Aptly named Return of Alice, American McGee's next twisted Alice game is shooting to outdo the original. EA Partners said they went to McGee because he had a passion for the IP and gave him a blank canvas to work with.

And just look how he's started to fill that canvas.

[Thanks VenDeath]

"We've given him a blank canvas to go where he would like," said David DeMartini, Electronic Arts Partners chief. "There is nothing set in stone and nothing has been removed either."

Writing on his personal blog today, McGee said that the sequel to American McGee's Alice, currently named The Return of American McGee's Alice, will have the same writer and executive producer as the original game.

"The original Alice was a good bit of fun - and aspects of the original are still quite compelling," he wrote. "The challenge for us - to build a great game, and a sequel worthy of the original - is real, but not daunting.

"For me, this is a dream come true."

It could be for Electronic Arts Partner label as well.

Although the current project is part of a single game contract, it doesn't mean that collaboration won't lead to other titles down the line, DeMartini said.

"We are really having him focus on this one for now," he said. "Letting him create as strong a game as he can."

But if the game does well, it could lead to future projects.

DeMartini said that there currently aren't any plans to bring the original Alice out of retirement, even as a port for the Playstation Network or Xbox Live Arcade, but that it "wasn't a bad idea."

He added that while the new Alice project, which isn't connected in anyway to the film that has been in the works for yeas, is being developed for the PC, Playstation 3 and Xbox 360, that doesn't mean it will never come out on the Wii.

"It is possible we would revisit that," he said.

"People loved the original game, loved the gameplay," he said. "It was highly creative and interesting."

When EA Partners started thinking about returning to Alice, they "felt that there would be no better place to turn than to the original creative force behind the first game," he said.

"The first place we turned was to American and American shared a passion for the IP and he's had eight years to think about it."

Currently titled The Return of American McGee's Alice, the game is still in pre-production and "won't be completed for some time." The game is in development for the PC, Playstation 3 and Xbox 360.

"This new project is a dream come true for me and the fans who've kept the Alice flame alive," said American McGee, senior creative director at Spicy Horse. "EA gave us creative latitude and support on the original game which resulted in something beautiful and daring. This trip through the looking glass promises to be even more exciting."

"EA Partners is thrilled to team up with American McGee and Spicy Horse on the next installment of the Alice franchise," said David DeMartini, senior vice president and general manager of EA Partners. "American McGee's interpretation of Alice was an instant classic, and EA Partners is ready to help him bring his innovative vision for the franchise to even darker, more exciting places."

What are you hoping for from this game? A rework of the original? New ground broken? Multiplayer?

We’ll get to her later. For the time being, she’s the impetus that spurred McGee to start frequently visiting Hong Kong and eventually fall in love with the city.

McGee first cut his teeth at id Software, working on the first two DOOM and Quake titles. After turning out the seminal American McGee's Alice, while working for EA, he was looking for an opportunity to work in the region he loved. All he needed was a chance.

"A chance did present itself — the making of Bad Day LA," McGee recalls. "I can’t say now that it was the 'right' chance in terms of the project — what a stinker. But it did get me into the region and taught me a mountain of lessons about game production in China...and in general."

Back in the States, McGee had set-up his own company, but he found himself in China, exploring Hong Kong and Shanghai and befriending ex-pat business entrepreneurs. With the debacle that was Bad Day LA behind him, McGee got something few get: a second chance.

Online game service GameTap offered McGee the opportunity to do Grimm, inspired by the German fairy tales, as an episodic title just as he was helping an Australian friend, art director Ken Wong, start an game art outsource studio in Shanghai. (Wong befriended McGee after sending the game creator Alice fanart — McGee later asked Wong to do art for the eventually canceled American McGee’s Oz.) "All roads led to China," says McGee.

McGee left everything in America behind: his car, his possessions. "I reduced my life down to two suitcases, a laptop, and a cat," he says. "Voluntarily losing everything and starting again from scratch is a powerfully cathartic experience. If you want to feel at home in a new place, make sure you burn down your old place first."

