Wallace & Gromit's Grand Adventures have commenced! Let's get playing!

[Jake]

Woo it's finally started! We've just released the first episode of Wallace & Gromit's Grand Adventures, "Fright of the Bumblebees." Are you guys checking it out? What do you think so far?

We've got more at the W&G website, including Wallace & Gromit hints and walkthroughs for those who are stuck right out of the gate. (It's okay, we'll only mock you behind your back!)

Grand Adventures continues in May with episode two, "The Last Resort," followed by "Muzzled!" and "The Bogey Man." We'll have more about those guys in the near future. For now, enjoy!


Also, since we love deals, we have another one:
To celebrate the launch of the series, we're following up last week's crazy deal with an all new crazy deal. We're crazy, apparently! During launch week, the game bundle is marked down to $29.95 (usually $34.95), and when you buy W&G you can add as much other stuff from the store as you'd like into your cart, and it'll all be 50% off! This is a ridiculous deal, if you were curious.

[Rather Dashing]

Oh wow! That second deal could have actually saved me more money than the first, considering I've been very seriously considering snagging two signed prints.

Ah well. I jumped on the first deal. I suppose that's the way it works. =/

[Shwoo]

Originally Posted by download window

337 MB

Holy crap. I don't think my computer's going to like this very much. I'm on a download limit, too. I'm still going to download it because I really want the game, but the size just took me by surprise.

[Derwin]

Originally Posted by Rather Dashing

Oh wow! That second deal could have actually saved me more money than the first, considering I've been very seriously considering snagging two signed prints.

Ah well. I jumped on the first deal. I suppose that's the way it works. =/

Did you get the email yet? If you ordered the game through TTG, you should have gotten a 50% off code as well. Woohoo!

[Emily]

Originally Posted by Rather Dashing

Ah well. I jumped on the first deal. I suppose that's the way it works. =/

Actually, as a preorder customer, you'll be getting a 50% off coupon in the email that contains your download link. We wouldn't want to snub the early adopters, after all.

EDIT: Derwin beat me to it! Telltale, give that man a job!

[DefaultArtist]

sweet! I caught their ad on ShutterCal.com! So glad I found out about this, awesome!

[Derwin]

Originally Posted by Emily

Derwin beat me to it! Telltale, give that man a job!

You don't know how long I have been waiting to hear you say that.

I will be in the office tomorrow morning at 8:30 am. I would be in earlier but it is going to be quite a long drive from MT, and I figure I should only speed so much...

Back on topic, thanks for releasing the game like this. both releasing it a day early (based on your timezone) and providing a 50% off coupon code has made this one of the best TTG releases yet... and I haven't even played the full game yet!

[Rather Dashing]

Ah! My e-mail hadn't arrived yet. This is very nice to know!

Okay. Now I'm not considering holding off on Telltale games anymore out of some ominous fear of the strange forces of price volatility. =p

[azza29]

Originally Posted by Emily

Actually, as a preorder customer, you'll be getting a 50% off coupon in the email that contains your download link. We wouldn't want to snub the early adopters, after all.

Nice. Can we use the coupon on Strong Bad DVDs? I like to make my Australian pesos go further.

Also very impressed by the release timing on this, it's almost 6pm local time, I can play when I get home from work!

[McGoiter]

So does Peter Sallis play Wallace in the games as well? If not, I really can't tell any difference.

[Rather Dashing]

Originally Posted by McGoiter

So does Peter Sallis play Wallace in the games as well? If not, I really can't tell any difference.

It's not Sallis. It's his official back-up actor, though, so it's the next best thing.

[bpullen]

Originally Posted by Jake

Woo it's finally started! We've just released the first episode of Wallace & Gromit's Grand Adventures, "Fright of the Bumblebees."

Will it be possible to order and download a single episode or is it only going to be available as a full series? As far as I can see there's no way to pay for just the first episode at the moment?

[Bryko614]

EEK! Thank you for an early day release! I remember the first Strong Bad episode came out in the afternoon. I'll get a taste of the game now before I go to school.

[Laserschwert]

I've just finished the episode (took me around 4 hours) and I liked it a LOT. As with all season starts the puzzles were a little on the easy side, but I assume you'll slowly dial the difficulty up with each episode. Oh, and I liked the fact that you controlled Gromit just as much as Wallace.

The new controls were easy to get used to, and the resulting presentation was fantastic. I think you've refined the clay shaders and textures since the demo, right? They looked way better here... photoreal in some situations. What I liked a lot as well was the use of depth-of-field (especially in the hallway), although I hope you use it much more in the further episodes, as most of the close-ups could look even better through the addition of the effect. Altogether a visually stunning game... the best looking Telltale game by far.

The music volume was far better than in the demo, but still I'd prefer a separate volume dial for the music in the further episodes. Performance was near perfect on my AMD X2 4200 at FullHD (1920x1200) resolution and highest graphics settings... and that's already a dated PC.

Altogether a great start for the series. Looking forward to the next episode :-)

(Oh, and I loooooooved the ending shot over which the credits rolled... the perspective, the composition... and if the episodes are seamless, I wonder how they get out of that pickle )

[tobar]

Pretty much what Laserschwert said, but boy 1920? I thought my 1680 resolution was high! It was amazing, and having gone on a W&G marathon recently, it was fantastic to see how perfectly you were able to replicate their world (though I never had any doubts)! Awesome start to the series guys, can't wait until May for the next one!

[azza29]

So I've played through the first act, visual quality is far better than I anticipated, even after seeing the demo. Also, the inital puzzles are great, definitely at home in the W&G world. Unfortunately the game is locking up at the end of the act so I haven't been able to play further but the part that's worked is quite good so far.

[bpullen]

Originally Posted by bpullen

Will it be possible to order and download a single episode or is it only going to be available as a full series? As far as I can see there's no way to pay for just the first episode at the moment?

Hmmm, looks like I have my answer. Little bit miffed by that to be honest but I doubt it will stand in the way of me ordering the season.

[Armakuni]

Been playing it a bit now and I'm impressed. They captured the feel of W&G very well, and the graphics are better than I've seen in any Telltale game so far.

Just had to take a break since my hand was getting tired.

One thing I noticed - you can click on hotspots and the character will automatically go there... so the game already has some sort of pathfinding in there... ah well, I won't go into this again

[LittleBuddy]

oh, what a nice surprise, it's been released early ! I see some of you have already finished it and the impressions seem to be great, can't wait until this finishes downloading!

[ShaggE]

Gonna have to hold out for the 360 version on this one. The whole "buy it all at once" thing has caught my wallet off-guard, and the prettified engine will probably play even worse havoc on my low RAM than Sam & Max does.