Telltale Games

hansschmucker · 08/08/2009, 01:50 pm

This is not a petition. The decision to make a PSP version of this or any other game is entirely up to them, I'm simply thinking aloud here how I think a PSP version could work best.

If you want to discuss why a PSP version should or should not be done, please go this thread that DjNDB found.

Graphics
The thing about the PSP is that the screen is relatively low-res for its size. For example if the screen had the density of my cell phone's screen it would be around 800x480 pixels, but it's 480x272. That's not a problem for movies, but since the PSP isn't fast enough to enable antialiasing on even moderately complex scenes you get a lot of flickering for small objects.
However, there's a lot of storage available, so why not prerender the backgrounds? Sure, that sounds like you could only walk through static images, but hear me out:
The PSP has a pretty good h264 (video) decoder. And even considering that you would have to include most routes twice (you can't easily play a video backwards) one route like the pier that's roughly 20 seconds end-to-end plus 10 seconds for the side routes (to jungle, to ship) would end up around 3 MB for EXCELLENT quality. Add a Z buffer at high quality and it may be 5 for but never more.

Of course these scenes would have to be static. Having animated parts would multiply the size of the whole route by the number of frames.

Using realtime animation for certain elements (like actors) would usually look pretty horrible, but since the video decoding would take up far less processing time than rendering the scene, maybe there would be enough time to enable antialiasing on the remaining elements.

Put that all together and you'd get a pretty amazing package that would far exceed the usual standard of PSP games and would probably require less work than trying to make the scenes look good in realtime.

Sound
Well, no big surprises here. Midi would work out nicely.

Controls
For a PSP release the controls would definitely have to be adjusted. Hot spot selection would have to make a return.

The Rest
One thing you have to keep in mind on mobile platforms is that users often play for only a very short time. So add a summary of the current tasks to the pause screen, so that when a user returns, he gets a short reminder what he was doing before he left.
Also, autosave is crucial. Users zap in and out of games far more often on a mobile device than they do on a PC. So do a quick autosave when the user exits and when he returns, don't bother loading the menu. Just return straight to the pause screen with the aforementioned reminder.

Any other thoughts?

guitarsareboring · 08/08/2009, 01:58 pm

I doubt Telltale would ever develop games for the PSP (and probably not DS either) but I'd love to see some exclusives on those consoles. They don't really need to worry about the graphics - it's the humour and story that makes their games. I'm afraid I don't have anything useful to add to your suggestions!

LuigiHann · 08/08/2009, 02:01 pm

Clever thought on using video for pre-rendered backgrounds.

*DjNDB* · 08/08/2009, 02:22 pm

There is a PSP port thread in the support forum you might be interested in.

hansschmucker · 08/08/2009, 03:14 pm

Thanks, I've updated the first post with a link, so that people who want to discuss why a port should or should not be done can talk about it there.

LuigiHann, as much as I would like to take credit for it, it's not really a new idea, just one I think may be worth considering. That kind of thing has been done ever since CDs appeared. Final Fantasy 7 comes to mind, or Rebel Assault.

Ash735 · 08/08/2009, 03:25 pm

Quote:

Originally Posted by hansschmucker

Sound
Well, no big surprises here. Midi would work out nicely.

PSP can be coded to playback whatever audio type as long as the engine allows it, to be really honest, if the PC episodes stay around 200MB, then it seems perfectly possible to fit a whole season onto a Single UMD without compressing the audio even more or switching the music to MIDI based, it could still use the PC style of the higher captured OGG files.

And yes it does seem sad that even a PSP has a major storage advantage over the Wii.

SHODANFreeman · 08/08/2009, 03:29 pm

I think TMI would work really well on PSP, use the analog nub for movement and the buttons to move the cursor, left bumper could open the inventory and right could click on things.

PSP is just a little less powerful than PS2, and Wii is just barely more powerful than an Xbox, so the graphics from the Wii version would be roughly equal quality (considering how compressed they were to fit in 40mb in the first place) to what PSP could handle, given the smaller screen resolution and all.

Ash735 · 08/08/2009, 03:36 pm

PSP is actually weird, Developers can now use the full CPU power which now puts it past the PS2 in terms of power, combined with the Memory Stick (and soon to be Hard Drive) loading it pretty much puts the game reads and seek speed past the PS2 as well. Given that TellTale have squashed the game into a compressed mess for the Wii, doing a PSP versions would seem to have miles more freedom.

hansschmucker · 08/08/2009, 03:36 pm

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ash735

PSP can be coded to playback whatever audio type as long as the engine allows it, to be really honest, if the PC episodes stay around 200MB, then it seems perfectly possible to fit a whole season onto a Single UMD without compressing the audio even more or switching the music to MIDI based, it could still use the PC style of the higher captured OGG files.

