The Neverhood
The Neverhood is a 1996 point-and-click adventure video game developed by The Neverhood, Inc. and published by DreamWorks Interactive for Microsoft Windows. The game follows the adventure of a claymation character named Klaymen as he discovers his origins and his purpose in a world made entirely out of clay. When the game was originally released, it was unique in that all of its animation was done entirely in claymation, including all of the sets. The gameplay consists mostly of guiding the main character Klaymen around and solving puzzles to advance. Video sequences help advance the plot. In addition to being unique, The Neverhood aimed at being quirky and humorous, as is evident by the characters, the music, and the plot sequence. The game has garnered a cult following. It received a sequel in 1998, Skullmonkeys, which was a platform game, abandoning the adventure format of the original. Armikrog was later released as a spiritual successor to the game, developed by many members of the same team.
Gameplay
The Neverhood is a point-and-click adventure game which emphasizes the solving of puzzles through character action rather than inventory usage. Klaymen must use the available environment in order to advance in the game, with the standard inventory being quasi-absent. There are possible gameovers if the player is not careful enough, with one where the game cannot be restored from a previous save and must be restarted.Plot
The titular Neverhood is a surreal landscape dotted with buildings and other hints of life, all suspended above an endless void. However, the Neverhood itself is strangely deserted, with its only inhabitants being Klaymen, Willie Trombone, Klogg, and various fauna that inhabit the Neverhood. Much of the game's background information is limited to the 'Hall Of Records' which is notorious for its length, taking several minutes to travel from one end of the hall to the other.The game begins with Klaymen waking up in a room and exploring the Neverhood, collecting various discs appearing to contain a disjointed story narrated by Willie. As Klaymen travels the Neverhood, he occasionally crosses paths with Willie, who agrees to help him in his journey, while Klogg spies on them from afar. Eventually, Klaymen's quest directs him to Klogg's castle, and for this Klaymen enlists the help of Big Robot Bil, a towering automaton and a friend of Willie's. As Bil marches to Klogg's castle, Klogg unleashes his guardian, the Clockwork Beast, to intercept Bil. The two giants clash and Bil proves victorious, but as he forces open the castle door for Klaymen to enter, Klogg gravely injures Bil by firing a cannon at him. Klaymen manages to get in, but Bil loses his footing and falls into the void with Willie still inside.
Alone in Klogg's castle, Klaymen finds the last of Willie's discs, revealing the full context of his tale: The Neverhood itself is the creation of a godlike being named Hoborg, who created the Neverhood in the hopes of making himself happy. Realizing that he was still alone, Hoborg created himself a companion by planting a seed into the ground, which grew into Klogg. As Hoborg welcomed Klogg to the Neverhood, the latter tried to take Hoborg's crown, which Hoborg forbade Klogg from doing. Envious, Klogg managed to steal Hoborg's crown, rendering Hoborg inert in the process, and the crown's energies disfigured Klogg. With Hoborg lifeless, any further development of the Neverhood ground to a halt. Having witnessed this, Willie discovered that Hoborg was about to plant a seed to create another companion. Willie took the seed and planted it far away from Klogg, with Willie hoping that whoever grew from the seed would defeat Klogg: That seed in turn grew into Klaymen.
The story ends with Willie giving Klaymen the throne room key through the terminal screen, hoping that Klaymen knows what to do once he confronts Klogg. Afterwards, Klaymen manages to enter the throne room, with Klogg and a motionless Hoborg waiting for him. Klogg tries to dissuade Klaymen from reviving Hoborg by tempting him with Hoborg's crown.
From here, the player may choose to take up Klogg's offer or take the crown to revive Hoborg:
- If the player chooses to take the crown for himself, Klogg gloats at his apparent victory, only for the now-villainous Klaymen, crowned and disfigured, to instantly overpower Klogg and declare himself the new ruler of the Neverhood.
