A Vampyre Story

A Vampyre Story is a 2008 point-and-click adventure game developed by Autumn Moon Entertainment for Microsoft Windows, published by Crimson Cow. The game is set in Europe during the 1890s, and follows a young female opera singer turned vampire as she attempts to make the journey back home to Paris in search of fame and normality. The title's distinctive spelling of vampire with a y was derived from the seminal western vampire tale The Vampyre by John Polidori.

Synopsis
Mona De Lafitte, the game's protagonist, is a young and talented Parisian opera student who becomes the object of obsession for a rather pathetic vampire. As a result, Mona is swiftly kidnapped and taken to his castle in Draxsylvania, where she is turned into an undead vampire. Mona must find a way to return home and fulfill her dream of becoming a famous opera singer, while also dealing with the unfamiliar problems inherent in her new condition. Mona is not alone throughout the adventure however, but is followed by her newly acquired and sarcastic sidekick, Froderick the bat.

The game is divided into two main areas: Castle Warg—the home of her kidnapper, Shrowdy von Kieffer, and his mother, the Baroness Vasilia von Kieffer, - and the town of Vlad's Landing. The cliffhanger ending suggests an upcoming sequel, which has since been announced: 'A Vampyre Story 2: A Bat's Tale'.

Gameplay
A Vampyre Story was created by a number of former LucasArts adventure game developers, and is similar to some of their previous games (such as The Curse of Monkey Island or The Dig) in presentation and style. As such, the game uses a point-and-click interface with a context-sensitive radial cursor, much the same as Monkey Island: upon clicking an interactive item, a graphic menu will appear around the object, displaying the available actions and abilities. As the game progresses, Mona will gradually learn how to use her new supernatural abilities. Consequently, her newfound powers and weaknesses will play a large role in the game's puzzles, requiring Mona to use her abilities to overcome certain challenges and progress through the game.

Development
A Vampyre Story was first announced in the June 2004 issue of The Inventory, an online adventure gaming magazine, as the winner of their "Most-Awaited Adventure Game" award. The game was originally given a tentative release date of Halloween 2006, but the loss of publisher backing in April 2005 left the game in unpaid preproduction for the following year. During this time Bill Tiller, Autumn Moon's founder and creative director, generally worked with no more than one or two other people on staff at any one time. This helped to reduce the cost of production while the project was still unfunded. In early July 2006 however, Autumn Moon announced that they had finally acquired a new publisher for A Vampyre Story, the Hamburg-based Crimson Cow, and that full production on the game would begin shortly thereafter, stating an expected 2007 release. In September 2007 however, the first trailer for A Vampyre Story was released, specifying a new date of early 2008. While Autumn Moon has mentioned their interest in the Nintendo DS and Wii as potential release platforms, no official announcements have yet been made.

Audio
The A Vampyre Story Original Soundtrack was composed and produced by Pedro Macedo Camacho, featuring soprano vocals by Carla Isabel Moniz and violin solos by Carlos Freitas. The soundtrack was released as an extra to the collector's edition of the game. According to an article in Develop Magazine, and an interview in The Pumpkin Post, John Williams’ work on the Harry Potter film series and Michael Land's work on the Monkey Island (series) were Camacho's main influences.

Several websites mentioned the soundtrack as one of the game's best features and described it as 'absolutely fantastic', 'memorable', 'great', and 'ingenious'.

Sequel
Even before the game's release, Autumn Moon Entertainment decided to create a sequel. The next episode of the franchise will continue the action right after the events of A Vampyre Story. A Vampyre Story 2

Pop culture references

 * Mona De Lafitte takes her surname from Laffite's Landing, a loading dock in the Pirates of the Caribbean theme park ride at Disneyland. Froderick's name was similarly borrowed from the popular 1974 Mel Brooks film Young Frankenstein.
 * The game's art direction, while akin to The Curse of Monkey Island in style, was largely inspired by Edward Gorey illustrations. As such, the game was originally planned to be drawn in Gorey's black and white, pen and ink style.
 * Being designed by former LucasArts developers, the game is riddled with easter eggs, referencing past LucasArts adventure games such as the Monkey Island series, Sam & Max series, Maniac Mansion: Day of the Tentacle, Full Throttle, and Grim Fandango.