The Blackwell series from WadjetEyeGames

The Blackwell Epiphany (5 in the series) will be released sometime in April according to an email from Dave Gilbert, creator of the series.
I am a fan of the series having played the first 3 games, but for some reason or other, I didn't play the 4th game (The Blackwell Deception) until this week after seeing the email. I'm kinda glad I waited this long as I had a great time with Rosa and Joey and my memories of the earlier games. So now I can hardly wait for April and the new game!
Anyone else looking forward to The Blackwell Epiphany?

I'm a big fan of the Blackwell series as well.I am really looking forward to the release of The Blackwell Epiphany also.

hatshepsut

I had hoped for more Blackwell series fans to show up here, but I do realize that this isn't a mainstream shoot-em-up, action, horror, vampire, zombie type of series. True, Joey is a ghost, but he is a charming one with a sense of humor and a great voice. This is also true of Rosa, although charming might be a bit much.
Oh well, one can't win them all. Or whatever!

I too am surprised that there doesn't seem to be more fans of the Blackwell series.
You are right about Joey, he does have a wonderful voice. Joey is one of my favorite characters. I would recommend the series to anyone who hasn't played it.

hatshepsut

Hmm, I'm thinking that maybe the PC is losing out to the iThis and iThat devices and as a result there are less fans playing any adventure games, which never had the largest number of players to begin with. Maybe the computer is going to fall by the wayside and become just another dinosaur, too big for the future world.   
Anyway, I'm happy that April is coming and I will be playing The Blackwell Epiphany and enjoying the adventures of Rosa and Joey once again.

Yes I think that more people are playing games on devices than PC. I have been noticing lately that more and more games are coming out that can be downloaded to other devices.. I guess progress is inevitable, but I don't think that PCs will become entirely obsolete. Although the younger generations do seem to be more hooked into the devices and laptops.
I'm glad I'll be playing another Blackwell adventure soon too.

hatshepsut

I would have loved to play the Blackwell series, but they were never ported to Macs. That being said, there are many other games now available for the Intel iMacs because of the iPad ports. Amerzone and Syberia are two that I never got to play until now, so I'm grateful to hand-held devices for that.

Yes the hand held devices have been wonderful for porting games that many people would otherwise not been able to play.


ladyK gog has a Blackwell bundle that is compatable with Mac if you are interested   

hatshepsut

Wow! I hadn't seen that. I'm going to go take a look now.

I like the Blackwell series also, have purchased the games as they come out. There are a number of good games using the AGS engine, both freeware and commercial. Blackwell series has consistently shown a lot of polish.

I hope PC does not get dropped by game developers anytime soon, as it is still my main source. I have such a huge backlog of purchased games from bigfish, steam, gog, gamersgate, dotemu, I aim to be PC gaming for a long time! Gaming on mobile or tablets is all well and good, but they can not power the top tier games. You will not be seeing Bioshock Infinite playing on the latest ipad. Also, not having a keyboard/mouse or gamepad kind of hurts the playability for the vast majority of titles. Adventure and certain puzzle games seem to work best for the touchscreen devices. Anyways, not so worried about PC gaming going away.

Hi lakerz

I don't think the pc is going away any time soon either.
Like you I have such a back log of downloade and boxed games that it would take me forever to get them all played anyway.
I've purchased and played every Blackwell game as they came out too. I'm really looking forward to the next one. I've heard a rumor that it will be the last one in the series. I hope that it's only a rumor.

hatshepsut

Actually, hatshepsut,
According to the email I received from WadjetEyeGames, The Blackwell Epiphany will be the end game of the series. Dave Gilbert wrote that he had an end to the series in mind from the beginning, but it took him several games to work it out ... or something like that as near as I can remember.
I still think that the PC for games is losing out to the iDevices, but that doesn't mean that it will happen tomorrow, or anytime soon. Way I'm thinking is that if old games are being ported to the new devices, that's where the action is, and that's where I would go if I were interested in making a game, AND making a profit.
BTW, where have all those Kickstarter games gone? Have any been released yet?

Well mindysue I am sad to hear that Epiphany will be the last game although I am sure Dave will come out with other good enjoyable games.

Weell there isn't any doubt that the developers will go where the profit is.

Broken Sword the Serpents Curse part 1 and 2 have both been released at GOG. Mobeus is suppose to be released March 11 and the new Tex Murphy is suppose to release in April I believe. I don't know of any of the other Kickstarters that have released or are close to releasing.

hatshepsut

I agree with you about older games being ported to phone/tablet...I think that has merit and good for the developers to try to rekindle interest in a franchise.

