Interviews

Interview With Dimitris Manos of The Inventory
Conducted by Randy Sluganski

About 3 years ago, I received an email from someone interested in creating an online adventure magazine and asked if Just Adventure could be the host. At the time, I was pretty ill and unable to write and more than welcomed the opportunity to add some new material to Just Adventure. It turned out to be a fortunate decision: the writer was Dimitris Manos and his online magazine, The Inventory, is now a worldwide success.

Dimitris is one of the adventure genres brightest young stars, besides being a top-notch promoter of the genre, he is also currently trying his hand at development. He has steadfastly refused to buckle under to the criticisms of others in the adventure community whose definitions of what comprises an adventure game depends on the developer. Quite simply – he plays no favorites. Dimitris is a very goal-orientated, driven individual and I appreciate his time spent not only responding to my questions, but also getting to know him a little better.

What inspired you to start an online adventure magazine?

I can’t really say that something inspired me to start an online magazine cause that was not the initial plan anyway. The Inventory was not meant to be a magazine when we started! What happened was that Yngvil Runde and I had formed an online club for adventure gamers in Scandinavia. Then I thought that it might be a cool idea to send out a monthly newsletter to all our members. But when I started adding material to the newsletter, the ideas just popped up one after the other, and in the end the final result was much more than a newsletter, it was a full blown magazine with previews, interviews and reviews

How many different languages is The Inventory translated into and how large do you estimate your current readership to be?

Right now The Inventory is translated in French, Italian and Russian, while we will probably have a Spanish version soon. We also have an agreement with the biggest Portuguese gaming site, PTGamers for articles exchange and some of the articles featured in The Inventory are featured in their website. As for our readership it is very hard to say, due to the fact that The Inventory is available through a number of sources. Apart from theinventory.org , justadventure.com and the three sites that host the foreign versions (www.planete-aventure.net, www.adventuresplanet.it and www.questzone.ru) The Inventory is also available in the CDs of gaming magazines in several countries (Greece, India and Bulgaria for the time being) so it is difficult to say. Unfortunately it is impossible to get feedback from all of the sources that provide the magazine so it could be anyone’s guess how many people read each issue, it could practically be anything from 40,000 to 100,000 readers.

You’ve so far released 23 issues of The Inventory. What have you learned during that time that you believe has made The Inventory better?

Well the first and most obvious improvement of The Inventory throughout these 2 years is the layout. This was apparently the biggest problem of The Inventory, since I was taking care of the layout personally and I had no training or education for this sort of thing. I have tried to improve however by reading tutorials and by taking a look at other professional magazines.

One more thing that I’ve learned is that you can’t please everybody. Trying to do so is a lost cause. Last but not least, I’ve learned that there is no such thing as an objective review. As for those that claim they write objective reviews…well let’s just say that if I were their spouse I’d be worried.

The Inventory has already earned a reputation for scoops – such as your exclusive screenshots from A Vampyre Story – how have you, in such a short time, already been able to earn the respect of so many publishers and developers?

It’s the parties I tell you. I give them a free weekend pass for The Inventory mansion and they give me scoops in return. Kidding aside, it is because of several reasons. a) The magazine reaches a wide audience b) It doesn’t just reach a wide audience, it reaches the right kind of audience. I know for a fact that many developers and most major publishers around the world read The Inventory every month. c) I have tried repeatedly in the past to bring developers in contact with publishers and I guess both sides (developers, publishers) feel grateful to me about that.

What do you like most about the current state of the adventure genre and what do you dislike the most about the current state of the adventure genre?

What I like the most is the large number of new development companies and the interest that some publishesr show in the genre, especially in Europe. The publishers there are really trying their best to give the genre a boost and there are many small developers who are working on great looking titles right now. What I dislike the most is the ‘bandwagon’ mentality. ‘Hey Myst sold a million copies. Let’s make a hundred Myst clones with lifeless worlds and loads of machinery.’ . ‘Hey Syberia sold well, let’s make a hundred Syberia clones with female leads and prerendered backgrounds’. ‘You know what, the Law and Order games sold well, let’s make a hundred Law & Order – clones with pre-rendered 1st person graphics based on a TV-series’. Some innovation would be definitely more than welcome in the genre. And when I say innovation I don’t mean action sequences or direct control.

