Dave Gibbons. Co-creator of Watchmen. Charles Cecil. Master of the Broken Sword series. The last time they came together, they brought the world the wonderful adventure game Beneath A Steel Sky. Now, as reported by Eurogamer , they're reuniting for a new game. Let the champagne corks ring loud.
The game won't be happening for a while yet. Gibbons is still working on a comics project, while Cecil prepares the ground for a Broken Sword project that everyone knows is coming, but hasn't actually been announced. Still, they do have a plan rather than simply a notion to work together again.
"With the new game I'm going to be involved from the ground up" says Gibbons in the above story. "I have had story input and the whole thing will have my imprint on it. Even if I don't hands-on do every bit of artwork, I certainly will direct the look of the whole thing."
Hurrah!
Adventure fans need no explanation of why this is Good News. Beneath A Steel Sky absolutely isn't the greatest adventure ever, but it's one that stood out in the early 90s for its cool futuristic setting, snarky British humour, and massive amount of character - particularly between main character Foster (named after a beer can, at least in the original, though that's not in the current version because lawyers look at computer games these days) and his robot sidekick Joey. Together, they clambered down the corrupt Union City on a simple quest to escape captivity, before finding out that-
Well, that would be a spoiler. And there's no need to spoil it, as Beneath A Steel Sky is one of the few classic games that's legally available for free download. You can get it from Good Old Games or the ScummVM Project . It has a slightly slow start, but quickly becomes very absorbing when Foster and Joey are reunited and start TRAVELLING around the CITY talking LIKE THIS for no real reason. Give it a try, and remember the era when it was shocking to hear characters say "Crap". Tssk. Naughty!
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