A Boy and His Blob

[Nester the Lark]

Here is a really cool video interview with David Crane at the G4 website. It's in three parts, and in the second part, he talks about Pitfall and A Boy and His Blob and their recent incarnations. But I think the whole interview is pretty interesting. (He refers to the Atari 2600 as "the Wii of 1977.")

[Nester the Lark]

IGN has a hands-on preview and an interview with director Sean Velasco.

IGN: A lot of WayForward's background is centered on traditional animation. You're in close proximity to CalArts, one of the biggest animation schools in America. How did that influence the creation process and also, how much animation really went into this game? For instance, how might you compare to a traditional cartoon on TV?

Sean: I can't really speak to a standard TV show, but I think those typically go for about 20 minutes and I think the animations run 12 frames per second, so it's not really comparable, especially because we're doing a lot of cycles but also have an absolute ton of animation -- it's ridiculous. We started out planning this game and said we were going to have 2,000 frames of animation, but I think at this point we've probably doubled that. We probably have about 4,000 unique frames of animation. As far as art goes, Mark Gomez is our art director, he's extremely talented, and most of the look of the game, the inspiration behind that can be attributed to him. He wanted to do something very soft, very Miyazaki-esque. The design of the boy, making him much younger and rounder, having the blob be his faithful companion like a dog, that was all in his head when he did it. He's a CalArts grad. A lot of our animators -- the lead animator who animated the boy is a CalArts grad. So a lot of that talent has been very useful for making the game.

There are also some new videos. The Boy has a voice now, but it might get irritating hearing him call "Blob!" all the time.

It's still a gorgeous looking game, tho! Good music, too!

[Da Robot]

I have to admit the blob calling sounds a little annoying, but other than that the game looks really, really good, it's sad more developers aren't using 2D on the Wii.

Also finally found footage of the boy hugging the blob (it's at 1:08).

[parrothead]

Hearing the boy call for his blob reminds me of Luigi calling for Mario in Luigi's Mansion. Sometimes the boy's calling can be as annoying as Alex Kidd losing a life in the arcade version of Alex Kidd: The Lost Stars.

[8bitretroshit]

I think the voice is pretty fitting, doesn't annoy me one bit. Maybe because it somehow reminds me of The Maw and that game's awesome.

[Koopaul]

Damn this game is adorable.

[Nester the Lark]

Here is kind of a short behind-the-scenes video.

I have to admit, even tho I'm not normally that interested in this type of game, this one is just so charming. They keep saying that it's modeled after animated films from the 80's, and they're really hitting the target.

While I'm at it, here's a developer walkthru (in HD) from E3.

So, in addition to a hug button, there's also a scold button?

Also, the game will have 40 regular levels and 40 challenge levels. (Altogether about 20+ hours of game time, according to the video.)

[Nester the Lark]

Here's an interesting video from Destructoid, featuring different developers playing each other's games.

Most of the time is spent showing Alex Neuse from Gaijin Games (makers of BIT.TRIP.BEAT) playing A Boy and His Blob. Alex thought that hugging the Blob was "the cutest thing in the world." Sean Velasco said that the game had a simple emotion system that would effect the Blob's mood, but that it wasn't necessary to use it to beat the game.

He also mentioned that the art style in the game was very influenced by Hayao Miyazaki.

Alex and Jonathan Holmes (from Destructoid) go on to say how much of an emotional impact A Boy and His Blob had on them from just playing a demo for a few minutes. Alex told Sean, "Huge kudos to you guys for making me care about this character in a six-minute demo."

The video ends with Sean playing The Conduit.

In related news, Joystiq has an interview with WayForward president Voldi Way. (I guess that's where the name came from!) He talks about a whole bunch of stuff, but for the things related to A Boy and His Blob, he said that all the art was high res, and it could've been down sampled to any resolution, including 1080p, but it was Majesco's decision to put the game on the Wii. (David Crane has said that he thought the Wii was the most appropriate platform for the new Blob game.)

He also mentions that WayForward has three other Wii games in development, two of which are supposed to launch this Fall around the same time as A Boy and His Blob, but the publisher(s) has not announced them yet.

[Nester the Lark]

3-hit extra gooey combo!!!

Remember how we thought the boy's voice was a little annoying? Well, according to this article from Destructoid, other people who played the game at E3 thought so, too:

[Pete] Rosky [Associate Product Manager at Majesco] also made sure to note that, based on feedback from the E3 build of the game, WayForward re-recorded all of the boy’s voice-overs. The boy still sounds like a kid, of course, but the timbre of his voice is much less high-pitched and whiny than before. They also recorded a bunch of new audio -- his vocabulary is more varied now.

The game is currently scheduled for release in October.

[TV Eye]

Aug 3, 2009 22:22:13 GMT -5 Nester the Lark said:

3-hit extra gooey combo!!!

[Da Robot]

Here's Gamestop pre-order bonus for aBahB.



Reserve A Boy and His Blob and receive a free stress ball. When you get frustrated just pick up the blob stress ball and squeeze all your cares away. Available online and in-store while supplies last.

Link.

[Wildcat]

That's pretty damn cute.

[parrothead]

I wonder if Jaleco would publish it in Japan just like they did with the first two games in the series?

[Nester the Lark]

Aug 25, 2009 15:06:05 GMT -5 parrothead said:

I wonder if Jaleco would publish it in Japan just like they did with the first two games in the series?

Doubtful. Jaleco withdrew from the video game industry earlier this year. (Source)

Anyway, here are some interviews with the game's art director.

[Swedol]

Aug 25, 2009 15:06:05 GMT -5 parrothead said:

I wonder if Jaleco would publish it in Japan just like they did with the first two games in the series?

I wonder if Nintendo will publish it in Europe like the NES game