Same question, but about the adventure community. What do you like and dislike the most about the adventure community as a whole?

The adventure community is really diverse and it would be difficult to describe it as a whole, but I will try to answer the question as best as possible. It’s also important to give a definition to the term adventure community. I assume that when we say adventure community we mean the developers, the publishers and the fans. So I’ll try to split my answer in three parts.

Developers: What I like most about them is that they are constantly trying to improve (House of Tales, Revistronic, Future Games, Razbor Studios to name a few). Each new title is better than their last one and this makes the adventure future look bright. What I dislike most about them is that most of the developers hardly aim for innovation (and just to make this clear again, when I say innovation I don’t mean keyboard controls or action elements).

Publishers: What I like the most about them is that they are gradually giving more and more adventure developers the chance to see their games sold in stores. What I dislike the most about them is that they often do not make certain that the products they publish are bug-free.

Fans: What I like the most about the adventure fans is their dedication to the genre. What I dislike the most about some adventure fans nowadays, is the blind faith they show to developers that once created a game they liked. It feels like if you make a good title, you might be able to say the most illogical thing and you’ll get away with it anyway.

What is your take on Tim Schafer's "Graphics Killed the Adventure Game" statement?

Let me answer your question with another question. What is your take on Robert Theobald’s “The millennium bug will have as big an impact on the global economies as the oil shocks of the 1970s” statement? I really think it’s counterproductive to talk about whether adventure games are dead or not and if they are what killed them. It is as redundant and outdated as talking about whether the millennium bug will cause havoc and mass hysteria. Anyway, you asked so I’ll answer. Adventures faced extinction during the end of the 90s, beginning of 2000. And for those who would like to know what almost killed the adventure genre…well here are in my opinion some of the most serious attempts to murder the genre back at that time:

- Grim Fandango
- Phantasmagoria 2
- King’s Quest 8
- Simon the Sorcerer 3D
- A bazillion Myst-clones produced by that time
- Monkey Island 4
- The guys who fooled Ken Williams into selling Sierra to them

The fact that Sierra and Lucasarts stopped producing adventures was a major blow for the genre. I mean, imagine if today Valve, ID Software and Rockstar Games announced that they would not create shooters anymore, wouldn’t that be a major blow for FPS games? It certainly would, even though it’s easier to create a good FPS than it is to create a good adventure game. If you are an FPS designer, you can come up with a new gun that can pick up objects and throw them at other people, and you’ll have FPS geeks screaming like little girls and worshiping you as the mega-developer of all times. Now compare that to …say…Le Serpent Rouge puzzle from GK3…. and tell me which one is the most difficult to come up with.

Coming back to the adventure genre…well the genre managed to survive each and every blow it received, it’s been recovering for a while and now it’s taking nice healthy walks in the park. Soon we expect the genre to start running again. Let’s see some of the developers working on adventures right now…Autumn Moon Entertainment, Telltale Games, Wicked Studios, Revistronic, House of Tales, Frogwares, Deck 13, Pendulo Studios, White Birds Productions, Microids …those are only some I could remember right now. Compare that with the developers working on adventures in 2000 and you’ll see what I mean. The genre never died and never will, so people… just move on.

You wanna know something that is actually dead? Creativity in the gaming industry. That’s dead with a capital D. Go in a games store and look at the titles there, it should be enough. Half of the titles feature on their box some tough-looking guys pointing a gun at you and the other half consists of licenses and RPGs. If someone would make a statement about “Graphics killing creativity in games”… now that would be something really interesting, up-to-date and exciting to read/comment upon

You seem to be very driven and goal-orientated. Can you provide us with some background info on yourself?

I was born on the 14th of November 1980, in a small city of Greece called Ioannina. Since then I’ve lived in 3 different countries (Greece, Wales and Sweden). I have a Master’s in information systems, but I’m not really keen on working with the field I’ve studied, I’d rather focus on game development. I guess though people are more interested in what I have done and what I am about to do more than who I am so we’d better move to the next question.

What is your definition of an adventure game?

A story-driven experience that requires from players to interact with the environment and with other characters and to think their way through problems and obstacles.

