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Ron Gilbert Publishes Original Maniac Mansion Design Document
Ron Gilbert, co-creator/designer of Maniac Mansion, recently published the original documents that eventually brought the game to life.
Today on Grumpy Gamer Retro Madness: The Original Maniac Mansion Design Document: http://t.co/Js4AeiAuoa
— Ron Gilbert (@grumpygamer) July 21, 2014
You can find the documents on Gilbert's blog, Grumpy Gamer. Gilbert had apparently had been keeping the treasure trove of classic video game documentation in a storage locker he recently revisited. In today's terms, this would be a pitch document, used by Gilbert and co-creator Gary Winnick to get a greenlight to create the game. During that time, though, it was more of a document put together to just show everyone what they were working on, as opposed to trying to gain the permission to do so. On his blog, Gilbert writes, "I don't remember a point where the game was 'OK'd'. It felt that Gary and I just started working on it and assumed we could. It was just the two of us for a long time, so it's not like we were using up company resources."
We recently put together a big retrospective on the history and impact of Maniac Mansion, which includes interviews with Gilbert. You can read that feature here.
[Source: Grumpy Gamer]
Our Take
I love seeing documents like this. Maniac Mansion is a huge influence on many gamers and designers, and the opportunity to see it on paper at its earliest stages is very exciting.
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