From Lamplight City to Rosewater – Francisco González GDC Interview

MonsterVine sat down with indie adventure game designer Francisco González of Grundislav Games at GDC this year to discuss the recent Lamplight City release as well as have a first look at his new project, Rosewater.

Samantha Lienhard, our reviewer for Lamplight City had a couple of questions about the game and the new project you’re working on. One of the things she mentioned was what she loved from Lamplight City was Bill’s role, especially in how it avoided the typical protagonist talking to himself narration that appears in adventure games. What inspired that aspect?

That was basically trying to figure out how best to convey the fact that Miles was hearing Bill’s voice. In the early iterations, when you hover a hotspot, you hear whispers or a heartbeat. Very Edgar Allen Poe style. But then I thought of other adventure games where there’s a second person narrator. And comedy games like Space Quest, for example, or the Leisure Suit Larry games. Sometimes the narrator and protagonist would have these fourth wall breaking comedy conversations. So, I thought if Miles is constantly hearing this guy’s voice in his head it would make sense that to convey that to the player. Just have him be the narrator. If I had moments where they talked to each other, it wouldn’t be a comedy fourth wall breaking thing. It would be a dramatic, oh, this guy is having a mental break. That’s kind of where it came from. Taking that old troupe and doing something a little different.

Will you be able to accuse the wrong suspect or declare a case unsolvable in Rosewater like you could in Lamplight City?

No because Rosewater is actually not a detective game. Rosewater is what I am calling very originally an adventure game in the sense that you actually go on an actual, grand adventure. Its a point A to B journey story with some twists and turns. It’s not a detective story although it is set in the same world of Vespuccia.

Aside from the setting, what is going to be the biggest distinction between your previous game and Rosewater? What things are you bringing new to the table?

A few things. One its double the resolution of Lamplight City. Lamplight City was 640 by 400. This game is 1280 by 720 so its actually 720 but its still pixel art though as you saw. It’s not a detective game. I’m bringing back inventory. There will be inventory puzzles. It’s a different genre. It’s a Western. It’s a lot brighter and sunnier than Lamplight City although there will be night scenes in Rosewater.

You started development in January. Do you have a target deadline or when you expect to get this out based on your experience working on these types of projects?

Lamplight City took about me about two and a half years. I want to try and get Rosewater out in less time than that. I want my maximum to be two years. Of course things happen and things change and things never take as long as you want. My goal is to try and get it out maybe early 2021. We’ll see.

I’m curious about these types of projects because you go through iterations. Are you completely starting from scratch or working off existing assets and re-purposing out for new games?

No, working completely from scratch. I’m drawing brand new backgrounds, brand new characters, brand new everything. I sort of took some of the cursors like the mouse cursors from Lamplight City and had to redesign them for higher resolution. Basically trying to get the design done and solid as soon as possible. And get the game playable as soon as possible and then worry about the assets.

How big is your team currently?

It’s me right now and my writing partner and personal partner, Jess Haskins. She is my dialogue consultant and script editor in Lamplight City but she’s taking more of an active role in the writing. She’s actually helping me out brainstorming design stuff and write the dialogue a little bit more this time around. So it’s really just the two of us right now. I spoke to Mark Benis, the composer from Lamplight City. He’s interested but we haven’t finalized anything.

For more coverage of Rosewater, Lamplight City, and its publisher Application Systems Heidelberg stay tuned to MonsterVine.