Happily Ever After Video Game

The above is a trailer for a new fairy tale influenced video game, Happily Ever After.

From the game's webpage where you can also download a demo:

The game will be priced at £2.99 for iPad and £9.99 for PC and Mac

When a problem page blogger starts to receive a series of weird and puzzling requests for help, they track down the source and go to investigate, only to end up in the Kingdom of Unbelievaville! Stuck there, their only means of escaping being turned into a doornob by the evil queen, is to help out the local inhabitants who are familiar characters with very unfamiliar problems!

It contains over 100 puzzles stretched through 24 levels with multiple endings in story mode, and if that's not enough, the game contains a bunch of against-the-clock minigames.

Happily Ever After will be available this Autumn/Fall!

In the mean time, why not follow either of the player character's twitter feeds at @TheFGM or @TheBlogFather1 or check out the Kingdom of Unbelievaville dating site FrogSnog.com.

And more from the press release:

Leading UK independent developer, Honeyslug, in ration with publishing partner Boiled Frog, are delighted to announce the forthcoming release of their modern fairytale puzzle adventure with a twist, “Happily Ever After”. Due for release on iPad, Mac and PC in October 2011, priced at £2.99 on iPad and £9.99 on PC and Mac. The title is supported with PR, trailers http://www.vimeo.com/30180207 and playable demo (PC only) on all formats. These, together with screenshots, are available at www.Honeyslug.com/happilyeverafter or www.Boiledfrog.co.uk.

Happily Ever After is a humorous puzzle adventure game which takes place in the contemporary fairytale Kingdom of Unbelievaville. After receiving a series of strange emails to your problem solving blog you find yourself trapped in the Kingdom. Following a hostile encounter with the Evil Queen, your only way home is to help out the cast of familiar fairytale characters with unfamiliar problems. These inhabitants include BB Wolff - the local smarmy, estate agent and apparent master of disguise, Goldilocks, a special girl with very particular tastes and an oafish, lazy prince who is charming only by name. Your adventure ends at the annual Unbelievaville “Know Talent” contest; will you find your way home or suffer the Evil Queen’s “hex” factor?

Happily Ever After is a hugely entertaining game, set over 24 levels with over 100 different puzzles. Players are set to enjoy many hours of gameplay with challenges including hidden object, logic games, mazes, spot the differences, riddles and more. With lavish comic book visuals, three fun arcade style mini games and a sparkling script penned by Childrens’ BBC script writer Hannah McKay, this title is sure to appeal to puzzlers and adventure game fans of all ages.

This one looks safer for younger kids--like 8 and up perhaps although I don't see an age recommendation, maybe even 5 although I think reading is needful--unlike make of the other video games featured on the blog previously which were definitely more adult.

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Fairy Tales, Video Games and the Supreme Court

  

A small media frenzy has been centered around the Supreme Court's decision about regulating video games for children.

For example, from NPR, Weekly Standard: Violent Games Are No Fairy Tale by Jeffrey H. Anderson:

On Monday, in the case of Brown v. Entertainment Merchants Association, the Supreme Court struck down a California law prohibiting the sale of violent video games to children. In a 7-2 holding authored by Justice Antonin Scalia (with Justices Alito and Roberts concurring and Justices Thomas and Breyer dissenting), the Court ruled that video games enjoy essentially the same constitutional protection as books, with violent video games being, in Scalia's estimation, much like modern day Grimm's Fairy Tales.

Of course, there is very little similarity between reading (or, for that matter, watching film adaptations of) Snow White or Cinderella and deciding whether to murder, disembowel, or rape one's victim in a video game (all of which, as Justice Alito details, are features of some of these games). That the Court's majority fails to see this distinction shows how inapt it is to have that body engage in such line-drawing for an entire republic. Further demonstrating this, Scalia also compares such video games to The Odyssey, and he somewhat mystifyingly declares that literature and video games are similarly "interactive."

From the majority opinion by Scalia, available here:

Like the protected books, plays and movies that preceded them, video games communicate ideas—and even social messages—through many familiar literary devices (such as characters, dialogue, plot and music) and through features distinctive to the medium (such as the player’s interaction with the virtual world),” Justice Scalia wrote. “That suffices to confer First Amendment protection.”

