The Firing Line: 5 questions about the history-meddling mischief of Inspire Me
An apple to the head
Inspire Me is an amusing cartoony point-and-click adventure game coming to iOS and Android in January 2015. It follows a young boy as he repairs history by bringing inspiration to the likes of Newton, Da Vinci, and Beethoven.
I spoke with Inspire Me developer Blyts's creative director Leandro de Brasi about how the game balances gags with historical accuracy, how to design a puzzle for an adventure game, and the upcoming Kickstarter campaign.
Pocket Gamer: What kind of game is Inspire Me, and what is it about?Inspire Me is a point-and-click adventure about a naughty kid that may have changed the world's history forever with his monkey business.
You must travel back in time and solve a series of puzzles while bringing inspiration to the greatest minds to turn the things back into their right course.
Inspire Me reminds me of the Horrible Histories series a bit. Are you trying to both educate and entertain with your cartoon take on history?
The main objective of the game is to entertain and amuse users. Furthermore, as a secondary objective, the idea is to narrate some important events of history.
Of course, the game is fiction, but we try to respect the myths that existed on these creations as much as we can.
How have you gone about writing the gags for Inspire Me - what type of humour is it, and who are you aiming it at?We're big fans of adventure games such as Monkey Island and Day of the Tentacle. Somehow we are want to pay tribute to those games that amused us both.
The gags come from situations that come to mind, often then transformed as they are brought to the game.
The humuor is mostly healthy, sometimes roguish, and somewhat extravagant. It's aimed at all audiences.
Puzzles tend to be hit or miss with adventure games, so what's your approach to them in Inspire Me?We don't want the puzzles to be too easy (the game moving along without the player thinking) or very difficult either. The idea is to create original, deductive, and funny puzzles, without giving the feeling of frustration.
The game will contain no dialogue, spoken or written. We will use a system of animated thought bubbles, to help you understand the character's feelings and responses.
This allows for a more dynamic game, so the puzzles will be associated with user observations and actions.
You're taking Inspire Me to Kickstarter. How much funding are you looking for and what will this allow you to do if the goal is reached?
The funding goal of Kickstarter will be $20,000 USD. The game will start with three chapters: Newton, Beethoven, and Da Vinci.
The stretch goals will include more chapters with historic characters whose contributions to science and art changed the world. There are some surprises waiting!
You can find out more about Inspire Me on its website.