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This year’s lead post-mortem at GDC 2014 will be an extensive look at LucasArts, a pioneering studio that played a pivotal role in the development of adventure games.
Frequently associated with the Star Wars titles that became its lynchpin in its latter years, LucasArts has been responsible for unusual and original games, such as Monkey Island, The Dig and Grim Fandango.
Sharing their experiences of working at the studio during its early years will be six former LucasArts employees: Ron Gilbert, David Fox, Peter Langston, Steve Arnold, Chip Morningstar and Noah Falstein, who will also moderated the session.
Falstein was one of the first employees at Lucasfilm Games, as it was then known. Develop spoke to Falstein this week, and you can read the first part of our interview here.
LucasArts was acquired by Disney last year and shut down shortly after GDC 2012. But GDC organisers intend to take a close look at early days of this trailblazing studio and its IPs.
In its early days, the studio was known for experimentation, with early multiplayer (Ballblazer), first-person games (Rescue on Fractalus, Koronis Rift), the first MMO (Habitat/Club Caribe) and well-liked graphic adventures, such as Maniac Mansion, Zak McKracken and the Secret of Monkey Island.
GDC’s post-mortem will ask: ‘What mix of creative and business forces shaped this early success story?’ and ‘Could this kind of company be duplicated today?’.
Read the our interview with Noah Falstein for more on LucasArts.