- If the player chooses to revive Hoborg, Klaymen distracts Klogg and manages to put the crown atop Hoborg's head, reviving him. As Hoborg thanks Klaymen, Klogg attempts to ambush them both, only to set off his own cannon which blasts him out of the castle and into the void. Returning to the building where Klaymen first started, Hoborg continues populating the Neverhood and orders a celebration when he is finished. However, Klaymen remains sorrowful over the loss of Willie and Bil, and Hoborg decides to use his powers to save Willie and Bil, and the game ends with Hoborg telling Klaymen "Man, things are good".
Development
After a year of work, The Neverhood was finally released to the public in 1996. The game elements were shot entirely on beta versions of the Minolta RD-175, making The Neverhood the first stop-motion production to use consumer digital cameras for professional use.
Soundtrack
The game's soundtrack was composed and performed by Daniel Amos frontman Terry Scott Taylor and went on to win GMR magazine's "Best Game Music of the Year" award. Tom Clancy's video game composer Bill Brown called The Neverhood Soundtrack, "The Best of any of them."Ports and legacy
A PlayStation port of the game titled Klaymen Klaymen: The Mystery of the Neverhood was made and released to Japanese audiences only. The game had some minor changes to the PC version such as longer loading times between rooms and the removal of The Hall of Records area. The Japanese release of Skullmonkeys, in turn, was titled Klaymen Klaymen 2.In June 2011, it was announced via Facebook and Twitter that some of the original developers of The Neverhood were negotiating for exclusive rights to release the game on modern platforms such as iPhone, iPod Touch, iPad, Android phones, Android tablets and Windows Phones.
As official support had ceased, e.g. updates for modern OS and hardware, a fan group created new compatibility fixes in the "Neverhood restoration project" in 2013.
On July 21, 2014, ScummVM version 1.7.0 was released by the ScummVM project which added support for The Neverhood, allowing it to run on many supported platforms including Linux, OS X, Windows and Android OS.
Reception
Sales
According to Leslie Helm of the Los Angeles Times, The Neverhood "won rave reviews" but was commercially unsuccessful. In early 1997, that paper's Greg Miller reported that the game's "sales have been slow and isn't even carried by all of the largest stores, including Target". This came at a time when big-box stores were increasingly important for securing sales, as many specialized video game retailers had closed due to competition with these outside companies. By August 1997, The Neverhood had sold 37,000 copies in the United States. Sales in the region had risen to 41,073 copies by April 1999, a figure that CNET Gamecenter's Marc Saltzman called "embarrassing".The Neverhoods total sales ultimately surpassed 50,000 copies, and "hundreds of thousands" of OEM copies were purchased by Gateway and pre-installed on its line of computers, according to Mike Dietz. It also received a huge fan base in Russia and Iran as a result of the massive bootleg copying and distribution of pre-installed games on computers.
Critical reviews
A Next Generation critic was pleased with both the visual style and the execution of the graphics, but found the game is held back by unexciting puzzles and a generally slow pace. GameSpot likewise stated that the game has endearing visuals but is held back by the puzzles. However, rather than being dull, they judged the puzzles to be unfairly difficult and frustrating, remarking that "Clues are so abstract they will lead you to despair." GamePro contradicted, "While some of the puzzles are perplexing, none of them have solutions so obscure that you'll burst a blood vessel trying to solve them." However, they agreed that the graphics and the personality of the characters are the highlights of the game. Weekly Famitsu gave the PlayStation version a score of 29 out of 40.The Neverhood was named the best adventure game of 1996 by Computer Games Strategy Plus and CNET Gamecenter, and was nominated for the latter publication's overall "Game of the Year" prize, which ultimately went to Quake. Gamecenter's editors wrote that it "went beyond anything seen so far in this genre". The game also won the 1996 "Special Award for Artistic Achievement" from Computer Gaming World, whose staff called it "the coolest-looking game of the year." While The Neverhood was nominated for the Computer Game Developers Conference's "Best Animation" Spotlight Award, it lost in this category to Tomb Raider.
Animation Magazines film festival "World Animation Celebration" awarded the game "Best Animation Produced for Game Platforms" in 1997.
In 2011, Adventure Gamers named The Neverhood the 35th-best adventure game ever released.