Day of the Tentacle Remastered - hands-on at IndieCade 2015

It wasn't that long ago that Double Fine hit the gaming world right in the nostalgia button with the remaster of Grim Fandango. But while that game featured some modernized visuals, Day of the Tentacle is going in something of a different direction. Yes, Day of the Tentacle Remastered is an updated version of the original classic, but it appears to have retained its classic art style. Shacknews recently had a chance to try it out at this weekend's IndieCade event.

The demo starts off with the introduction of the game's main characters. Dr. Fred Edison and nerdy Bernard Bernoulli are in the present, briefly expositing on the time travel chaos that lies before them. Their method of time travel, the Chron-o-John, has malfunctioned, though they can still send small objects across the ages. That leads to Dr. Fred sending over a note to the portly roadie, Hoagie, who's stuck in Revolutionar War-era America. All the while, Laverne, the fourth member of the group is hanging on a tree outside, dangling by her underwear.

As one might imagine, the game's humor remains completely intact, right down to the voice acting and its impeccable delivery. The entirety of the demo's playable portion saw Hoagie talking with the Founding Fathers about their drafting of the Constitution, showing off the classic LucasArts dialogue trees at work. The adventure gaming element has been updated for the PlayStation 4 that was available, with players using a cursor to point at objects and then determine whether "use," "pick up," or select any available actions.

The demo was very short, timing out after about ten minutes, so it wasn't quite enough to completely any of Day of the Tentacle's numerous puzzles. However, it was more than enough to see that the story is still just as funny now as it was in the 90s. There's already a lot to love about Day of the Tentacle Remastered, especially the vintage art style. It remains to be seen whether the puzzles will still hit those same good notes, but Double Fine is certainly off to a good start.

Those attending IndieCade this weekend in Culver City, CA have their first opportunity to try Day of the Tentacle Remastered out until tomorrow. Meanwhile, those in the San Francisco area can see the game for themselves at the Day of the Devs event in two weeks. That festival will be open to the public.

Ozzie Mejia

Senior Editor

Ozzie has been playing video games since picking up his first NES controller at age 5. He has been into games ever since, only briefly stepping away during his college years. But he was pulled back in after spending years in QA circles for both THQ and Activision, mostly spending time helping to push forward the Guitar Hero series at its peak. Ozzie has become a big fan of platformers, puzzle games, shooters, and RPGs, just to name a few genres, but he’s also a huge sucker for anything with a good, compelling narrative behind it. Because what are video games if you can't enjoy a good story with a fresh Cherry Coke?