There is a mixed conception when you mention Telltale Games. They have a knack for story and player’s choice that actually matters. Although, there is a lot of stories they’ve already told that were bad or even better than the last Walking Dead game they made, there is one I want them to explore because of how fit they are in Creative Freedom. When Tales from the Borderlands was in development, people were wondering what the game was going to be like since the source material they’re basing the game off of (Borderlands) there was nothing to work with besides some snit-bits of character development and the end of sequel. In the end, the game turned out to be amazing, fitting everything with the Creative Freedom they had with how much room they could explore with the story, they did basically what they wanted while sticking with the source material. Every joke was well thought out, the story was dynamic and the character development made you cry for their losses. The game was amazing. I’ll simply put it there and let you play the game on your own if you haven’t. Since they proved they could make a decent and fun story out of anything there is one thing I want to see them do that has no story whatsoever and carries amazingly developed characters that are fun to watch: Space Dandy. Hello and welcome to this Game-Making Challenge.
If you haven’t watched enough Adult Swim in 2014 or haven’t looked at the hero image up there, Space Dandy is about a Dandy guy and his Dandy space crew in space. That’s almost all you need to know. Oh, and they’re Alien Hunters hunting for unregistered aliens. That’s another thing you need to know, but you don’t really need to keep in mind. If you’re not a fan of Anime because it has some bad storytelling and has an incredibly long list of episodes that you won’t be able to finish before you kids have kids, you don’t have to worry because this anime is a very short list of episodes and has no story to follow whatsoever. The least you’ll get is references to past episodes. Besides that, each episode is amazing and almost refreshing. They don’t alienate newcomers to the show by making tons of complex references to something that happened four seasons ago, they start almost every episode with a new story to follow and leave anything else that had happened to feel like they never really did. And on top of that, they explore a lot with the design every no and then, having new artists and animators come in to guest star for an episode. It’s just… You already know what I’m going to say. The point being that this is perfect for the Telltale gang to explore and is currently on my wishlist for games to come. Now to explore the game would be like.
At least the first season does this, each episode starts with the mission of finding an alien to catch. Of course this very broad and there’s nothing there, but that’s kind of what they did in the show. Since the show was very experimental, why not do the same with this? Well… It’s risky, but… Nevermind that. This kind of what they did in the Zombie Episode, the Chameleonian one and even my favorite episode in the first season, A Merry Champion is a Wagon in Space, Baby, where the alien he’s trying to catch is a little girl that is on a quest to find her family. They all had the core mission to find an alien and they were all fun and/or amazing to watch, but they challenged the main character to see how he would react. Let me break down how Dandy acts.
Dandy is an in-of-himself kind of guy that also has a heart, he only cares about money and boobs but tries to act like an intellectual while sounding like an idiot while doing so. What kind of position would this boobs-loving character be in with a kid? Especially if she’s an unregistered alien. That’s how they explore his character, trying to see what he’d do in situations you probably have thought would be impossible to see him in. How about if he made friends with an Imperialistic Prince and made a band with a one-hit wonder called Lonely Nights? How would you imagine him in that situation? That’s the core reason why I say it should be mostly experimental, although having some heavy choices in the game.
Of course, if it’s going to be a Telltale game, there’s not going to be much gameplay besides the choices. What I want to see in a Telltale’s Space Dandy game is the basic dialogue choices and changes in the story, the “He Will Remember That” trope and all, but all taken in a Dandy way. Kind of like how they did it in Tales from the Borderlands with that kind of humor that seems meta or fourth wall breaking but doesn’t use it too much. I don’t want it to be too in of itself. The only thing that I would want, if I was apart of the development, is it to be different compared to other Telltale games, because almost all of them tread the same ground trying to capitalize on it while also making decent stories. I still want the player’s choice to apart of the core gameplay, but I want the development team, hypothetically, to explore new grounds with the mechanic of choice. The one thing I notice in a lot of Telltale games is that they tend to make the game explore complex paths, but each path explores the same scenery. Yeah, you might have done something completely different compared to someone else, but you tread the same ground with some different people or thoughts. They never go as far as this small thing changing the player’s experience drastically, having them make some differing choices, where one player has to choose the death of an infected love one or not in this point in the game, the other player experienced something completely different in the same time because one of them didn’t steal needed resources to survive. Do you get me? Probably not. To put it down simple, every choice matters, but you probably already heard that in many Telltale games.. I hope you understood.
