From the monthly archives:

February 2009

Main Arvale Music Theme

by Jason Surguine on February 25, 2009

While digging through all my files looking for the original Arvale compositions (so I can make the re-arranged songs for the iPhone versions of Arvale II and Arvale: Short Tales), I’ve run across a ton of music for these games, some I haven’t heard in a long time.

But one tune of course stands out and appears throughout all the Arvale themed games, the main Arvale theme. I’ve compiled every occurrence of it that I can remember right here for your listening pleasure, simply click on the files below (or right-click and save-as). Enjoy! :)

The original Piano theme from the title screen.
Arvale: JOI Title

The more fleshed-out theme used for the title.
Arvale II Title (apologies for the quality, this hasn’t been re-arranged yet)

A reprise of the theme during the ending music.
Arvale II Ending

There was no title music in Short Tales, so I sprinkled the theme throughout different sections of the game.

When you visit the main Pub in Maestyl at night time
Arvale:ST Pub (again, this one hasn’t yet been re-arranged)

When you run into a battle in Chartreuse Forest during daytime.
Arvale:ST Chartreuse

When you hang around in Koden’s house a minute or so.
Arvale:ST Koden

Ah yes, and the minor version of the theme heard when your character falls in battle in Arvale: Short Tales.
Arvale:ST Death (not re-arranged, and can’t find the original :/)

And of course, the Jazzy swing version of Duncan Swing.
Catchy Cadence: Duncan

Hope you enjoyed the little aural adventure through Arvale’s main theme :)

Jaybot7 Banned in China.

by Jason Surguine on February 25, 2009

Seriously.

China rocks!

Why? That’s just funny!

Annoying to a few of my Chinese friends (they shouldn’t be reading this anyway according to their government), but still funny.

New Graphic Adventure Game, Broken Blueprint Released!

by Jason Surguine on February 20, 2009

I should be gearing up for the big move, but instead I decided to put together a short Graphic Adventure game demo for you all. Aren’t I nice? :)

Broken Blueprint 1

The game is called Broken Blueprint Beginnings, and has been a work in progress for about 5 years. Varying with work from different artists, designs, programmers, and tons of other things, so I finally decided to nail it down. You may noticed a few mismatching art styles due to the smorgasbord or time and people that worked on it, but hey, it’s FREE and it’s just a short demo to show you what it can be in the future.

Broken Blueprint 2

Anyway, Broken Blueprint is about a tribe of Frogs and Snakes living together in The Caves. You play as Hunka, the tribes Witchdoctor :) It’s very reminiscent of the old Lucasarts Graphic Adventure games such as Monkey Island, Day of the Tentacle, Sam & Max, etc. Or if you were a Sierra fan of Leisure Suit Larry, King’s Quest, Willy Beamish, etc. So if you love those games, you’ll be right at home with Broken Blueprint.

It’s full of humor as usual :)   Those who like the Arvale series and enjoy simply walking around and interacting with objects will definitely love this one. Experienced Adventure gamers can possibly breeze through the game in about 10-30 minutes. If you spend your time Looking at, Grabbing, Trying out inventory items on things, and Talking with each and every character and object (including every single Torch) in the game, you could spend over an hour or so just reading all the different responses.

To install:

Just download the installer and run the setup file and you should be good to go (Again, PC only, sorry). You can download the installer from the Games Page, or directly download: here.

[Update: I just tried it on an Intel Mac with Crossover Mac and it works wonderfully, If you have an Intel Mac you may want to download the Crossover trial just to play it ;) ]

[Update 2: Some people with computers from the last decade (Windows 2000 and earlier) are having problems running it, getting errors about the display. This can easily be fixed by downloading the latest DirectX version from Microsoft.]

To control:

Gameplay is basically move your mouse around, and click on stuff to try out different actions. The basic controls are explained in the intro to the game so I won’t go into it.

More screenshots on the Games Page.

Have a wonderful weekend!

Jaybot Goes to Tokyo!

by Jason Surguine on February 14, 2009

This has nothing to do with yesterday being Friday the 13th :)

That’s right. I’ve made the decision to the major question that’s been haunting me these past few months.

And It seems I have chosen to walk away from the lucrative music deal and move to Japan.

I must be nuts.

But this actually does come down to a few factors:

  • Videogames!
  • 日本語 (Japanese language)
  • Anime!
  • My Other Half
  • J-pop!
  • Tokyo
  • My Health!*

And on top of all that, I’m still young. If I wish to get back into the Music or Games Biz, I can always do so in a couple years.

I hear some of you crying out there, about Arvale III and PDAmill losing the Jaybot and various other scary thoughts involving wheelbarrows…

But don’t worry, I’ll still be working part-time with PDAmill remotely. For those that have known PDAmill or I since the beginning, that’s not too different from how it worked for a few mentionable games such as Snails, Arvale I+II, Anthelion 1+2, Flux, and a few GameBoxes.

So you shouldn’t worry too much. Plus I’m leaving the best damn game designers I personally know in charge of PDAmill Game Studios.

That being said, thanks to everyone who I’ve met with and worked with these past few years in Budapest. I wish you all the best, and a bunch of other warm and fuzzy sentiments! Nagyon szépen köszönöm srácok! (és Zé ;) ).

I will, of course, keep writing the most important, up-to-date, awesome news about games, music, and their odd relationships to my life right here in the future.

Oh, and Happy Valentine’s Day!

Peace!

*Don’t worry, it’s not as bad as Steve Jobs is yet :)

New Arvale Game Release!

by Jason Surguine on February 11, 2009

I’ve been prototyping a lot of different games and trying out a lot of different engines recently.

While doing so, I whipped up a quick little Arvale game which you can of course download for Free here.

Back in the Castle

It’s called Arvale: Really Short Tale. It involves Duncan after the events of Arvale: Journey of Illusion, and all Arvale fans will enjoy seeing him and Entoque again, I’m sure.

Veteran RPG’ers will most likely breeze through it in about 15 minutes.
Veteran Arvale players will probably occupy themselves for about an hour just checking things out ;) (yes, there are a few Wheelbarrows)

Anyway, I’ll be prototyping a few more games over the next month or so, and I’ll try to share whatever I can with anyone who wants it. So I might as well set up a Free Games page here.

Install: Simply download the installer, and it should set it up on your computer just fine. (PC only, I’m afraid).

Controls: Pretty simple, mostly arrow keys and Enter/Space Key. Escape Key is the cancel button. You can also mouse around and click on characters (if you want, but I reccomend arrow keys/space as some mouse actions are wonky). You can also toggle Full Screen by hitting Alt+Enter if you really wish to. The rest, I’m sure you’ll figure out on your own. ;)

← Previous Entries