof’s The Drifter, it’s only the beginning. Mick Carter is killed after witnessing a violent murder, but the game's eponymous drifter is brought back to life seconds before the fateful event. The problem is, Mick is framed for the first murder and must stay on the run to clear his name, all the while tortured by his own past and harboring the creepy suspicion that something returned with him from the other side. With its rich atmosphere, slick pixel art presentation, brooding score and refined point-and-click-style gameplay that promises to keep the pace moving quickly, we’re dying to get our hands on this one, if only for a weekend.

Whirlight: No Time to Trip (World Premiere)

imaginarylab

Italian developer imaginarylab took players on a whimsical search for fabled pirate treasure (and a long-lost father) in 2020’s Willy Morgan and the Curse of Bone Town. This time around they plan to send us through time and space to the very brink of catastrophe in Whirlight: No Time to Trip. It all starts in the 1960s, when the brilliant but unlucky inventor Hector inadvertently propels himself three decades ahead, where he meets a steadfast and talented artist named Margaret. Together they’re thrust even further into the future, to a not-so-distant time when the fate of the entire world hangs in the balance. These two mismatched protagonists must learn to work together if they’re to stop imminent disaster and hopefully get back to their own respective eras. How will they do it? We’ll need to play to find out, but one thing’s for sure: it’ll be another gorgeous adventure filled with quirky, humorous characters along the way. So mark this space and time on your calendars for July 26-28th in Tacoma, Washington!

Heir of the Dog

Tall Story Games

Heir of the Dog is the second commercial title by British studio Tall Story Games, hot on the heels of the critially acclaimed Lucy Dreaming. After a successful Kickstarter in 2021, they are currently hoping to bring us a new campaign for Heir of the Dog soon, with big boxes and other physical rewards to tempt adventure game fans around the world. This new game is a comedy point & click adventure inspired by Jekyll & Hyde. A loveletter to the LucasArts classics of the 1990s like Monkey Island and Day of the Tentacle, it invites you on a hilarious romp through the dark streets and back alleys of Victorian London, where you’ll discover talking lice, cannibalism, a secret society and rather a lot of dogs. Replete with intricate, witty, and sardonic storytelling, Heir of the Dog, tells the story of bachelor and upper class twit, Cummerbund Bandersnatch. When visiting his uncle's laboratory, Bandersnatch discovers an experimental new formula guaranteeing a ‘good time’ for whoever drinks it. Seduced by the promises listed in his uncle's journal, he drinks the strange elixir and undergoes a monstrous transformation. Life will never be the same again.

Interactive Museum of Classic Adventures – From Advent to VR

Last but certainly not least is Nathan Prescott's mind-blowing collection of classic adventures on vintage hardware! And this museum isn’t the do-not-touch-the-glass kind, but the roll-up-your-sleeves-and-get-playing kind. Here is where you can experience the original Colossal Cave on a teleprinter as it was originally played in the 1970s. You can also find out how Mystery House looked and played on the 1979 Apple II Plus, or join Sir Graham on his quest to save Daventry in King’s Quest on an IBM 5150. And these are just a few of the classic adventures exhibited – we don’t want to spoil ALL the surprises ahead of time – on still more equipment like Kaypro computers; an Amiga 1000, 500, and 3000; Commodore 64s, 128 and COLT 286; and many, many more. The hardware will progress all the way through adventure game history, up to and including modern VR headsets running The 7th Guest VR and the new Colossal Cave at its immersive best. It’s an incredible display of genre history that you could easily lose yourself in for hours all on its own. (Not to worry – we’ll send someone in to find you when it’s finally time to go home.)