The second act of Double Fine’s Kickstarted adventure Broken Age is on course for an early 2015 release, according to an update from the developer. The game’s second half is now a playable alpha for everything except for the big finale. According to Double Fine’s playtesters, the second act runs about eight to twelve hours.
“Now that we have all the writing and design finalized and VO recorded, the remainder of development is much easier to estimate,” wrote Double Fine’s Greg Rice. “So the production team is currently working to nail down a new schedule for finaling [sic] the game that we can use as a goal for the team and also share with you all.”
Double Fine seems confident that the second act is nearly complete: “The puzzles seem to be providing a good level of challenge, nothing is really standing out as needing to be heavily re-worked, and most importantly people are laughing a lot and seem really pleased with where the story goes.”
Broken Age tells the seemingly separate coming-of-age tales of Vella and Shay. You can jump back and forth between controlling these two protagonists as the story progresses. Act 2 promises to bring their disparate narratives together in some way, as those that completed the game’s first act likely suspected already.
The classic point-and-click puzzle-solving is powered by the charming and funny writing of Tim Schafer (The Secret of Monkey Island, Psychonauts). Digital Trends’ Adam Rosenberg gave Act 1 a ringing endorsement as “at once a declarative commentary on Double Fine’s precedent-setting approach to publishing and the vintage Schafer adventure we were promised.”