Those first days living in Hong Kong were rough. Two years of previously back-and-forthing between the States and Hong Kong, aka "China-light," helped buffer the initial culture shock many new comers feel. "The difficulty of adjusting to a place like China is all about how flexible a person is," says McGee. "I see a lot of foreigners come to Shanghai and get bent out of shape because they think the world here should operate exactly as it does back home."

It was 2007, and China was buzzing — with optimism and energy. "Chinese contemporary society is like a whirlwind," says McGee’s business partner and art director, Ken Wong. "It seems to have changed in 10 years as much as America has in the past 40." McGee and Wong, started boutique studio dubbed “Spicy Horse” or “Ma La Ma” in Chinese. Initially, they worked out of their homes on an island off the Hong Kong coast. "We moved into some really low-rent warehouse space in Shanghai upon our initial landing in the mainland," says McGee. "From there we moved a few more times, ever growing the company, taking on more people, and evolving the culture."

Making Grimm in China did present it’s own set of unique challenges. "For me, the biggest challenge was pushing a Chinese art team to work together and be creative on subject matter and in an art style they were totally unfamiliar with," says Wong. "It’s a tall order for any young art team that has never worked together, let alone one who grew up with cultural revolution and dubbed anime rather than Bugs Bunny, the Jetsons, and Little Golden Books."

There weren't just culture differences to contend with, but linguistic. Being immersed helped, and McGee kept plugging away. "One of the biggest challenges in a language like Chinese is that there are no 'anchor points' such as those an English speaker might find in French or Spanish." So while in English speakers can take a stab at words in European languages, there isn't the same learning curve for Chinese. "If you don’t know a word, you simply don’t and no guessing will help you grok it."

Language wasn’t the only difference. While packaged titles rule in the West, China is different. "There’s no such thing as 'box product' game – everything is online," McGee points out. So publishers here are all about online. And many of them have made a massive fortune online — but usually with only one or two successful games." Because of that, innovation is pushed to the side by the laziness that success brings.

"In general they’re resistant to innovation, despite the fact they’re sitting on huge piles of money," says McGee. "Their organizations might be huge, but there’s not a lot of creative direction where it counts — in the trenches. These days, he concedes, things are, like with the rest of the country, changing and fast.

The game industry in China is still growing, still young, still hungry. "As the public becomes more discerning and computer specs in internet cafes increase, I think they will demand higher quality and more creativity from Chinese developers, who from my perspective, are adept at churning on casual games and MMOs, but with little innovation," says Wong. While, for some, China still strikes images of sweatshops and grossly underpaid laborers, the game business could not be further from those stereotypes. "The truth is, in our industry, we’re working with top talent — people who demand and deserve world-standard wages, inspiring work environments, and a guarantee that their efforts are protected by reasonable production practices and solid development processes," says McGee.

"If you come to China hoping to make world-class games on the cheap, then you’ll fail. Product development here takes every bit of care, creativity, and compassion as it does elsewhere," says McGee. "You don’t get that sort of stuff 'cheap'. People who ignore this, whether in China or elsewhere, fail at their endeavors — deservedly.

I read a lot of bigotry and racism in people’s comments about China, the Chinese workforce, and working conditions. People comment on 'slave labor in China', talk about 'backward China' and spew other unfounded hate. These aren’t just misconceptions about the industry — but about the country and its people in general."

Spicy Horse expat hire Clifford Chin and junior producer adds, "Sometimes I have to deal with a stigma or prejudice from some other people within the industry who don’t know what we are doing here at Spicy Horse or in China. A lot of people still think I work for an outsourcing company and there’s definitely a negative connotation when you hear the word outsource."

In comparison to the hours that many in the game industry clock, Spicy Horse workers have it good: Monday to Friday, 8 hours a day. To date, the company hasn't had a crunch period or a work-weekend. "I attribute this to our strong production processes," says McGee, "and the dedication of the development team."