And yes it does seem sad that even a PSP has a major storage advantage over the Wii.

Both would work. I was just mentioning MIDI since it's a good deal smaller while offering good quality. But in the end you'd probably use whatever is easier to implement, which would probably be AAC.

Ash735 · 08/08/2009, 03:40 pm

Console view, AT3 would be best for the PSP as that's what format it uses for menu sounds, clips, etc, and most games use that to, for example, the GTA games used AT3 for Cutscene Audio and the Radio Stations.

But once again, with a bit of tweaking it can play any format, ScummVM on the PSP is in a small way proof of that, barly using more CPU power to decode MP3, OGG and FLAC. That and the console itself by default has the codecs for WMA, MP3, AAC and PCM playback.

hansschmucker · 08/08/2009, 03:43 pm

Quote:

Originally Posted by Pale Man

I think TMI would work really well on PSP, use the analog nub for movement and the buttons to move the cursor, left bumper could open the inventory and right could click on things.

PSP is just a little less powerful than PS2, and Wii is just barely more powerful than an Xbox, so the graphics from the Wii version would be roughly equal quality (considering how compressed they were to fit in 40mb in the first place) to what PSP could handle, given the smaller screen resolution and all.

You think so? I am a little bit afraid that the imprecision of this setup, combined with relatively small objects could make this an issue.

Maybe it could be combined: The cursor moving mouse-style, but snapping to the closest hotspot if you let it rest for half a second.

Or the controls could be rewritten entirely:
Analog nub: Move. Focus on closest hotspot when movement ends.
L/R: Cycle hotspots, closest to farthest.
X: Action
O: Back
/\: Inventory
Start: Pause
Select: Menu

hansschmucker · 08/08/2009, 03:45 pm

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ash735

Console view, AT3 would be best for the PSP as that's what format it uses for menu sounds, clips, etc, and most games use that to, for example, the GTA games used AT3 for Cutscene Audio and the Radio Stations.

Atrac3... completely forgot about it ever since I gave up my Minidisc player

SHODANFreeman · 08/08/2009, 03:52 pm

Quote:

Originally Posted by hansschmucker

Maybe it could be combined: The cursor moving mouse-style, but snapping to the closest hotspot if you let it rest for half a second.

I think that would work pretty well in addition to the controls I mentioned, good idea.

Quote:

Originally Posted by hansschmucker

Or the controls could be rewritten entirely:
Analog nub: Move. Focus on closest hotspot when movement ends.
L/R: Cycle hotspots, closest to farthest.
X: Action
O: Back
/\: Inventory
Start: Pause
Select: Menu

That could work too but I wasn't very fond of that style of object selection in W&G on the 360, I much preferred the way the cursor was handled in S&M on 360, but maybe they could put in both control schemes?

hansschmucker · 08/08/2009, 04:07 pm

Maybe we could add a twist to the classical point-and-click walking system by making the player follow the cursor all the time, while keeping [ ] pressed would cause the player to stop following. It could still provoke the dreaded floor-not-visible issue though.

hansschmucker · 08/08/2009, 04:57 pm

Another idea: And if ToMI continues to have relatively few open spaces, it could work:

There could be rails that the player follows from hotspot to hotspot. So if you press left below the clothline, he will automatically walk up to the fire. Then if you press x, a cursor appears at the current player position, which you can move until you release the button. The player will then interact with whatever the cursor is pointing at.

Actually, now that I think about it, that could work without the rails. Just make the player walk with the analog nub and switch to cursor mode as long as he presses X.

bugzbunny90 · 08/09/2009, 11:22 pm

dont underestimate psp ..if they can port GTA and God of WAR ..monkey shouldnt be a problem..thats what iiiiiiii think

Kolgax · 08/09/2009, 11:58 pm

I doubt it's worth the headache. It certainly could be done...all the capabilities are there, but from what I hear programming for the PS2/PSP is kinda a PITA. I can see why they do Wii and XBOX (yes I mean 360) versions, but far less have PSP.

They'd then have to worry about publishing them to UMDs and such, whereas XBOX and Wii they can be just downloaded. And even if you did download it to PSP, (which would mean using a 1gb memory stick at least) how would you keep it from being pirated?

