Czech computer games are currently one of the country’s biggest export articles, with games such as Mafia, Kingdom Come or Vietcong selling millions of copies worldwide. Now one of the top players in the Czech gaming industry - Amanita Design, is preparing a sequel to its most successful product.
Active since 2003, Amanita Design have released popular titles such as Samorost, Creaks, Phonopolis, but their most successful product is Machinarium from 2009. In it players follow the journey of the robot Josef (named after Josef Čapek, who coined the word „robot“), a small friendly humanoid wondering in a post-apocalypse world, surmounting dangers and solving puzzles.
“Machinarium is one of the most beautiful games I have ever played. Hand drawn graphics and breath-taking animations make the game immortal,” says gamer profile Ondda, one of the users of the game at the platform Steam, where the game is available for an official purchase and has a user score in the category “extremely positive”.
Let’s be honest, how many of you have let your child or a youngster you were taking care of to download a computer or mobile game, which was for free? Flashing content, ADHD tempo and frequent options for additional purchases while playing. That’s the price for simple and fast solutions. However, that’s not the philosophy of Amanita Design.
Amanita Design games are not flashy and don’t offer in-game microtransactions. Their focus is letting the player dive into the fantasy world and continuously improve problem-solving skills.
The huge success of Machinarium, which has sold over 4 million copies worldwide so far, motivated the team to prepare a sequel. Jakub Dvorský, who founded the Czech independent video game developing company explains:
“We decided to make the sequel, because we felt the time is right. It’s just a feeling you have that you must do something. We just wanted to enter this universe again after so many years.”
Machinarium 2|Source: Amanita Design
He says another significant motivational factor was the stable global fan base.
“Wherever I travel to a conference or on vacation, I meet people who say they have known the game for years or it is important for them. They might have grown with it or it helped them to overcome an important phase in their life.”
Dealing with extremely challenging situations in life is very close to Amanita Design philosophy and therefore they frequently donate money to the Czech NGO People in Need – Člověk v tísni. Dvorský explains:
“We have been cooperating with People in Need for some time already but only on their Ukrainian aid projects. Because it’s the most pressing issue for us.”
Machinarium 2|Source: Amanita Design
In the Machinarium sequel, Josef is on a quest with his partner Berta and the player switches among the characters. The background music forms a crucial part of their journey setting the atmosphere of a scene or praising the player for solving a puzzle. Tomáš Dvořák aka Floex is currently halfway through the process of writing the soundtrack.
“I have just opened the session and I'm working on a score. It's kind of a cutscene which is introducing some really important parts of the story.“
Floex is one of the most significant names within games soundtracks and compliments about him range from Indian ambient metal band Skyharbor, where their guitarist Keshav Dhar considers Floex his lifelong inspiration or electronic music icons Orbital, who prepared their interpretation of “The Glasshouse with Butterfly” one of the Machinarium tracks.
Machinarium 2|Source: Amanita Design
Tomáš Dvořák recently finished working on the Phonopolis game and now he can focus on Machinarium 2, which is for him a natural blend of electronic music and acoustic instruments. He specifies his artistic approach:
„I'm trying to be more musical, because compared to Phonopolis, it was much more abstract, so I'm trying to look for some important themes and to work with the core of the music. I also look for some more profiled sounds or instruments, rather more mature, so there are more symphonic sounds.”
Update your Steam wishlist and if you would like to learn more about Amanita Design portfolio, go to their website.
Machinarium 2|Source: Amanita Design