By John Walker on March 26th, 2010 at 7:04 pm.
The Whispered World, a promising German adventure game, has now been given a release date for the Europe and the US. 23 April on Steam, and available on the same day at retail in both locations. The game has been released in Germany, with a demo, and shows off some really lovely 2D artwork. There’s now an English language trailer, which you can see below.
You know what this absolutely reminds me of? When you’d be home from school ill, or maybe on a half term holiday, and you’d see a cartoon on BBC2. Being a cartoon you stop changing channels to watch, and then you realise it’s not one you’re familiar with. It’s strange, it’s slower, it’s more thoughtful. It’s… foreign. Oftentimes this meant it was impenetrable, but every now and then you’d be completely drawn in by one. You’d never hear of it again, never know its name, nor be able to recall it in enough detail to describe it to anyone else. But you’d dream about it.
That’s what this reminds me of. It’s utterly beautiful, and while the voice acting seems dodgy, and the puzzles (chess puzzle, arrange the pipes) look a little too familiar, it has that same haunting magical tone. We should hopefully be receiving some review code soon, so will let you know if it lives up to the gorgeous design.
26/03/2010 at 19:27 Pantsmansoy says:
This looks absolutely wondrous. I wonder if it’d be good to play with my 7 year-old son?
26/03/2010 at 19:35 robrob says:
Getting a definite Studio Ghibli vibe off this, looks lovely.
26/03/2010 at 20:05 lhzr says:
i played the german demo and it was charming and melancholic. if it manages to maintain the feel of the demo, and i can’t see why it wouldn’t, it should be quite good.
27/03/2010 at 01:06 Howl says:
Exactly what I thought. The environments had a touch of the Princess Mononoke about them too. It looks beautiful.
26/03/2010 at 19:37 Sagan says:
Yes, please give us a Wot I Think about this.
It got great reviews from the German press, but then I played the demo and it had a really annoying puzzle and not-interesting dialogue, and frankly you can’t trust German reviewers when it comes to German games, so I stayed away from the game.
Since then I have wondered if I have missed a brilliant game here, just because I had bad impressions from the demo.
26/03/2010 at 20:49 Mr Labbes says:
I wonder how that works in other countries. Do british games get obviously better reviews in Britain?
(Crysis got a better rating than HL2 in all major German PC magazines, which I would call “obvious”.)
27/03/2010 at 07:32 Sagan says:
@ Mr Labbes:
The Crysis situation wasn’t so bad actually. Sure, the German press pretended it was the best game ever, when in fact it wasn’t, but it still was a good game. The problem is more with games like Settlers 5 or Gothic 3 getting great review scores. If they get scores in the eighties, and Whispered World gets scores in the eighties, then what am I supposed to think about the Whispered World?
26/03/2010 at 19:37 Hmm says:
I’ve been waiting for this and The Book of Unwritten Tales… WHERE OH WHERE is the English version of the latter? It was critically acclaimed in Germany and hailed as one of the best adventure games of all time, yet there’s no news of the English release.
26/03/2010 at 19:40 jsutcliffe says:
I was thinking more Don Bluth, but either is a good sign. It is a shame the puzzles look mundane — I’ll be interested to read reviews.
27/03/2010 at 08:53 dadioflex says:
Don Bluth? really? Hmm.
Looks pure Ghibli to me, in the action scenes as shown anyway.
Anyway, I suspect I would rather watch this as a movie than play it as a game.
26/03/2010 at 19:41 abhishek says:
Does anyone know what it will be priced at?
26/03/2010 at 19:51 Sobric says:
Oooh this looks brilliant. Although some of the English voice acting looks a bit ponderous – I hope there’s an option to play with English subtitles and German dialogue (if that doesn’t mess with the puzzles).
26/03/2010 at 20:23 Frankie The Patrician[PF] says:
Will check the demo, my German should suffice…I hope, it looks absolutely gorgeous!
26/03/2010 at 21:53 Wulf says:
Lucky!! Let us know how it turns out, eh?
28/03/2010 at 23:13 Frankie The Patrician[PF] says:
It’s bloody fantastic! I love it! Getting tad lost in more complex sentences, but otherwise having no problems with it.
It’s not German in a way like, say, Jack Keane (thank God!). It’s a different class of an adventure game. Sadwick is truly a marvelous character – an ever depressed clown with a sarcastic, often even cynical sense of humour. The German voice-acting is really nice – his brother Ben sounds like a rather unlikable bully, the grandfather DOES sound like an old senile man etc.
