RedBedlam has announced that early access on the Steam platform for Bedlam will begin on August 8th, granting access to two complete worlds of the game and providing a glimpse into the incredible “gameverse” created by the Brighton-based development team.
The game worlds are Starfire and Death or Glory, comprising 12 levels of gameplay; approximately one third of the game in total, giving players a real chance to get their teeth into Bedlam ahead of the launch in autumn.
The genre-hopping shooter, which parodies a selection of games from the 80s and 90s, represents a unique creative collaboration which has seen a novel and a video game developed concurrently.
Check out the Steam homepage on August 8th at approximately 21.00 (GMT) and get your hands on Bedlam.
To whet people’s appetites, ahead of the Beta access launch, RedBedlam is also hosting an exclusive event at BAFTA’s headquarters, 195 Piccadilly in London, on August 5th. The BAFTA Games Showcase will premiere the brand new trailer for Bedlam, followed by a game demo, then an interview with Christopher Brookmyre, author of the game’s best-selling companion novel. The audience will also have the opportunity to pose questions.
The session will provide insight into:
- ● How the project came about from fan email to author and how that then turned into a novel
- ● The creative process for taking a published novel and turning it into a video game
- ● The creative process between the writer and game developer to take the game to launch
- ● Making the decision to introduce a female lead for the video game
- ● How the book and game industries are working closer together
Afterwards there will be hands-on access to the game for the very first time, followed by a networking drinks reception.
In addition, everyone who attends will be eligible for a 50% Steam discount code for Bedlam’s early access, so it will only cost £6.50 (usually £12.99).
RedBedlam recently took a step towards redressing the longstanding gender imbalance in the FPS genre by announcing that the lead role in Bedlam will be a new character created specifically for the game.
In Bedlam, players will take on the role of Heather Quinn (aka Athena), a programmer at medical scanning developer Neurosphere who finds herself transported into the world of Starfire: a nineties FPS she remembers from her teen years. Searching for an explanation and a way home, she ventures beyond Starfire to discover a vast realm of interconnected game worlds documenting the evolution of the FPS genre and of video games in general.
Bedlam is adapted from the novel by Christopher Brookmyre, but diverges from the original in this change of protagonist. The novel’s hero, Ross Baker, does feature prominently in the game, but the switch to a female lead – who is a gamer and sci-fi fan – offered a fresh and bitingly humorous new perspective upon the “gameverse” that the player will explore.
Official Website: http://www.bedlamthegame.com
BAFTA Event: http://bit.ly/1mf8D6f
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