To give you an example, Dandy is given the choice to hunt down a selection nearby unregistered aliens. You don’t know whether the stats you read about the probability of them being there is true or not, so you are to choose between the selection of let’s say three: a grass alien on a desert planet with signs of hardly any water on itt, a ridiculously unbelievable alien that can set you on fire with a single stare or a busty beauty of an alien that seems almost impossible to exist. You have select paths on what you want to do and it will reflect on the player a lot. By that, I mean the art style. You’ll probably notice Dandy’s Hair become more outrageous and QT’s actions more according to protocol. Because you chose one of these, you started a story path and through that story path, you have different branching paths that lead to different situations that you interact with and experience almost alone. Only you or anyone watching can experience these things or at least in a realistic sense have something new almost every playthrough.
The ideal way to make a game out of an already made show, movie or book is to get the people involved in it to pay respects to the creator or at least capture the true nature of the story. Of course, I would want the voice actors to be the same people who voiced them in the show as well as the Japanese voices. I for sure know that both Sub and Dub voice actors would love to do another Dandy role again as well as the other cast. The only person I don’t think would want to come back to this show would be the director, Shinichiro Watanabe, since he only does two seasons and leaves it on that. As amazing as you may think it, having so much told in two seasons about the characters and their world, but it hurts a lot that the show won’t go on. Though he likes to leave his shows as is, he left it with a To Be Continued stapled in the credits, so maybe he would like to come back? Who knows, but we all would want the same people apart of this entire ride.
To add to the cast of people voicing the new characters I would love to see. Dee Bradley Baker, Luci Christian, Roger Craig Smith, Laura Bailey, Matthew Mercer would be ideal people to me, great voices and great actors in the industry of voice acting. They might be perfect for the game since they have so much experience and have lots of voices to utilize. Mr. Baker is amazing with animal noises and Laura has lots of experience directing voice acting gigs.
Of course, the writing has to be on point with everything, having every outcome make sense and not have the player question why that happened after he made that choice, it has to be straightforward but explain something complex. Kind of like how almost all stories should be told. And the game can’t have anything too over the top, but still try to achieve it to make the game charming like in the show. Another thing I need to point out is that the game can’t explore too much from the show’s past, having characters from one episode appear one more time would be like cheap fan service to me and that kind of thing is cliche to me. Exploring new ideas and characters to question Dandy’s character would be the prime objective for the team if I were in charge.. Hypothetical.
The reason why I chose this show for this challenge was that everything about the show is so vibrant and colorful, it’s nothing but saturated with color. And (to add my personal reasoning why) I just love this show so much. I was 14 when the show aired and I was in a pile of depression that year. School was rough as well as the unneeded AVID class and there was so much going on with family that I really don’t want to talk about. I was in a bad place and the show kind of picked me up at a late Saturday night after midnight. I watched the first episode and I loved it so much. It was probably the most real smile I put on that year and I couldn’t stop thinking about it. During that following year, the Telltales games were in my radar as well as trying out there games, so seeing that they could do a good job with the so many shows made me wish for that Telltale’s Space Dandy game. I bet a lot of fans out there agree with me that they would love to see a Telltale game out of Space Dandy and seeing their engine is pretty good with its animation and cell shading would make the imagination a lot better.
Well, what do you think? Too much thought? I hope you liked this either way, but I just wanted to say that I need your criticism! What did I do wrong, what choices were bad, did I use the wrong word, what? I have to know and the only way I can get better is if you tell me what I did wrong. Tell me! Besides that, the challenge is in the 23rd of this month, and you have to write about a game based on the word Saturation. I hope you enjoy that and if you're wondering why I’m posting this early it’s because I’m doing a School Play this week, so I don’t want to lose the thought afterward. Again I hoped you liked this and ‘til next time…
Stay Dandy, Baby!