Don"t panic but fans of the late Douglas Adams might want to get excited right about now. Today a new press release was issued announcing that a new "edition" of the guide was in the works to be developed by Hothead Games. Details about the new game version, including a release date and platforms, have yet to be announced. However a teaser web site for the game is already available.
The sci-fi comedy franchise, which features the adventures of Earthman Arthur Dent who goes traveling the universe with friend Ford Prefect after the Earth is destroyed to make way for a new hyperspace bypass, started as a BBC Radio show written by Adams in 1978. It has since been been adapted by Adams into a series of best selling novels, a stage play, and a six episode TV series. In 1984, Adams worked with game publisher Infocom to create a Hitchhiker"s Guide text adventure game for the PC that is still fondly remembered. Adams continued to work in the game industry, including writing an original graphical adventure game, Starship Titanic, before he died in 2001.
Vancouver-based Hothead Games is known for its downloadable games that also have a lot of humor, starting with the two episodes in the Penny Arcade Adventures series. In 2010 it released two games in the Deathspank fantasy action-RPG series. Most recently it released Swarm, a action-puzzle game in March 2011 where you had to lead a "swarm" of blue creatures to complete tasks without having all of them killed.