Do you think that the adventure community’s constant disagreements over keyboard vs. mouse, 3D vs. 2D, Myst vs. anti-Myst has hurt the genre or has it helped developers create better games?

I guess the conversations taking place in forums do not represent a very large chunk of the demographic. I mean gaming itself takes much time and most of the adventurers out there might not have the time or the will to participate in online discussions. Furthermore I don’t think that all the conversations online are very creative. You see forums with thousands of members, yet in most forums you usually get to read the same people expressing their opinions over and over again. I think scientific polls would be of better use to draw concrete conclusions about what adventurers really think on each of those issues.

The magazines in North America have not been kind to adventure games for many years, is it the same in Europe or is there more tolerance from European reviewers for puzzle-driven, thoughtful games?

You bet! Although I have to make a small distinction here between puzzle-driven and story-driven adventures. Puzzle-driven adventures don’t rate that high in European magazines either. Story-driven adventures however usually manage to get very good grades, some of the best examples I can think of are: The Black Mirror, The Westerner, The Moment of Silence and Runaway.

Your outspokenness and dedication to the adventure genre has found you in the center of a few controversies. Do you think your strong convictions have helped or hindered your career?

Neither I guess. The Inventory is going better than ever before, I’m preparing a very slick adventure site for the European market, and I have a job as a story-writer / game-designer so my career is going much better than I could ever wish for right now. I don’t think that the controversies I’ve been a part of had anything to do with it though.

Do you think that the future of the adventure genre rests with our Independent Developers?

No. I love the indie productions and the games produced by them, but to say that the future of the genre rests with them would be an overstatement. It takes LOADS of time to create an adventure game and developers would just loose interest if the financial return was not enough to support themselves and their families. Unless of course they find some way of gaining money for their work in which case I could see many of them making a great business in the future, but still I would not say that the future rests on the independent developers. There are loads of commercial companies out there doing a good job at creating adventures right now and they are getting better and better.

From your perspective, what are the main differences between the European and North American adventure gamer?

Obviously to answer this question I need to generalize and obviously there are exceptions to the rule, but I’d say that in general American adventure gamers enjoy puzzle-driven adventures more, while in Europe adventurers are more keen on story-driven adventures.

You had been working on an adventure game called Sealed Lips, but we have not had any reports for some time. Is the game still in development?

Yes and no. We had started Sealed Lips as an online project, with a team consisting of people from all over the world. We had two plans. First, we would try to find investors to help us with funding. If that wouldn’t succeed we would continue with development ourselves and get paid for our work when the game would be finished and we would start selling it. Both plans failed. But I’m still working on the script and the game design and I am trying to shop it around publishers and game development studios. If anyone is interested contact me at d.manos@theinventory.org

I understand you are currently working on an adventure game for mobile phones. Are you able to tell us anything about the project?

Certainly. The name of the game is The Exchange Student. It is going to be a pure adventure comedy game similar to the original Leisure Suit Larry adventures by Al Lowe, with some influences from the cartoon series Johnny Bravo as well. The most important inspiration however is taken from my encounters with exchange students the past 5 years I have been studying in Sweden. You will take role of Emilio, a 22 year old Italian student who is still a virgin. His best buddy Vicenzo has just returned from an exchange program to Sweden and he tells Emilio about the great time he had there and all the girls he met. Emilio decides to follow his friends’ path and goes on an exchange program to Sweden. I’m trying my best to get a well known developer who’s also a friend of mine to help me develop the game, but I can’t say who cause nothing is final yet. That’s all I can say for now. We will have more for the readers of JA when we start our PR campaign for the game, which by the way, is going to be massive.

Is there a market for mobile phone games?

Is there a market for mobile phone games? Certainly. As far as I know the Nokia N-gage (which is only one of the mobile phone brands that Magixoft is developing games for) has sold over a million phones. And trust me, not even one of those customers bought it for its phone features (which let me tell you, are mediocre at its best). Is there a market for mobile adventure games? That I do not know. But if there’s not, we’ll start one! It’s all about PR.

What’s the future hold for The Inventory?

Well The Inventory has reached a certain peak point and I don’t know how much it can be improved. It could of course use some improvements in the layout and maybe some more content. But my biggest dreams right now go far beyond The Inventory.

Thank you very much for the opportunity and for your work all those years within the adventure genre Randy.