Certainly the books we give children to read–or read to them when they are younger–contain no shortage of gore. Grimm’s Fairy Tales, for example, are grim indeed. As her just deserts for trying to poison Snow White, the wicked queen is made to dance in red hot slippers ’till she fell dead on the floor, a sad example of envy and jealousy.’ . . . Cinderella’s evil stepsisters have their eyes pecked out by doves. . . . And Hansel and Gretel (children!) kill their captor by baking her in an oven.

Some other links:

At PBS: Citing Violence in Fairy Tales, Justices Strike Down Calif. Video Game Law

At the New York Times: Justices Reject Ban on Violent Video Games for Children by ADAM LIPTAK

At the Miami Herald: Justices don’t live in the real world by Cal Thomas

And Maria Tatar also posted about this on her blog.


I'm not jumping on the opinion train here--although I admit I have one as someone who works with kids and it is about to become obvious anyway--but I find no end of amusement that centuries old literature is being used to defend a very recent invention which is rather unrelated. Yes, both are graphic, but their means of delivery are so very different in intent and impact that it is almost disturbing to compare them. In other words, I read and deal with fairy tales most of the hours of my life but I can't stand to watch the violence of many of these games. Yes, I had a nightmare when working on Bluebeard, but that is the exception not the rule.

And, no, parents in my experience aren't usually sharing the most violent versions of fairy tales with the kids anyway. It's the high school and college students who learn that the tales are much more violent than they knew and feel like another level of their innocence has been eroded away at the discovery. Then they either beg for the violent ones--I get emails!--or run for familiar relative safety of the Disney versions although I contend those are much more violent than we admit.

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Fables Will Be a Video Game

There's not much on the game company's site yet, but here's more info from Telltale Signs That Videogames Will Be Downloaded, Not Sold at Retail by Tricia Duryee:

But a small San Rafael, Calif.-based videogame company thinks it has the winning formula as the business moves to digital.

Today, Telltale Games is announcing an exclusive worldwide publishing agreement with Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment to develop videogames for the comic-book series Fables...

Telltale’s games are written as a narrative or a cinematic adventure and are divided into five separate episodes. Players download a new one every four weeks for a six-month period. A season pass for a game, including all episodes, costs roughly $35.

Telltale then repeats the process and sells the games across a combination of consoles, mobile devices, tablets, PCs and Macs.

  

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FarmVille and Fairy Tales

I've explained I'm not much of a gamer, but I am at least aware of FarmVille and know some people who play it. Last week's Farmville update included some limited time fairy tale themed bits. Since I can't explain more than that myself, here's an excerpt from FarmVille Fairy Tale Decorations: Prince and Princess Gnome, Enchanted Forest, & More by Brandy Shaul:

As part of tonight's FarmVille update, we see the release the Fairy Tale theme in the game, which contains (as of this writing) five different decorative items that you can use to decorate your farm like a fairytale wonderland. Two of these items go for coins (luckily, the most impressive decoration is one of them), while the other three decorations are premium, Farm Cash items.

The two coin items are the Enchanted Forest and the Golden Rose Arch. The Golden Rose Arch costs 10,000 coins, and looks exactly like most other arches in the game, save for its inclusion of golden roses. Meanwhile, the Enchanted Forest costs 200,000 coins, but might just be worth the high cost, as it is an animated item, with trees that drop multicolored leaves onto the colorful grassy area below.

The three new Farm Cash items are the Prince Gnome and Princess Gnome (obviously a matching pair), and a Pumpkin Carriage, a la the fairytale of Cinderella. The Pumpkin Carriage here, however, is a mixture of what the carriage looks like while Cinderella is using it at the ball, and after it turns back into the orange pumpkin it originated from. You can add this animated item (complete with moving horses and chinchillas) for 18 Farm Cash.

These Fairy Tale items will only be available in the game's store for the next two weeks. If Zynga adds more items to this theme in the meantime, we'll be sure to let you know.

This page also has images of the animated characters which are quite cute.

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LittleBigPlanet and Hansel and Gretelbot

I try to keep informed about many areas of society out of fascination and plain old desire to participate in conversations in the real world. Discussing fairy tales doesn't really work well for me often in my time away from the computer unless I am at a conference meeting you dear readers.

However, one of my greatest knowledge base weaknesses is in gaming. I'm not a gamer. I play FreeCell and a few simple word and brainteaser games online. That's the extent of my playing besides some occasional social bouts with the Wii. (I had a slight addiction to Link's Crossbow Training for a few weeks last year. I finally mastered it and then my gaming obsession went away again.)