The Spicy Horse employees sing the company’s praises. According to lead level designer SunYiMing, who’s been in the industry over 5 years and worked for a Western developer, "It is quite different from working for some big company that there is no 'big shot' who knows little, but decides a lot. Everyone feels free to express their own ideas." Fellow level designer JiFeng chimes in, "American's an affable boss, and kind to everyone."

There is a solid mix of Western expats at Spicy Horse and Chinese team members. Expat Spicy Horse hire Olivier Leroux explains, "The team is international. Because of the differences of culture which you need to overcome, I feel there is a possibility to grow both professionally and as an individual."

For American, the future is China. "I’ve said it before, but I think it’s worth repeating: The international development community should keep an eye on China. As the development community here learns (and does so quickly) and finds more outlets into Western markets, it will become a proper and powerful contender with established Western studios and publishers." The experience has changed him — as business partner Ken Wong points out: "American seems happier and more content these days. China seems to provide enough adventure and inspiration for him, while building the company keeps him grounded."

China maybe the future for the gaming industry, but not necessarily McGee. The developer is settling into Shanghai for the next couple of years, but eventually, he might feel that need to unroot and start from scratch all over again. Thailand, Vietnam or even possibly Africa. "I’d like to make another 'great game' — if I can," says McGee. "If in the next few years I can’t manage that, then who knows, it might be time for something different. But that 'different' wouldn’t be complete if I just came back home. I hope to keep exploring, traveling, and finding new challenges."

And what ever happened to that girl McGee followed all the way to Hong Kong? "The girl...she and I are still friends, but we eventually went our separate ways. These days she’s still in Hong Kong, happily married, etc. I’ve since found myself another nice Hong Kong girl to spend my days with. Oddly enough, her name is 'Alice.'"

Those interested in checking out more photos of the Spicy Horse offices, do visit American McGee's flickr.

For one, it’s the first Chinese cart racing game developed with an authentic and original Chinese art style, set in real-world locations, and featuring some of the funkiest racing vehicle designs the world has ever seen (inspiration coming from actual Chinese vehicles).

And...yeah.

BaiJiu Racer Concept Announcement [American McGee, via Gamasutra]

I think we'll continue to see updated interface devices at the forefront of the mini-revolutions in the years to come. Ultimately, I think this is all heading to one uber-revolution in the shape of seamless computer-human interfaces, ala The Matrix. It'll be great to get away from the dated keyboard/mouse, monitor, speakers way of interfacing with our content. As soon as someone starts offering trial "implant" testing — I'll be first in line. I just hope I don't crash my brain, it would take a lifetime to reinstall everything.

As you may have heard, Grimm is going to be an episodic game, with new episodes appearing every week. Episodes will be free for the first 24 hours and from there you can either purchase them individually from GameTap.com/grimm or get them free via a gold GameTap subscription. Each episode will take on a different fairy tale (some well know and some not so well known) with the first being “The Boy Learns What Fear Is,” and others to follow including “Red Riding Hood” and “The Girl Without Hands.”

In the game, you take on the character of Grimm, an evil little troll who is sick of the happy endings that most fairy tales seem to have. So he takes it upon himself (and you) to wreak as much havoc as possible on the rainbow colored fairy tale worlds. Each episode starts out with a “puppet show,” with Grimm telling you the good version of the tale. Once the show is over, you are set loose in the land of the story to see exactly how much of it you can turn dark.

As you run about the darkness spreads around you, turning everything into an outlandish Tim Burton-esque kooky, spooky world. What makes this extra fun is that everything in the world has a light and dark form. The shiny hatchet in the corner turns into a bloody headsman’s axe, the bucket of water turns into a bucket of blood, the pretty princess turns into an ashen zombie and all it takes is a little running and jumping on Grimm’s part. As things turn uglier, your dark meter goes up, allowing you to reach a wider area and turn larger and larger object into their darker selves. But beware, do-gooder NPC’s are on hand to try and clean up the mess you’ve made! Give a good butt stomp near them to send them into a daze and gain enough darkness to eventually turn them over to the evil side. Once you are all finished you are presented with another puppet show, this time showing you the darker version of the tale.

