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[IMG News]

NextGenBooks and author Darren Reid have announced that they are bringing an all new point and click fantasy adventure to Windows PCs, Macs, and consoles. Darren Reid’s The Half Broken Crown: The Broken Kingdoms is an all new game based upon the best selling author’s upcoming novel The Half Broken Crown. The game is a point and click style adventure which incorporates MMO elements, allowing all online players to communicate and solve puzzles through collaboration and cooperation.

The main game, being co-developed by James O’Hara, will feature over 100 unique screens and be a complete, self contained experience. Additional in-game purchases will open up episodic content that will increase the size of the game over the course of 2007.

The Broken Kingdom sees players working in the same world as Reid’s upcoming novel The Half Broken Crown, decades after the events in the book. The game is presented from a first person perspective and is heavily reliant upon puzzle solving rather than combat requiring players to work together in order to solve a series of scenes and puzzles.

“Of all my upcoming projects this is perhaps the one I am most excited about,” admitted Reid, “It is a unique opportunity for me to expand upon the [upcoming] book and to tell new stories.”

The game will be launched exclusively on NextGenBooks and be playable through internet web browsers with specific and individual versions designed for Wii, DS, PS3, PSP, PC and Mac. All console and computer versions of the game will be fully featured, however, the DS and PSP editions will not immediately support the multiplayer components of the game.

The game is due to launch in June 2007 with the the main game being free to play and additional episodes available for a small fee. Depending upon the level of content the episodes will range in price from $2.50 to $5.00.

Follow the links below to learn more about The Half Broken Crown: The Broken Kingdoms.

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[Matt Diamond]

That title sounds like something a half-broke author might come up with.  

[Eric5h5]

What is it with all this stuff breaking...crowns, kingdoms, and we also have "The Broken Hourglass"...you just can't get well-made goods anymore....

--Eric

[Mister Mumbles]

You mean, we still can't get any well-made goods. After all, we're talking about the semi-medieval age here.

[the Battle Cat]

Eric5h5, on May 29th 2007, 11:16 AM, said:

What is it with all this stuff breaking...crowns, kingdoms, and we also have "The Broken Hourglass"...you just can't get well-made goods anymore....

--Eric

At least they aren't CRYING about everything like those OTHER games.

[Janichsan]

the Battle Cat, on May 29th 2007, 09:54 PM, said:

At least they aren't CRYING about everything like those OTHER games.

It's pointless to cry about a broken crown.

[Matt Diamond]

Eric5h5, on May 29th 2007, 02:16 PM, said:

What is it with all this stuff breaking...crowns, kingdoms, and we also have "The Broken Hourglass"...you just can't get well-made goods anymore....

To be fair, the crown is only half-broken. Like, maybe it works, but it slides down on your head and you have to keep pushing it back up?

The author apparently has a previous book, "The Lord Of Darkness and Shadow", subtitled "The Chronicles of the Shadow". So Darren likes to stick to his primal themes, shadows and broken things, even repeating the keywords in the same title if necessary.

I also note that his book image for LoDaS (on his rather ugly website) says "The Amazon Bestselling Novel". As opposed to being a NYT best-seller, for instance. And the screenshots I saw for the game were quite garish and basic.

It's cool that he is able to publicize his work so effectively. If you google Half-Broken Crown you will see dozens of sites reprinting the same press release about the new MMO based on the "best-selling fantasy series". But the product itself all feels a bit amateurish and home-grown to me. I think he's cleverly exploited the format of press-releases as well as buzzwords like MMO and best-selling to give an inflated impression. That's how the marketing game is played, but I'm taking it all with a huge grain of salt.

Disclaimer: I haven't ready any of his work. For all I know it's brilliant stuff.

[Janichsan]

Matt Diamond, on May 29th 2007, 10:50 PM, said:

To be fair, the crown is only half-broken.

That's how you discern the pessimist from the optimist: the crown is either half-broken or half-whole.

But to add something meaningful: I wonder how they plan to release a "free" game for the DS and the PSP when these versions won't support online/multiplayer.

[teflon]

well, its episodic based, and it only includes MMO elements... take those away for a bit and its not quite as good (i assume)...

and anyway, it says that the DS and PSP will support online play eventually.