Archive of our old blog (2005-2010)
The second part of our postmortem of The Path is written mostly by Auriea and explains the design process that went into the game. From the uncertainty at the start of the project, over mixed experiences with collaborators, the inspiration of glitches and the importance of prototyping, to our ideas about 3D aesthetics and dealing with personal emotions in videogames. Illustrated with work-in-progress sketches and screenshots.
Thanks to the hard work of many volunteers, The Path has been translated in several languages. The following translations are available free of charge as a patch for the Windows version or automatically on Steam when you change your interface settings.
Once again, thanks to all the translators for putting so much effort into making The Path more accessible.
The language patch for The Path is a continuous project. We are working on more translations and will release them in an updated version of the patch as they get finished.
For the one year anniversary of The Path we’ve made a new version of our popular USB stick edition! This time in silver and printed with a picture of Robin. We only have 50, and of those 42 of them are for sale. We will not print this edition again so this is your only chance to get the Robin printed USB drive! This is a whole package too; you also get your choice of poster, a The Path sticker and the 6 Red Girl polaroid cards. You get both Mac and PC versions of the game, and lots of extras! (Yes, different extras than were on the PC only USB stick.) Check out the page in the store for more details!
We are also marking down prices on many of the other store items.
So, if you have been interested in The Path merchandise there has never been a better time to get something! It will be a lot of work for me to put these packages together, I put effort into making each poster unique, but I’m looking forward to it! 
The store sale runs until March 28th. But the Anniversary Editions will remain available until the last one is sold.
We have written an elaborate documentation of the production of The Path and will be publishing the article in 4 parts, as we proofread and finalize them.
A first introductory chapter summarizes the history of the project: How the idea started. When we got funding. And how long it all took.
In the next part, scheduled for tomorrow, we delve deep into the design of the game, followed by an overview of what went right and what went wrong, to conclude with a look at reception and sales.
We hope you enjoy the read.
The Path is one year old. To start the anniversary festivities, we are discounting all our titles by 50%!
For the next 10 days, until Sunday March 28, prices are:
One year ago, tonight, The Path was released from a bed in a room in a hotel in San Francisco, where Auriea and I first met in person, exactly 10 years before. To celebrate this double anniversary we’ll be revealing and announcing The Path related material throughout the week. So keep an eye on our blog, facebook, twitter or wherever you’re reading this!
Today is the anniversary of our collaboration. 11 Years ago, Auriea and I launched our first joint web site on the day when we met in person for the first time. Here’s a selection of one portrait, one project and one event per year.
| 1999 |  |  | Our DHTML love letters were presented on hell.com as a pay-per-view online exhibition, entitled Skinonskinonskin. |
| 2000 |  |  | The SFMOMA Prize for Excellence in Online Art was presented to us by Bill Viola at the Webby Awards. |
| 2001 |  |  | Our web work is featured in the bourgeois exhibition Belgisch Atelier Belge, among that of Belgian art superstars like Delvoye, Fabre and Tuymans. |
| 2002 |  |  | Tale of Tales is born during a research project at the Jan van Eyck academy. |
| 2003 |  |  | After their initial refusal, we convinced the Flemish Audiovisual Fund that they should support videogames, starting with our 8. |
| 2004 |  |  | Unsuccessfully pitching 8 to commercial publishers at the Game Connection in Lyon marks the start of our career as independent developers. |
| 2005 |  |  | At the Innovative Game Design symposium in Maastricht, we shelved our ambitions to become commercial game developers. Chris Crawford was there too. |
| 2006 |  |  | We presented the Realtime Art Manifesto at the Mediaterra Festival in Athens. |
| 2007 |  |  | We stopped resisting Web 2.0 and started the Tale of Tales blog . |
| 2008 |  |  | Showing The Path demo at the Independent Games Festival to hundreds of colleagues and fans was an exhilarating experience. |
| 2009 |  |  | We launched The Path at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts with live music by Jarboe and Kris Force. |
| 2010 |  |  | The Notgames initiative is an attempt to stimulate artists and designers to create interactive entertainment that is not games. |
Hover your cursor over the images for captions.
since The Path was released.
On 18 March 2009, we launched The Path from a room in the hotel where we first met exactly 10 years before. Get ready for celebrating the first anniversary of our six little girls and their very own big bad wolves! Expect an elaborate and revealing post-mortem/making-of, a special limited USB edition package, a nice discount on the regular download, an updated translations patch (now also on Steam!), an interview with a source of inspiration, news about the soundtrack, and of course an Endless Forest bathed in darkness and mist.
And we are not there.
Instead, we are at home, working on a new project. A project that doesn’t have a name yet. You can follow what we’re doing on Tumblr where we post some of the reference material that we’re collecting to inspire and inform the design.
We can’t say much about this project yet. Because we don’t know what it will become yet. We have a basic idea but that can still change. It has something to do with flowers, and with locks, and with diagrams of the universe, and with sex. It’s very different from any game we’ve made so far. There’s no story at its basis. There’s no characters. And it might even feel like an actual game -though we’re definitely applying the notgames dogma to this one.
We’ve also done something unusual with the design method. Auriea and I have split up. The new project consists of two very different parts. Auriea is designing one and I am designing the other. And then we’ll bring the two together.
The current phase is a prototyping phase that will run on and off until some time next year. This phase is supported by the Flanders Audiovisual Fund.
To all our friends at GDC: enjoy the event!
Now on the App Store: The Graveyard for iPhone and iPod touch. Only 1.99 US Dollars. A free Lite version will be available as soon as Apple approves it (release has been stalled a bit because they disapproved of your use of the word “Trial” and the reference to the full version in the description of the “Lite” one).
From the press release:
The Graveyard offers a player the opportunity to imagine themselves in a certain situation. It’s not a game in the sense that there is a way to win or lose or a puzzle to solve, or even a story to uncover. But the interaction does immerse you in a virtual world filled with narrative, an equally powerful feature of the medium of videogames. The iPhone version of The Graveyard is the same as the PC version. Only a few elements have been removed or simplified to allow it to run on the iPhone hardware. But the fact that you hold the game in your hand and touch it with your finger, adds to the sensation of fragility and preciousness.
Main Entry: welt·schmerz
Pronunciation: ˈvelt-ˌshmerts
Function: noun
Usage: often capitalized
Etymology: German, from Welt world + Schmerz pain
Date: 18641 : mental depression or apathy caused by comparison of the actual state of the world with an ideal state
2 : a mood of sentimental sadness
Weltschmerz (from the German, meaning world-pain or world-weariness) is a term coined by the German author Jean Paul and denotes the kind of feeling experienced by someone who understands that physical reality can never satisfy the demands of the mind.
The modern meaning of Weltschmerz in the German language is the psychological pain caused by sadness that can occur when realizing that someone’s own weaknesses are caused by the inappropriateness and cruelty of the world and (physical and social) circumstances. Weltschmerz in this meaning can cause depression, resignation and escapism,
the prevailing mood of melancholy and pessimism associated with the poets of the Romantic era that arose from their refusal or inability to adjust to those realities of the world that they saw as destructive of their right to subjectivity and personal freedom—a phenomenon thought to typify Romanticism
Weltschmerz was characterized by a nihilistic loathing for the world and a view that was skeptically blasé.
Main Entry: bla·sé
Pronunciation: blä-ˈzā
Variant(s): also bla·se
Function: adjective
Etymology: French
Date: 18191 : apathetic to pleasure or excitement as a result of excessive indulgence or enjoyment : world-weary
2 : sophisticated, worldly-wise
3 : unconcerned
synonyms see sophisticated