So when I read about and see things like this:



I am amused but slightly confused. I know LittleBigPlanet and LittleBigPlanet 2 are popular. That little guy is a familiar image. But that is where my experience ends.

So I am not going to try to explain how or what this Hansel and Gretelbot really is. I know it is part of LittleBigPlanet 2 and that is sufficient for my needs at this point although I say that and will probably spend the next half hour trying to figure all this out.

If you understand the game, this may make more sense to you. From LittleBigPlanet 2 – New Community-Created Playable Theme Coming Soon:

Hi guys – I’m sure that lots of you LBP fans out there have worked your way through the LBP 2 Story mode, confronted the mighty Negativitron, and are now exploring the intricacies of Create mode and the hundreds of thousands of new user levels.

If you’re hungry for some more Story mode-type Sack-venture, or looking for some creative inspiration and examples of just how powerful the new tools are, then here’s some very cool news for you, direct from Media Molecule…

We are very proud to present to you the preview trailer for Hansel & Gretelbot [see above], a very special community project based loosely on an old fairy tale, and that’s nearly ready for you to play!

 

 

Oh, and here is more about the actual story. I understand stories!

Once upon a time, in a little cottage on the edge of the Dark Western woods, lived a humble Woodsman, his wife, their son Hansel and robotic daughter Gretelbot. One sad day, the Woodsman’s wife was taken ill, and passed away not too long afterwards. Time passed, but eventually the Woodsman became stricken by loneliness, and he remarried.

The Woodsman’s new wife was a wicked woman, who hated her new step children. They were the reason, so she said, that they had to live in such poverty. They would eat them out of house and home, the Woodsman must get rid of them! His will weakened by his heartbreak, the Woodsman relented, and led Hansel and Gretelbot into the Dark Western Woods, leaving them to fend for themselves, with no idea how to get home…

Hansel & Gretelbot should be out later this month, keep your eyes peeled for more info!

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Gretel and Hansel Computer Game

Here's an article about a new computer game based on Hansel and Gretel as well as a link to the game.  I tried playing it for a few minutes and got stuck.  I don't have a gamer's brain.  But it is interesting to look at so take a peep if you are interested but not a gamer either.

From Death Is a Strange Reward: The 'Gretel and Hansel' Series by G. Christopher Williams:

Most modern versions of fairy tales also revise the more “questionable” elements of such stories, but David Bae and Nathan Ratcliffe’s Gretel and Hansel series returns to the uglier truths of a violent world that is unforgiving of the inexperienced and immature. Interestingly, the reversal of the protagonist’s names in the title, which signals the developers’ decision to make Gretel the clearly dominant hero in the story, seems to especially beg comparison to Perrault’s type of tale. It is the female character that is most at risk throughout the games, since that is the character that the player largely controls, making one wonder if there is a similar lesson intended, something about the fragility of children with younger women being made especially vulnerable here.


These games are clearly designed to be unsettling though. Their aesthetics make this notion abundantly clear from their opening cinematics to the beautifully rendered, but grotesque cartoon imagery to the remarkably strange score of the game. In the opening sequence and tutorial of Part 2, for example, the player learns how to move Gretel around and interact with items by yanking up what appears to be a weed growing against a stark background. Instead, it is the head of her brother Hansel that emerges from the ground, as does the head of another older man across the screen. When Gretel yanks on the man’s head, a tree erupts from the ground, splitting the man’s head open. Another tree quickly follows, destroying Hansel’s head. In a cinematic, Gretel flees the violence, but as she disappears from the screen, her shadow lengthens, and the player sees that another shadow now looms over Gretel. The shadow appears to be that of an adult woman, but a woman bearing an axe. The opening cinema demonstrates the nature of the world of Gretel and Hansel. It is terrifying and violent and flight to figures that might seem to offer safety, like an adult, holds no real promise of security.

The game itself is available for playing at Gretel and Hansel by makopudding.

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Pet Society Fairytale Items

I am completely ignorant of these things, but this is fairy tale related, so I thought I would share:

From Let Your Imagination Wander With Pet Society Fairytale Items:

It’s another Monday in the world of Pet Society, and that means that a new item theme has been unleashed in the game’s many stores. This week, we take a trip to the world of princes and monsters – it’s Fairytale Week!

