I had the pleasure of speaking with Markus "Notch" Persson during GDC (the full results of which you'll see on the site soon), and -- of course -- I had to ask about Psychonauts 2. Among other things, Notch revealed to me that he'd be having a face-to-face chat with Tim Schafer during GDC. It would be, I figured, a spirited dialog that'd be spoken of in awed whispers for years to come. Legends, epic poetry, interpretive dance -- all of these things would come of it. But then they, well, didn't.
So said Notch in a follow-up email:
"Nothing happened. [Tim] said, 'Well, we've got a lot to do for a while', and I said 'yeah', then we had a great lunch. But now we've met face to face!"So that's probably on the backburner for the time being. Which is understandable given the sudden surge of interest in Double Fine's Adventure project, but still a shame because Notch seemed optimistic beforehand. He explained during an interview:
"If they still want to do it and the numbers are reasonable –- if I think I might actually have a return on the investment and stuff –- I would love do it."
"I think Psychnoauts 1 did surprisingly poorly in sales, which is bizarre. Sure, it's kinda niche, but it has huge personality and only one bad level: the meat circus. So I think there's definitely room for a Psychonauts 2 to sell well. Especially now, because you could treat as not necessarily a triple-A project. I mean, you can't make it too small scale, because it needs to top the first one."That in mind, it sounds like a pretty great idea, right? But alas, it looks set to remain just that for now: a great idea, and little else. Well, here's hoping "a while" in Double Fine time translates to sooner rather than later.
