Next is the never before seen (not even on the show) inside of the Babycakes Bakery.

Ok well, maybe it’s never been on the show but it still looks sweet! haha get it!

Meanwhile release dates have been delayed and marketing avenues are re-examined to further look at the best possible timing in conjunction with the show.

Legacy, obsessed with making the best game possible despite all constraints and hurdles, has taken this opportunity to overhaul the graphic quality of the game and improve the engine for far superior gameplay performance. Examples of the quality upgrade will hopefully restore enthusiasm for fans throughout the galaxy….

(Sorry, I’m a huge Star Wars geek. Check out the graphic upgrades below. I assure you the engine upgrades are just as good and we hope to have a more settled release schedule for you soon.)

End cycles of game development are trying, especially for a Designer/Producer like me. This is the time where I have to argue with myself (not in the crazy, homeless, wandering the streets, talking to myself, way). This is where my two roles in the process clash the most. As a Producer I have to start making compromises on things and determining which elements are most important to the game and prioritizing them in order to get the game done in time (and, of course, on budget). As a designer, I want to throw away all schedules and budgets and keep improving the game until it is the best game ever! So this is great news for my designer side. It means more time (and as I have just discovered, possibly some more money? Especially awesome considering resources get thinner and thinner toward the end of projects, particularly projects that have been delayed, as overhead costs rise) to get done the things I want.

Please be patient, I sincerely know it will be worth it to you loyal fans. I will continue to wrestle with both sides of my persona (Maybe this has something to do with being a Gemini. Or perhaps that is the only reason I can cope with it?). Here are some more sneak peaks at some more areas of the game (sorry, backgrounds only right now) and I’ll be sure to post some more as all the bells and whistles come together.

Why do we do this so early in the process? OK, it is not really that early in the process but it may not be apparent why we start putting polish on the first 60 minutes when, say, the last 60 minutes may not be completed yet. The finished 60 minute demo is what is examined and evaluated to determine whether the game is worthy of creating a Collector’s Edition version.  As you could imagine this is a very important milestone in the development. So naturally, despite the historical record, we want to put out our best possible impression of the game.

What do I mean by “historical record?” Well… obtaining a Collector’s Edition status is difficult with licensed games because the limitations that the licenses start with don’t allow for customized gameplay as well. What I mean is, we have criteria to adhere to for the license that does not always allow us to customize the game to the criteria for a collector’s edition as well. Most Collector Editions are games that are wholly original story concepts that, as I hope you can imagine, are easier to cater to the elements that are perceived as popular with the gamers at that time since they can be built into the story. That is not to say that it is not possible. It is just the trade off we make for having a built-in fan base and recognizable title. We are certainly going try to shoot for the moon.

Wish us luck. We’ll keep you posted. Until next time…

As a result we are dealing with a bit of a morphing monster of a game right now as previously completed areas of the game have to be readjusted to fit with new areas being added and we try to spread out and enhance the mystery of the story as we add new twists and character intricacies. This is, to say the least, quite a daunting bit of work. Not just for myself but for everybody involved (except maybe the voice actors because they don’t get involved until all the dialog is complete) but the programmers, artists, writers, and everyone in between is feverishly working on these adjustments. It is fairly amazing that we maintain any level of coherence through this chaos (OK, maybe I am embellishing a bit).

I am not complaining, though. I am a gamer because I love the physical and mental challenges video games provide and I love the challenge of problem solving. This is exactly what I do on a daily basis and although it is perhaps not as visually pretty as the world of a video game, the satisfaction in the end is far beyond a high score. Another thing to note is that this process (at least on my side as a producer) involves a lot of constant collaboration and communication, things I am a big fan of being mostly extroverted. (Not a scary, hyper-extrovert like those who over share on a constant basis through dozens of daily Tweets; heck I barely blog once a month as you can see here.)

So I must return to my efforts in deepening character backgrounds and fleshing out interesting new plot twists while avoiding the hurdles and pitfalls of feature changes. We still plan to deliver a game with new, never-before-seen elements of gameplay for this genre. What? Something that hasn’t been done a hundred times already? Does that scare you? Good! I bet you can’t even beat level 1! (jk, I hate those FB ads. Thankfully, HO/adventure games don’t have levels.)

…must…go…on…

So, obviously, we would like to have all the real cast members voice their parts for the game but realistically that is not always possible. A lot of naysayers may think that it is because we are just trying to be cheap and save money by not hiring the real actors and to an extent they are correct but not because we are short changing you – the players. The real cast members are all famous, in-demand, unionized actors that are worth (and by all rights, deserve) significant compensation. If we budgeted for this it would take a disproportionately large part of the entire budget of the game to do so. We would rather utilize up-and-coming actors that sound like the stars (The characters will still look like the stars) and save the budget for developing better gameplay. In otherwords: we are passing the savings on to you!

Secondly, and this is really more so the reason why we use soundalikes, it is a matter of logistics. Because the show is still running, the actors are very much engaged in the filming of the episodes right now. Obviously, the filming of the show takes precedence over the game, after all: no show; no game. Therefore, we would have to wait a very long time to actually schedule all the actors for voice-over sessions around the schedule of the show. Now there may be some of you out there that would be willing to wait another year or so for the game to come out but we’re thinking more of you would like to maybe play the game this year, while the show is still airing, and have enough imagination to enjoy the characters in the game even if they only sound 90% like the real characters.

Well there you have it: Game Development Economics and Logistics 101. Hope this gives some insight into the real reasons why we do what we do. If there are any other questions let me know and I’d be happy to try to answer them.

If you could imagine fireflies buzzing around the lights, and the city lights twinkling I know you would feel as I do. There are so many other subtle animations going on that it really is a drastic contrast to the still backgrounds we have been working with for the past few months. The world is coming to life! Can’t wait to share it with all you in its full glory!

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Psych-Game/474679109225886?ref=tn_tnmn

Many fans requested that we create this fan page for easy access to the latest information on the game, and we couldn’t agree more! We want to make sure that our Psych fans have the best and easiest ways to stay updated. We will still be posting updates on this blog for our fans that would rather not get on Facebook, so no worries!

So with production of the game in full swing now, I thought I would treat you to some new art of a few of the original locations for the game. Exteriors only for now but we should have more to share soon as we ramp up production to make up for lost time. So… without further ado here they are and I need not remind you all that these are still in process and subject to change and not necessarily final images blah, blah, blah…

Yes, I realize they all have exactly the same UI in them. It’s what we call a “mock-up.” It’s not an actual screen capture from the game because right now there are more things in the game (not seen above) that aren’t finished and thus don’t make as pretty a screenshot. I also want to be careful not to expose any spoilers just yet.

I don’t really watch a lot of television (I’m more of a movie person) and I certainly can’t remember the last time I was excited about an upcoming episode of a show but this has got me lousy with anticipation, if you will. The Dread Pirate Roberts and Gimli in one episode! (Sorry, was my geek showing? I didn’t know if people would remember the name Sallah and “No one would surrender to the Dread Pirate Westley!”)

Eagerly awaiting the 29th…