So...don't hold your breath I think. I happen to have one and I love it btw...before any of you accuse me of fanboyism.

I definitely wouldn't mind a portable telltale game.

hansschmucker · 08/09/2009, 11:59 pm

We're not, but that discussion belongs into the other thread linked to at the top.

Kolgax, I answered your post in the other thread.

SHODANFreeman · 08/10/2009, 12:06 am

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kolgax

They'd then have to worry about publishing them to UMDs and such, whereas XBOX and Wii they can be just downloaded. And even if you did download it to PSP, (which would mean using a 1gb memory stick at least) how would you keep it from being pirated?

Considering that when PSP Go launches, most (if not all) PSP games will be available as digital downloads on PSN, what you said here isn't true at all.

Kolgax · 08/10/2009, 12:08 am

Okay then - if you want to be stubborn, and you really want it to work...

The only way that I think it'd ever work would be for some VERY enterprising people to get together and make a team to create a TelltaleVM.

But like you said before, there's no good hardware reason it can't work - all the capabilites are there hardware wise...

08/08/2009, 01:50 pm	#1
hansschmucker Senior Member Join Date: Aug 2007 Posts: 945	How do you think a PSP version should work? This is not a petition. The decision to make a PSP version of this or any other game is entirely up to them, I'm simply thinking aloud here how I think a PSP version could work best. If you want to discuss why a PSP version should or should not be done, please go this thread that DjNDB found. Graphics The thing about the PSP is that the screen is relatively low-res for its size. For example if the screen had the density of my cell phone's screen it would be around 800x480 pixels, but it's 480x272. That's not a problem for movies, but since the PSP isn't fast enough to enable antialiasing on even moderately complex scenes you get a lot of flickering for small objects. However, there's a lot of storage available, so why not prerender the backgrounds? Sure, that sounds like you could only walk through static images, but hear me out: The PSP has a pretty good h264 (video) decoder. And even considering that you would have to include most routes twice (you can't easily play a video backwards) one route like the pier that's roughly 20 seconds end-to-end plus 10 seconds for the side routes (to jungle, to ship) would end up around 3 MB for EXCELLENT quality. Add a Z buffer at high quality and it may be 5 for but never more. Of course these scenes would have to be static. Having animated parts would multiply the size of the whole route by the number of frames. Using realtime animation for certain elements (like actors) would usually look pretty horrible, but since the video decoding would take up far less processing time than rendering the scene, maybe there would be enough time to enable antialiasing on the remaining elements. Put that all together and you'd get a pretty amazing package that would far exceed the usual standard of PSP games and would probably require less work than trying to make the scenes look good in realtime. Sound Well, no big surprises here. Midi would work out nicely. Controls For a PSP release the controls would definitely have to be adjusted. Hot spot selection would have to make a return. The Rest One thing you have to keep in mind on mobile platforms is that users often play for only a very short time. So add a summary of the current tasks to the pause screen, so that when a user returns, he gets a short reminder what he was doing before he left. Also, autosave is crucial. Users zap in and out of games far more often on a mobile device than they do on a PC. So do a quick autosave when the user exits and when he returns, don't bother loading the menu. Just return straight to the pause screen with the aforementioned reminder. Any other thoughts? Last edited by hansschmucker; 08/08/2009 at 03:12 pm.

08/08/2009, 02:01 pm	#3
LuigiHann Senior Member Join Date: Oct 2006 Posts: 2,660	Clever thought on using video for pre-rendered backgrounds. __________________ "I think it's the idea that counts, not the actual method. As long as you set out to cause a horrible death through insects eating the person, you're good." - apenpaap

08/09/2009, 11:59 pm	#18
hansschmucker Senior Member Join Date: Aug 2007 Posts: 945	We're not, but that discussion belongs into the other thread linked to at the top. Kolgax, I answered your post in the other thread. Last edited by hansschmucker; 08/10/2009 at 12:05 am.

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08/08/2009, 01:58 pm	#2
guitarsareboring Senior Member Join Date: Jul 2009 Location: Birmingham, UK Posts: 1,274	I doubt Telltale would ever develop games for the PSP (and probably not DS either) but I'd love to see some exclusives on those consoles. They don't really need to worry about the graphics - it's the humour and story that makes their games. I'm afraid I don't have anything useful to add to your suggestions!