Grimm has a great, simple graphical style but don’t let that make you think it’s a game for kids. This is a very twisted world and the game will have an M rating. The humor is quite black and may have some players scratching their heads but those of you with a sick sense of humor will absolutely love it. The keyboard and mouse controls are simple and easy to use but if you tend towards the controller, you can use any USB controller at your disposal (including the 360’s). Each episode is short and can be completed straight through in about 30 minutes, but there are plenty of reasons to go back and replay the levels including secret items, power-ups, beating your time and the simple pleasure of seeing everything turn scary. Since it is being powered by the Unreal Engine and the graphic style is very simple, it allows for a lot to be crammed in to a very small space and they take full advantage of it.

The first episode of Grimm, “The Boy Learns What Fear Is,” launches absolutely free for the PC on July 31 with the remaining seven episodes of Volume One appearing each week thereafter. Two more volumes of eight episodes each will also be available at a later date. No price for the individual episodes has been announced yet. If you like your games with a sickly humorous edge, be sure to give Grimm a try. It’s clever, fun, looks great and most importantly, twisted as all hell.

American McGee's new Spicy Horse Studios is on the hunt for a "dark cartoon" concept artist for their upcoming game based on the dark side of Grimm's Fairy Tales. The ad calling for talent showed up on McGee's Flickr photo gallery a few days ago and was spotted by Kotakuite, Joe. It outlines the types of styles they are looking for which is dark and spooky as opposed to bloody and gory. The list of applicable influences include the likes of Tim Burton, Tim Biskup, Dave McKean, Maurice Sendak's Where the Wild Things Are and McGee's own Alice. You can send your appropriately creepy samples or links to ken@spicyhorse.com.

A full sized version of the ad with all the trimmings is available for perusal at American McGee's Flickr Gallery or you can see it on American McGee's Blog. Flynn De Marco

Epic Games has formed a Shanghai-ased outsourcing division to come up with assets for its games, as well as third-party developers. The idea is to use the skilled communist working class to cheaply make assets that you normally have to pay twice as much for if you hire an American or stinking European.

How well is it going to work? I'll let American McGee answer that question, talking about the advantages of using English-illiterate meat puppets with no autonomy of their own to help develop a game.

U.S. game development teams are really creative, brilliant, innovative—and they're really headstrong. A guy that I'd hire to be a junior artist would try to force an idea into a game and hijack the production, throwing a major monkey wrench into the process. That's the Western development team. It's the opposite with the Chinese team. If you come up with a good idea and you give them good direction, they'll stamp it out. Problem is, they will not deviate a f***in' inch from what I say. So the challenge is coming up with enough of a good idea, and...like, I find my days are now 80 percent just giving directions. And it's really frustrating and really annoying and boring, but it works. Otherwise, I've had people following orders until there was nothing else to do. They just sit there and stare at the screen.

How well did employing brainless automatons with no inspiration of their own to help balance out American's pedestrian 'vision' work out for him? Check it out for yourselves. Florian Eckhardt

Epic Games forms Shanghai-based outsourcing division [Gamesindustry.biz]

American game designer American McGee has offered up his two cents on the next-gen war, pitching his tent in Camp Nintendo. Speaking in a yet unpublished interview with game site CVG, the seasoned industry vet says:

I sense that Nintendo is going to capture the hearts of gamers while Microsoft and Sony stab each other in the neck for market domination. The only true next-gen console out there is the Wii. Everything else is just a video card and processor upgrade.

When not alienating Sony and Microsoft, McGee is gearing up for the release of his natural disaster game Bad Day LA for the Xbox and the PC. Brian Ashcraft

More Here [Next Gen]