The 2K Play division of 2K Games is bringing two indie titles to Xbox Live Arcade: a time-bending tale of pie addiction called The Misadventures of P.B. Winterbottom and painterly point-and-click game Axel & Pixel.
As it turns out, you couldn’t pick two more drastically different games in concept: one is a colorless and quirky game with what sounds like complex time travel mechanics, while the other seems to be a meditative (and decidedly colorful) adventure in the simple point-and-click vein.
The former is The Misadventures of P.B. Winterbottom, developed by The Odd Gentlemen. The game follows the titular misadventures of the titular character, who has an insatiable craving for pie and will do no less than manipulate the fabric of space and time to get his hands on delicious baked goods.
“Record yourself and harness your time bending abilities to cooperate, compete against and disrupt your past, present and future selves,” The Odd Gentlemen writes. “Winterbottom’s debut misadventures present [a] whimsical spin on the notions of time, space, and play.”
The game, which started its life as a student thesis at the University of Southern California, uses an art style drawn from silent film: it’s all top hats and big mustaches in a black-and-white world.
Axel & Pixel, meanwhile, seems a bit less convoluted in concept and mechanics. Described by 2K as “combining simple point-and-click gameplay and a beautiful hand-drawn environment,” the game is being developed by Silver Wish Games, a small team in the Czech Republic.
Axel & Pixel will be released this Fall, while P.B. Winterbottom will hit in “early 2010,” during which it will attempt to steal a piece of the sales pie from the 10 million other games coming out then.
