When Dvorský began creating games, he did so in an environment that was very different from his parents, and he admits to being lucky in this regard. I was a fairly typical dark-romantic kid, I guess.” I also read many science-fiction books, listened to death metal records, drew maps and bizarre castles, and spent time camping in the wilderness.
“I started with 8-bit games but got seriously hooked later with early PCs, adventure games, and dungeon crawlers. “I was a gamer as a kid but never a hardcore one,” he says. Still, that free-form thinking would soon define Dvorský’s approach to his art. Even so, it took three years to get the game ready for release in 1997 because the pair couldn’t settle on a genre. He’d combined genres and styles that he liked at that time, “and, surprisingly, it kind of worked,” he says. That game was Asmodeus: Tajemný kraj Ruthaniolu, which Dvorský designed with Marek Floryán. “A year or two later, I was already a game designer working on my own project, a combination of a dungeon crawler and adventure game with half hand-drawn graphics and half pre-rendered 3D.” “At first I worked as an animator, helping my friends with their point-and-click adventure game,” he says referring to his time at the indie studio, NoSense. “I felt that was my way as well I knew I was unemployable.”ĭvorský’s game-making career began when he was 15 years old. “They were freelancers, even in communist Czechoslovakia when the state employed 99% of working people and it was very uncommon,” the 42-year-old says.
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I was free to do what I felt like doing.”ĭvorský grew up in an unconventional household, at least by old Czech standards. “They never taught me any artistic skills and never pushed me in any direction. “My parents taught me a lot, but not directly,” Dvorský says. This artist-led way of working is partly thanks to Dvorský’s mother, who was a film director, and father, who was an illustrator. Where that path takes them all is part of the excitement. If an idea sounds great, or if Dvorský encounters a team producing something special, he’ll give the go-ahead or make an approach. These games are part of an ongoing artistic evolution where little is planned in advance. It still needs a lot of work, and we haven’t even announced it officially yet.” “But it’s too early to talk further about this game. “Phonopolis is being developed by a new team who’ve brought yet another art style to our studio,” says Dvorský. Phonopolis is also in the works: a puzzle game designed by a three-person team which makes use of handmade paper models, which are then photographed and turned into animated 3D objects.
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Happy Game is due for release in the spring, and it’s demanding the studio’s full attention – “I’m quite busy these days,” Dvorský says – but then, these are exciting times for Amanita.
We encourage him to do so and help him to realise his vision, no matter if it’s happy and playful or scary and disturbing.” Wild Times Jára doesn’t plan and mull over things too much he just creates. “This time he’s created something much darker – we really don’t know what’s going on in his crazy head. “It’s going to be Jára Plachý’s latest game,” says Dvorský of the developer he’s worked with for over a decade. Announced at Nintendo’s Indie World Showcase in mid-December last year, Happy Game is far less jolly than its title implies. Happy Game, on the other hand, will take the studio into slightly less family-friendly territory. But their games also defy a number of genre conventions, taking players on wordless journeys that let their worlds and the thoughts of their tiny characters speak for themselves.
Amanita’s games are mostly point-and-click adventures and share an enchanting style, both in their art and sound. The studio’s passion is such that its games aren’t released until they’re deemed as perfect as they can be. And it’s a sense of creative freedom that has underpinned the success of his studio for more than 17 years.įrom Samorost to Machinarium and from Botanicula to Chuchel, Amanita’s games are carefully engineered mixtures of the natural, the industrial, and the downright surreal. “A sense of freedom is vital to me,” he tells us, taking a break from working on Happy Game, his studio’s forthcoming title. He’s as fascinated by rusty old machines and abandoned industrial buildings as he is by classical architecture, and spends a great amount of time in the surrounding forests with his family. But while the Czech Republic’s capital might be picturesque, Jakub Dvorský, Prague resident and founder of Amanita Design, sees beauty elsewhere. With its spires, turrets, and steeples, Prague is among the most romantic and beautiful cities in Europe.
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