08/08/2009, 02:22 pm	#4
DjNDB Community Moderator Join Date: Jan 2007 Location: Germany Posts: 4,747	There is a PSP port thread in the support forum you might be interested in.

08/08/2009, 03:14 pm	#5
hansschmucker Senior Member Join Date: Aug 2007 Posts: 945	Thanks, I've updated the first post with a link, so that people who want to discuss why a port should or should not be done can talk about it there. LuigiHann, as much as I would like to take credit for it, it's not really a new idea, just one I think may be worth considering. That kind of thing has been done ever since CDs appeared. Final Fantasy 7 comes to mind, or Rebel Assault.

08/08/2009, 03:29 pm	#7
SHODANFreeman Mute Ruler of Insects Join Date: Nov 2006 Location: Wisconsin Posts: 3,741	I think TMI would work really well on PSP, use the analog nub for movement and the buttons to move the cursor, left bumper could open the inventory and right could click on things. PSP is just a little less powerful than PS2, and Wii is just barely more powerful than an Xbox, so the graphics from the Wii version would be roughly equal quality (considering how compressed they were to fit in 40mb in the first place) to what PSP could handle, given the smaller screen resolution and all.

08/08/2009, 03:36 pm	#8
Ash735 Senior Member Join Date: Jun 2009 Location: Manchester, UK Posts: 1,149	PSP is actually weird, Developers can now use the full CPU power which now puts it past the PS2 in terms of power, combined with the Memory Stick (and soon to be Hard Drive) loading it pretty much puts the game reads and seek speed past the PS2 as well. Given that TellTale have squashed the game into a compressed mess for the Wii, doing a PSP versions would seem to have miles more freedom.

08/08/2009, 03:40 pm	#10
Ash735 Senior Member Join Date: Jun 2009 Location: Manchester, UK Posts: 1,149	Console view, AT3 would be best for the PSP as that's what format it uses for menu sounds, clips, etc, and most games use that to, for example, the GTA games used AT3 for Cutscene Audio and the Radio Stations. But once again, with a bit of tweaking it can play any format, ScummVM on the PSP is in a small way proof of that, barly using more CPU power to decode MP3, OGG and FLAC. That and the console itself by default has the codecs for WMA, MP3, AAC and PCM playback.

08/08/2009, 04:07 pm	#14
hansschmucker Senior Member Join Date: Aug 2007 Posts: 945	Maybe we could add a twist to the classical point-and-click walking system by making the player follow the cursor all the time, while keeping [ ] pressed would cause the player to stop following. It could still provoke the dreaded floor-not-visible issue though.

08/08/2009, 04:57 pm	#15
hansschmucker Senior Member Join Date: Aug 2007 Posts: 945	Another idea: And if ToMI continues to have relatively few open spaces, it could work: There could be rails that the player follows from hotspot to hotspot. So if you press left below the clothline, he will automatically walk up to the fire. Then if you press x, a cursor appears at the current player position, which you can move until you release the button. The player will then interact with whatever the cursor is pointing at. Actually, now that I think about it, that could work without the rails. Just make the player walk with the analog nub and switch to cursor mode as long as he presses X.

08/09/2009, 11:22 pm	#16
bugzbunny90 Senior Member Join Date: Aug 2009 Location: Blood Island Posts: 150	dont underestimate psp ..if they can port GTA and God of WAR ..monkey shouldnt be a problem..thats what iiiiiiii think

08/09/2009, 11:58 pm	#17
Kolgax Member Join Date: Jul 2009 Posts: 65	I doubt it's worth the headache. It certainly could be done...all the capabilities are there, but from what I hear programming for the PS2/PSP is kinda a PITA. I can see why they do Wii and XBOX (yes I mean 360) versions, but far less have PSP. They'd then have to worry about publishing them to UMDs and such, whereas XBOX and Wii they can be just downloaded. And even if you did download it to PSP, (which would mean using a 1gb memory stick at least) how would you keep it from being pirated? So...don't hold your breath I think. I happen to have one and I love it btw...before any of you accuse me of fanboyism. I definitely wouldn't mind a portable telltale game.

08/10/2009, 12:08 am	#20
Kolgax Member Join Date: Jul 2009 Posts: 65	Okay then - if you want to be stubborn, and you really want it to work... The only way that I think it'd ever work would be for some VERY enterprising people to get together and make a team to create a TelltaleVM. But like you said before, there's no good hardware reason it can't work - all the capabilites are there hardware wise...