With only a couple of weeks to go until its release, The Misadventures of P.B. Winterbottom is looking like one of the most quirky, unique Xbox Live Arcade titles in recent memory. We were pretty curious about the pie-filled game, and couldn't wait until its February 17 release to find out more, so we shot some questions over to developers The Odd Gentlemen in hopes of getting some answers. And pie.

Why did you go with the silent film era as the inspiration for The Misadventures of P.B. Winterbottom?

I was a film major before I got into games.  I wanted to bring the charm of silent films to video games.  I wanted to tell a simple story without the aide of cinematic cut scenes.  In the era of silent films, stories were told with simple actions and title cards both readily available to me as a student designer.  
 
Were there any silent films in particular or notable silent film characters, that influenced the game?

The great actors of the silent films inspired me such as Harold Llyod, Buster Keaton and Charlie Chaplin. In terms of visual design, we looked at films like The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, A Trip to the Moon and Metropolis.
 
What will the gameplay consist of?

Winterbottom is a 2-D puzzle platformer where the player has the ability to record their actions to make time clones. With these time clones, Winterbottom can stand on his clones’ head, smack them around if necessary and be in several places at the same time. All of these gameplay actions serve a single purpose: eating delicious pie.

Each level has a different game mechanic revolving around the core recording features. In some puzzles, Winterbottom only has a limited time to collect pies before they disappear and thus must team up with his clones in order to collect pies before the timer strikes zero. In other puzzles, only his clones can collect pies and in other instances he must avoid his clones altogether as they become evil. The game has 75 puzzles in total.



The Misadventures of P.B. Winterbottom was developed by The Odd Gentlemen and originated as a student project. How did it make the transition from project to full-fledged game?

I was at The University of Southern California and working on my thesis project. The game started as a flash thesis project. As my thesis project progressed, we entered and won the student showcase at the Independent Games Festival in 2008.  It won the student showcase. We showed the game at the 2008 E3 expo through Indiecade and were able to lock a deal down with 2K Play.

After we signed the deal, we spent a year building the game entirely from scratch for XBLA. There is no magic button to port flash over to Xbox, so a good deal of work was involved making this happen. It’s been a quick and wild road of development but overall the journey has been amazing.

Why was this game a good fit for the Xbox Live Arcade?
 
While the game started in Flash for the PC, we always envisioned gamers playing it using a controller on a console. I think XBLA is a great spot to test out original IPs, and take chances with riskier game development, so it suits us well.  

Are there any plans to bring the game to other downloadable platforms if it performs well on the Xbox Live Arcade?

It is not out of the question.

Does P.B. Winterbottom have the potential for additional gameplay via DLC in the future, or is this intended to be a standalone adventure?

At the moment, the game is a standalone adventure, but that does not mean DLC is not a possibility in the future. Hopefully gamers will love the game and demand for more.

What, exactly, is the recipe for Chronoberry Pie?

A sprinkle of caramelized eternity, a dash of super string theory, a tad of Pi rounded to 3.14, but mostly blueberry. About three heaping cups of blueberries - fresh, not frozen.