Pixel Pulps and storytelling... Plus, we want your questions!
Hi Everyone,
Just in case you missed this recent post from the Bahnsen Knights blog I am putting it here for your perusal. Make sure you wishlist and follow Bahnsen Knights to see all future posts first!
In addition, we also want your questions! We will be doing a new developer walkthrough for Bahnsen Knights as part of our activity for the upcoming Steam Next Fest, which starts on the 9th October. If you have any questions you would like to ask about Bahnsen Knights, the Pixel Pulps series, or even where the best food can be found in Buenos Aires, just leave your questions here in the comments. Thank you.
In the meantime, I thought you would be interested to get an insight into why we make the games we do and what we think of the genre too. You may have seen some of this touched on in the lovely recent Eurogamer article about visual novels (see here), but we thought you might be interested to find out more!
Why create the ‘Pixel Pulps’ interactive fiction games?
Fernando Martínez Ruppel and I, Nico Saraintaris, come from a background of twenty years of storytelling (we are both 39 years old and will turn 40 this year… ancient!). We have experience writing novels, short stories, illustrated stories, comics, storyboards, and scripts. But we've also made lots of games in the past! In recent years we have created many games under another label, games in which exploring innovative mechanics was a key part of the designing process. Just to give you an example, we've made Moveless Chess, a variant of chess in which the player cannot move the pieces. So LCB's games are a combination of these two aspects, our passion for storytelling and our love of designing mechanics that generate new and interesting gameplay systems.
What do you think players enjoy about this genre of game?
I believe that what makes visual novel games so popular is their ability to ignite players' imagination by leaving things unseen. With their static images, transitions, and scene jumps, visual novels seem to create something similar to what a comic does, almost like a movie that skips frames and allows the audience to fill in the gaps. In this type of fiction, the player's imagination is enhanced as they fill in the blanks while being carried away by a narrative with a defined thread (beyond concepts such as branching or multi-threading). Additionally, there is no urgency in a visual novel. Like a book, each player can take as much time as they want to enjoy it.
Where do you think visual novels will go in the future?
I think that visual novels (and I would refer to them as interactive fiction) are more of a meta-genre than a genre, a framework that encompasses multiple gameplay systems. Just as there are infinite numbers between 1 and 2 (the principle of discrete infinity), there are infinite possibilities within the bounds of interactive fiction. In this sense, interactive fiction is pure potential, capable of incorporating elements of resource management, strategy, board gaming, RPG, roguelikes, etc. I believe that these elements (cleverly used within the context of each game's fictional universe) open up possibilities for a future - or rather, a present - full of exploration.
What do you like about this genre of games?
Visual novels (and interactive fiction, once again) have the potential to work as a trap. You are aware that you will be reading extensively, have control over your time, and can submerge yourself in a new world. The familiarity that it offers can be deceptive, as interactive fiction has the ability to surprise you from within, being both familiar in concept and surprising in execution.
I hope you have enjoyed finding out a little bit more about where we came from and why we have really enjoyed creating the Pixel Pulps adventures. Don’t forget to play the demo for Bahnsen Knights and wishlist the game!
Cheers and thanks for reading!
Nico, LCB Game Studio
Bahnsen Knights has a demo and a release date!
Hi Everyone,
In case you missed the news or haven't yet wishlisted Bahnsen Knights (what are you waiting for?!) we have a demo available for Bahnsen Knights for you to try out. We have also confirmed the game will be releasing on October 26th!
What is a release date without an accompanying trailer?
We hope you enjoy getting this little taste of the next Pixel Pulps adventure. Don't forget to leave any comments or questions here and also wishlist Bahnsen Knights.
Many thanks
LCB Studio
Pulp fiction and retro gaming in the 21st Century
Hello! We are Nico Saraintaris and Fernando Martinez Ruppel, co-creators of LCB Game Studio from Argentina. As we have Mothmen 1966 and Varney Lake in the Visual Novel Fest sale we thought this would be a good time to share with you this insight into how we approach creating our games.
We have now released two games that belong in to a subgenre that we call Pixel Pulps, Mothmen 1966 and Varney Lake, with a third title, Bahhsen Knights, coming soon. So, what are Pixel Pulps?
PIXEL PULPS Pixel Pulps are text adventure games in which we combine a type of narrative from the first half of the 20th century - the so-called 'Pulps', cheap paper magazines with large print runs that published stories in genres such as horror, crime, or science fiction - with home computer graphics and adventure game interface from the '80s.
THE PULPS The relationship of our games with the Pulps is not only thematic (mothman, cryptids, vampires, and cults, among many other themes and characters), but also productive: our production cycles are short, we work quickly and steadily, seeking to release one game after another. This particular philosophy is behind a slogan that we use almost like a battle cry: "We are the Pulps of interactive fiction!"