And it’s funny! Not only in the sarcastic way (Sadwick describing the “him being cannonball” trick is splendid), but there are also word games (I highly doubt those will be transferable to English, I’m afraid), absurd situations (I’d rather not spoil them) and some others. I think I’m actually getting the German version, for the jokes and all…and I need to work on my German again anyway.
It’s not only traditionally visually, but also by the amount of work they put in it. On each screen there is plenty of active items with at least 4 dialogues itemless (looking, tasting/chatting with other folks about it, touching/picking up, using Sadwick’s pet worm Spot) and many others triggered by items (the use of compass on other items always begins with something like “The compass points to the north” and carries on with a relevant sentence “Where…”). It’s truly magical, it almost makes me cry, it takes me back, just like Al Emmo or Dave Gilbert’s Blackwell games…wish I could afford to shell out the 34 euro’s now.
And the music is nonintrusively nice and clean..
I think I’m in love..
26/03/2010 at 20:25 Tiny says:
We need more purty 2D games. It seems to be marketed as a children’s movie, so wondrous and magical. Also, I thought it was forbidden to mention the word “game” in the voice-over for a game’s trailer?
And indeed, WTB WIT. Iykwim.
26/03/2010 at 20:58 Hmm-Hmm. says:
I’m always kind of surprised when a new game is touted as being ‘long-awaited’. By whom, then, may I ask?
Regardless, this looks rather interesting.
26/03/2010 at 21:52 Wulf says:
Me? I remember John (or someone) talking about this a bit back.
I’m not sure about the ‘long’ part, but I’ve definitely been waiting for it.
26/03/2010 at 22:16 Hippo says:
Yeah, I’ve also been looking forward to it for a long time. It’s a 2D point & click adventure game. I’m pretty confident that most gamers who are interested in such games (quite a few, even though the mainstream sites don’t give that impression) are looking forward to trying it. At least the ones who frequent sites such as Adventuregamers.
27/03/2010 at 02:22 Berto says:
The non-German adventure gamers community. Yes we exist out there.
27/03/2010 at 15:17 Hmm-Hmm. says:
Oh by all means, the long-awaited bit wasn’t pointed at this game in particular. In fact, I rather like adventure games myself. Not that I knew of this game, but that’s another matter.
26/03/2010 at 21:02 Nero says:
“We’re rocks!”
26/03/2010 at 21:32 Taillefer says:
It’s been hopping on and off my radar for a while now. It’s one of those games I want so I can show it to everybody.
26/03/2010 at 21:51 Wulf says:
Dodgy voice-acting or no, I want this.
It’s all ready sold me on the beautiful animation, the abstracts, and the unashamed wonder it prevents, not afraid to be very strange, unusual, and the stuff of dreams. I could endure an average game with average voice-acting to romp around in that world for a while, as it looks simply sublime.
Yes, I want this. Very, very much.
26/03/2010 at 22:01 Shih Tzu says:
I wonder if there’s an option for German with subtitles? Or, if not, someone could patch it in using the German game?
26/03/2010 at 22:00 Ozzie says:
The voice acting is dodgy indeed. Disappointing. :(
By the way, THE TRAILER SPOILS THE ENDING OF THE SECOND CHAPTER which should come as a surprise. I was annoyed that I already knew how the chapter ended just because I saw the trailer. Why did it have to be so full of spoilers?
The Whispered World isn’t as good as Edna bricht aus, and its bugs ruined my nerves, but still, I have to admit that it’s very atmospheric and charming. It’s a title of high quality, with some quirks.
26/03/2010 at 23:07 Vapor says:
Relatively appropriate YTMND link
http://instilled.ytmnd.com/
27/03/2010 at 07:49 Luggage says:
That picture is nice. Any idea what its source is?
29/03/2010 at 13:01 KillahMate says:
@Luggage: The painting is by Daniel Lieske, i don’t know the actual name but I think it’s technically called “The Journey Begins” – it was one of the competitions on CGChannel. I recommend checking all of them out – there’s some sterling work by high-end professionals on a variety of interesting subjects. But I do like this particular piece very much – so much so I remembered all of this :-)
But what I want to know is WHAT IS THAT MUSIC IN THE BACKGROUND. THAT IS SOME GOOD MUSIC. So if anyone knows…
25/06/2010 at 12:31 rob0tik says:
>Sorry, I ment that to be a reply to the post about the YTMND link: http://instilled.ytmnd.com/
25/06/2010 at 12:33 rob0tik says:
>The music is called “Your Destiny” by an artist on newgrounds.com, Brian Holmes.
