Little Big Adventure 1 & 2 being refreshed with cloud saves, controller support, more
Console releases also under consideration.
Fans of Adeline Software's much-loved Little Big Adventure series will soon be able to play both instalments with a selection of newly implemented modern day niceties, including cloud saves and controller support, thanks to refresh work currently underway at developer 2.21.
The original Little Big Adventure - an evocative blend of platforming, puzzling, and exploration that charted the story of young hero Twinsen, on the run from evil dictator Dr. FunFrock - released back in 1994 and was followed by a sequel three years later. With both titles now over a quarter of a century old, they are, understandably, rather lacking in terms of modern day polish, and 2.21 is looking to remedy that as it seeks to bring the games to more players ahead of its planned third instalment in the Little Big Adventure series.
To that end, as detailed in a new blog post, 2.21 has been working on new 'Classic +' versions of Little Big Adventures 1 & 2 (recently renamed Twinsen's Little Big Adventure Classic 1 & 2 to avoid confusion with Sony's Little Big Planet series) that will bring controller support, UI changes including in-game language selection, unspecified "gameplay improvements", and various platform-specific features, including cloud saves and achievements.
Those that already own Little Big Adventure Classic 1 or 2 on Steam or GOG will automatically be upgraded to the relevant Classic + version on release, and all owners will get Retro Editions of each game too - enabling them to play the original versions more or less as they were on release (albeit now with in-game language selection and playable on Windows).
2.21 hasn't yet formally announced a launch date for its new enhanced editions of Twinsen's Little Big Adventure Classic 1 & 2, but Steam currently lists the incoming Retro versions as arriving on 31st May, so it seems reasonable to assume Classic + iterations are due around the same time. It also says console versions of Little Big Planet 1 & 2 are under consideration, although nothing has yet been finalised.
There's one casualty in among all this excitement, however: 2.21 has confirmed it will be ending support for the existing iOS and Android versions of Little Big Adventure 1 & 2. "One of the downsides of being a very small team is that sometimes we have to make some hard decisions that will lead to disappointment," it explains. "This one was not easy to make but we decided to stop supporting the mobile versions...as we want to focus on PC and consoles and we don't have the capacity to support mobile platforms anymore."