But while our stories are as agile and fast-paced as the Pulps, they also feature multi-dimensional characters, something that many Pulp stories lacked, relying on almost one-dimensional representations with very obvious narrative functions.
Another difference is the use of the unexpected. The Pulps were often formulaic. A savvy reader could guess more or less where each author was going with their stories. In our case, we seek to surprise the players, and we strive to make each of our Pixel Pulps a completely unexpected experience.
THE PIXELS As for the interactive adventures of the '80s, there are four very specific elements that we use to work on our games: the colour palette, the pixel art, the sound design and the choice-based input system.
One of the first aesthetic decisions that Fer made was to use a classic palette for retro gaming. Each of our games uses a subset of the 8 colours (and their brightness variations) from the ZX Spectrum colour palette, limiting colour choice even further per-game basis but developing a distinct identity that emphasises particular aspects of their respective stories: Mothmen 1966 is associated with green and Varney Lake with cyan.
What about pixel art? Fer's pixel art is not simply a tribute to the pixel art of the time, but a conscious reworking from our own present, where one can see his experience of over twenty-five years in the world of illustration, comics, and concept art.
The third element is the sound design. In our games, we make use of speaker sound - reminiscent of old-school ZX Spectrum games - as a key element in our process. This classic sound not only adds a touch of nostalgia, but it also serves practical purposes such as signalling in-game events and adding a unique audio texture to certain aspects of our Pixel Pulps.
The fourth element we want to highlight is the choice-based input system. This is another thing that we sought to work on from the beginning of the project, the idea of turning the entire interface between players and game modules into a system solely based on choices, that is, not only using choice selection for narrative sequences like any visual novel, but extending this concept and using this same input system for such dissimilar elements as solitaire card games, hopscotch with dice... and even a fishing game!
A SUBGENRE OF OUR OWN In conclusion, we like to think that this particular alchemy that we call 'Pixel Pulps' results in a subgenre of which we are the only exponents, an idea that allows us to take some risks and do things in a way that only we can do them, and that if we fail, we will fail better than anyone, always aiming to fail even better next time!
We hope you enjoyed finding out a bit more our games. If you'd like to find out even more, Mothmen 1966 and Varney Lake are both on sale until the 14th August and you can wishlist Bahnsen Knights too...
Thank you
Nico and Fer
Watch the devs play the next Pixel Pulps adventure!
Join Nico and Fer from LCB Studios as they play through and introduce you to the next Pixel Pulps adventure - Varney Lake. They will delve into the story and the unique art style that pays homage to the mid-century pulp fiction novellas and early home computing graphics.
You can pick up the first Pixel Pulps adventure, Mothmen 1966, in the LudoNarraCon sale until 8th May.
If you want to complete your collection you can even save an extra 10% with the Pixel Pulps Volume 1
Varney Lake is available now!
Hello Everyone,
We are really pleased to announce that Varney Lake, the next Pixel Pulps story, is out now!
Want to find out a little more about the game? Then here's the trailer:
Still want to know more? Well then, if you are a fan of storytelling, engaging puzzles, vampires and mysteries, this is the game for you!
Varney Lake is the second Pixel Pulps story, following on from Mothmen 1966. The Pixel Pulps series is thematically inspired by 1950s pulp fiction magazines, with graphical inspiration from 1980s home computing. This combination leads to a very distinctive text adventure game... one we are sure will be quite different to anything you have played before (except Mothmen 1966).
The story unravels one mystery across two timelines. In 1954, you will meet Jimmy, Doug and Christine. Three kids enjoying their summer vacation at Varney Lake, inventing games, dodging bullies... and hanging out with a vampire. In 1981, Lou Hill, a paranormal investigator, is uncovering a dark and fantastic tale through conversations with the adult Jimmy and Christine. Will you find out what happened that summer? Will you find out what really happened to Doug?
We hope you really enjoy playing Varney Lake and let us know what you think in the reviews!
Gracias,
LCB Game Studios
Varney Lake launches tomorrow!
Varney Lake launches tomorrow and Listz can't wait to welcome you all to the next Pixel Pulps tale!
Varney Lake is the second game in the 'Pixel Pulps' series and follows on from Mothmen 1966. In this new story you must unravel the truth of what happened THAT summer in Varney Lake...
The next Pixel Pulps adventure is coming soon!
Varney Lake, the second adventure in our Pixel Pulps series, will be launching on Friday 28th April.
We were so excited with this news that we even created a sort of trailer to share the news:
Don’t forget to wishlist and follow the game to keep up to date!
