Not too long ago we wrote about Double Fine finally being able to collect the funds from the crowdsourcing they did via Fig for Psychonauts 2. They have now posted an update on their Fig page along with video, offering a breakdown of where they are currently in the development of Psychonauts 2. Even though the funds have been approved and collected, fans who missed the boat on the campaign or people who are interested in investing in the game, a unique aspect of Fig versus other crowdfunding sites, they can still do so by visiting here. The video is hosted by Tim Schafer, the CEO of Double Fine, and the project’s Lead Designer, Zak McClendon.
The update video on their Fig page shows that the game is currently in the pre-production stage. A large portion of the work that has been done so far is translating Raz and the Psychonauts world into the Unreal 4 engine. The aspects that were shown to be more fleshed out were the distances and metrics in regards to Raz. This is paramount in a platformer in order for developers to correctly build worlds around the metrics and not be forced to rebuild them after realizing a metric was incorrect and a part of the level would become impossible or too diffcult.
In order to see how the world of Psychonauts would appear on next gen systems, the development team rebuilt Whispering Rock, from the original Psychonauts, in the Unreal 4 Engine. The development team built the test world from scratch, using the older models as a reference. The world of Psychonauts looks incredible in Unreal 4. The textures and environments just pop in this next gen format. In the video they make clear that this level is merely for testing purposes and that they have no plans on returning to Whispering Rock for the sequel. As Tim Schaffer puts it, “we built it to burn it.”
A lot of the finer elements of the game such as they story, the brains they plan on using, etc. are still in the works. One of the things that the dev team says they are holding off on is the combat. The reason behind this being that first they want to develop Raz’s new abilities and powers, then design the combat scenarios and enemies around them. The update video can be seen below. The full update on Psychonauts 2’s Fig page, where they go much more in detail, can be read here.