There are a number of kickstarter games that have been finalized and on the market. The Broken Age is one of the big ones, but I've noticed quite a few are also out. I'm still eagerly awaiting The Tesla Effect as well as Asylum.   

I'm very happy for the gamers who are now able to play the old games for the first time...enjoy! I know how much I enjoyed them when they were new games. With luck maybe this trend will bring some new games that are as good as the old ones used to be. I can dream, can't I?

It's good to dream. :-)

Nowadays, I'm hoping some the tablet only adventure games can get ported over to the PC platform! Either that, or I need to pick up a slightly used ipad.

Me too. I've seen several games I would like to play that are only on iPad or other device.

hatshepsut

I bought an iPad last year just to play the games, but so far I haven't learned how to use it. Silly me. I get all sorts of emails from Apple, iTunes, App store so I know the iPad must be connected somehow or other.
Oh well, Blackwell Epiphany will be out this month. If I recall correctly it should be released on April 24, 2014.

Yes mindysue according to the wadjet eye website Blackwell Epiphany will be released April 24

hatshepsut

Seems like a lot of people are having a lot of fun using their tablets to play the older adventure games of the day. I guess they use SCUMMVM emulator or perhaps a different emulator to play a lot of the classic sierra games for example. It might be nice to spend some evenings on my most favorite lazy boy reclining chair playing on a tablet instead of sitting in front of my computer desk on my not so comfortable computer chair. :-) I guess a laptop would serve a similar purpose come to think of it.

Lady Kestrel wrote:

I would have loved to play the Blackwell series, but they were never ported to Macs. That being said, there are many other games now available for the Intel iMacs because of the iPad ports. Amerzone and Syberia are two that I never got to play until now, so I'm grateful to hand-held devices for that.

Unfortunately the ports often leave out most of the puzzles. I don't know about Syberia, but the ports of older 1st person games like the Cryo games (Atlantis, etc.), and games developed or published by the old Microids (Amerzone, Road to India, etc.) have had most of the puzzles removed as well as many locations removed (for example you can no longer exit from the upper level of the lighthouse and walk around the back of the upper storey in Amerzone, many nodes are missing, and many objects that you could interact with in the original are just background scenery in the port). The rainbow bridge puzzle is gone from Atlantis 2, as are the Mayan number puzzles and just about every other set piece puzzle, in the new ports for iPad and Mac). Yet they left in that dreadful jungle maze. Although they've improved the graphics resolution, I'd rather have the old puzzles. Too bad they couldn't do faithful ports of the games. I assume it's from inability -- they couldn't figure out how to code the puzzles.

So far, Myst/RealMyst is the only port of an older 1st person game that I've played that contains everything that was in the original. I haven't played through Riven yet, but it may also be complete since it was ported by Cyan (like Myst) and not by Coladia or Anuman.

I don't seem to have the same problem with Mac versions of recent games where the original developer was probably involved in the port. But for the older 1st person games ported by Coladia or Anuman, I'd rather play the original in an emulator on the Mac and skip the iPad or Mac ports entirely.

LadyK, you probably have the original Mac versions for OS9 and can play on an older Mac. That works fine. But I wouldn't recommend the new ports of older 1st person games to anyone (with the exception of the Myst games and other games where the port is made by the original developer).

I didn't know that puzzles were left out of some of the games being ported to the hand held devices. I would assume that it is a matter of coding and possibly a memory issue.

hatshepsut

Hmm, is the glass half-empty or half-full?
If one has played the original game and has a good memory of it, whatever is left out will be missed; but if one has never played the game, it can be enjoyed just as it is. Something is better than nothing.

As for The Blackwell Epiphany, April 24 is getting closer every day, cheers! I also want to add that one can pre-order the game and get some extras, if interested.

I like to look at it as the glass being half full.
I can think of a few puzzles that I wouldn't have missed if they weren't in the game.

hatshepsut

After not being able to download The Blackwell Epiphany game from the link in my email and trying several times, I went straight to the game's forum for help. I really, really wanted this game! I finally got a download from Dave Gilbert himself. How's that for service?
So now I'm having a really, really great time playing the game and couldn't be happier. Rosa and Joey are a great team and I thoroughly enjoy the interaction between them, and switching between playing as Rose or Joey. And now, back to the game!