The theme starts in the game’s Gardening Shop, where you’ll find all sorts of architectural details like arches and waterfalls, that would look perfect as part of a Princess’s castle, or just as nice decorations if you happen to have an outdoor garden, or classical theme celebrating an era gone by.

Next, in the game’s Mystery Shop, you can pick up a Fairy Tale Mystery Box, either by its lonesome for 6 Playfish Cash, or in groups of 5 or 13 boxes for 24 and 60 Playfish Cash, respectively. These boxes contain bundles of Fairytale clothing items, with five different options being available to receive at random.

I really don't have anything to add.  Except for if I played this game, I would want the Princess and the Pea bed.  I've always wanted a Princess and the Pea bed.  At least in theory.  I still remember the thrill of the idea of using stairs to get into bed, from bunk beds to short stools.  I first read of one tall enough to require a step in Anne of Windy Poplars and dreamed of one for years.  Now I am much more practical--I like sitting at the foot of my bed to put on my socks, but I can still enjoy the fantasy....

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American McGee and Little Red Riding Hood

This story is appearing on many gaming sites this morning.

American McGee Shows Off Little Red Riding Hood Concept

American McGee posted this concept image, painted by two artists from the veteran developer's Spicy Horse studio in Shanghai, on his Flickr account to share a game idea he's hoping to sell: Little Red Riding Hood with an axe thirsting for wolf blood.

"[The artwork] depicts a scene from a game concept I'll be pitching at this year's GDC," explains McGee. "If we're lucky, an interested publisher will help us move it into production. It's an idea that [Spicy Horse art director] Ken Wong and I have been toying with for years."

This isn't the first time the Alice developer has thought of featuring Red in a video game; his 2008 episodic PC game, American McGee's Grimm, featured a chapter devoted to the fairy tale character. She's also appeared in several other video games in recent years, such as The Path, Fairytale Fights, and Little Red Riding Hood's Zombie BBQ.

The original Grimm game was also made into a comic book, by the way, American McGee's Grimm. The game itself is available on GameTap with several packs. Here's a link to The Girl Without Hands, for example.

With the new movie in development, this game might have a better chance of being produced, too. Timing is often the most important factor...

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Video Games: Storybook Workshop

As happens too often around here, I'm a little late on this one since it was released this past November. However, here it is!

Storybook Workshop is a new game for the Wii aimed at the preschool set. First, here's a trailer from Konami, the maker:



And further product information from Amazon:

Synopsis

Including 16 famous children's fairy tales, Storybook Workshop offers plenty of make-believe fun. Reminisce on your own childhood story time as you read well-known favorites such as Little Red Riding Hood, The Ugly Duckling and The Golden Goose. Read in your own voice, or use the Magic Voice feature to change your voice to sound like characters from the stories. You can also sing along to four classic children's songs and record them, so boys and girls can listen to the performances on their own.

Key Game Features:

Features 16 children's fairy tales to listen to or perform, such as Little Red Riding Hood, The Ugly Duckling, The Town Musicians of Bremen, Be Kind to the Earth, The Boy Who Went to the North Wind, The Little Match Girl, The Happy Prince, The Giant Turnip, A Glove and Hats for the Jizos, Three Wishes, The Star Money, The Elves and the Shoemaker, and The Golden Goose

Serves as an interactive book with fairy tales from around the world written by Hans Christian Andersen, the Brothers Grimm, Aesop and other famous authors

Play mini games and sing along to four classic children's songs

Record readings as well as the songs you perform in Singalong mode

Change your voice to match that of a fairy tale character with the Magic Voice feature

Earn rewards the more you read, such as the ability to feature your Mii in select stories

Virtual sticker pad helps track progress

So far, the reviews are limited and mixed. I think, as always, this type of game depends on the players using it and what they expect from it. As a tool for interacting with children with stories, it should be somewhat satisfactory. (Although I prefer an actual book myself!) As a tool for teaching literacy, not so much, which some parents seemed to think it would do. After all, the game is actually aimed at the pre-reading set.

I find the game interesting and would love to try it with a child, but am not going to buy it to test it. I have some of my own ideas about what would make a great fairy tale video game after all of the reading I've done this past year. And I am not a gamer although I admit the Wii has gotten me to play more than any other previous system. Current favorites: Just Dance and Wii Sports Resort...

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