>http://www.newgrounds.com/audio/listen/226769
26/03/2010 at 23:10 tycho says:
Perhaps when you good people at RPS do a review you could ask the devs if English subs with the German version will be possible?
It looks truly great, but as others have said, the english voice acting is pretty awful, not to mention
(and this is the worst bit) out of synch with the animations.
26/03/2010 at 23:44 Jakkar says:
“Oftentimes this meant it was impenetrable, but every now and then you’d be completely drawn in by one. You’d never hear of it again, never know its name, nor be able to recall it in enough detail to describe it to anyone else. But you’d dream about it.”
So very many. Not all were necessarily foreign, but it took me a lot of study to rediscover Cogs Hollow, Bertie the Bat, and I never did understand the Moomins.
27/03/2010 at 07:45 Luggage says:
To all the nay-sayers: it can’t be worse than the Tell Tale abominations of classic Lucas Arts titles. :p
(And please no flame war on this, it comes down to a matter of taste and Tell Tales take on MI and S&M just isn’t my cup of tea).
Initially I thought about getting it for myself, but after seeing the trailer I consider giving it to my gf for her birthday so she can finally catch a glimpse of what she’s missing out on while playing WoW every day. Freggin’ WoW!
27/03/2010 at 10:05 Pod says:
What was so abominable about their games? The fact that you had to ‘pilot’ Guybrush? Or the one-click controls?
27/03/2010 at 08:08 bill says:
That BBC2 nostalgia was spot on. It was before the internet too, so we couldn’t even google it to find out it’s name.
It also happened to me a lot with Channel 4′s weird foriegn films. I have vague memories of 2 or 3 obscure foreign films that I’d like to find again, but i’ve no idea how i’d ever do that.
They aren’t even all dodgy french films!
27/03/2010 at 15:42 Sonic Goo says:
@bill
Make a thread on the forums with what you remember. Maybe one of us will know. :)
27/03/2010 at 10:04 Pod says:
I AM AWATING THE JOHN WALKER YES/NO SEAL OF APPROVAL. PURCHASE/NON-PURCHASE IS SOLEY BASED UPON THIS.
DO NOT DISSAPOINT ME JOHN, YOU WON’T LIKE THE RESULTS.
(I can cry, like, loads</b, y'know? Ever read the bible? It'll be like that.)
27/03/2010 at 10:09 Pod says:
More posts [because I didn't log in so can't edit that one^]! Is Saaaaaaaadwick a German name? Or some brilliant pun-based translation?
27/03/2010 at 14:33 Ozzie says:
He’s also called Sadwick in the German version.
27/03/2010 at 17:58 stahlwerk says:
Neither is it a german name (well, at least I never heard of it).
27/03/2010 at 18:28 Ozzie says:
No, you’re right, it isn’t.
27/03/2010 at 11:59 mcnubbins says:
Absolutely hilarious voice acting. I was a bit skeptic before about this, but now I can’t wait!
Ah, but the game is actually out in Germany already. Finally it pays off to have spent years in school learning that bloody language:D
27/03/2010 at 13:07 Gaytard Fondue says:
Regarding the dodgy voice acting, the German voice acting for this is even worse imho
27/03/2010 at 17:54 Ozzie says:
I thought the German voice acting was pretty good, I liked it a lot. Sadwick’s voice doesn’t seem to meet everyone’s taste though. I thought it was bold to voice him that way, and after playing, I can’t imagine him sounding any different. It fits perfectly.
But the voice acting in this international trailer…it doesn’t sound even professional! And it’s so obvious that the voice actors recorded their lines separately. I didn’t had that impression in the German version anyway. At least the script got a proper translation.
28/03/2010 at 15:37 Craig Stern says:
Sadwick is an odd name choice. He sounds like a melancholy candle.
28/03/2010 at 17:47 MWoody says:
Wow, I couldn’t even finish the trailer thanks to awful writing (or translating) and absolutely horrible voices. The first time that Eeyore-wannabe opened his mouth I wanted to smack him. No thank you.
29/03/2010 at 13:05 KillahMate says:
Oh God. The game is beautiful and fascinating, but I can already tell that the voice acting will prevent me from ever playing it. German with English subtitles please?
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25/06/2010 at 12:27 rob0tik says:
The music is called “Your Destiny” by an artist on newgrounds.com, Brian Holmes.