"Broken Sword" creator Charles Cecil: "I take full responsibility for the goat puzzle"
Revolution Software founder Charles Cecil reveals in an interview how the genre's most notorious puzzle came about, what fans can expect from the upcoming remake of the second part, and what his absolute favorite adventure game is.
"Paris in the Fall" – if this opening evokes a nostalgic, warm feeling in you, you've probably played "Broken Sword". Revolution Software's adventure classic is still considered one of the best in the genre.
In it, lawyer George Stobbart and journalist Nicole Collard encounter murderous clowns, aggressive ruminants, a horny widow, and uncover an international conspiracy along the way. The game received four sequels, another is in development, and a remake of the second part is due by the end of the year.
I spoke with series creator and Revolution Software founder Charles Cecil about his long-running franchise and confessed to him that I stole from him about 30 years ago.
Charles, congratulations: The Kickstarter for the Collector's Edition "Broken Sword 2: Reforged" recently ended and raised many times its original goal. You even surpassed the success of the previous campaign.
Charles Cecil: It's overwhelming. For the first part, around 650,000 pounds were raised in the end, here it's around 800,000. We owe that solely to our community. We are incredibly lucky to have such passionate fans.
And this, of all summers, is when Sony announces that it will no longer press discs for new PlayStation games from January 2028. How do you feel about this as a declared advocate of physical media?
That was a shock, even though we all knew it would come eventually. It's a commercial decision and the logic behind it is obvious. But it's also a shame. 20 years ago, when everything went digital, the consensus was: nobody wants VHS tapes and DVDs taking up space at home. There's some truth to that. But real things have a tactile quality that simply doesn't exist digitally. Our fans want to hold a disc in their hands and put something on their shelf. That's why our Kickstarter campaigns work so well.
Your Collector's Edition also comes with a fancy manual, doesn't it?
Yes, and it was fun to write. I like to think back to the old manuals that were packed with info and lore. You could still feel the developers' passion for their games.
Our manual is accordingly thick: In addition to controls and background info, there's a guide to the "Broken Sword" path through Paris – and everything else that might interest fans.
Physical media isn't the only thing that's regularly declared dead. Point-and-click adventures were already buried around the turn of the millennium. A judgment you yourself famously signed at the ECTS gaming fair in 2002.
That quote haunts me. It was deliberately provocative and rarely fully reproduced. But if I said and meant it that way: I was obviously wrong. However, this attitude was widespread. After "Broken Sword", the head of the Virgin Group, our publisher at the time, invited me to dinner. He told me he hated 2D and adventures and that they were dead.
He genuinely believed he had a good sense of what sells, even though he didn't play games himself. He belonged to a generation of bosses who despised the medium but were convinced they understood it.
Ironically, the PlayStation, almost the symbol for the leap into the 3D era, became one of the most important pillars of "Broken Sword". How did that happen?
It was one of those decisions that turned everything upside down. I had known Phil Harrison since the late 80s. In the 90s, he was responsible for building PlayStation in Great Britain. During this time, he unexpectedly contacted me and suggested a collaboration.
It was unusual for a console manufacturer to approach a small studio like Revolution back then. The cooperation gave us access to the official PlayStation Magazine (OPM), among other things, which rated the game 9 out of 10. Accordingly, sales were good, "Broken Sword" sold several hundred thousand copies.
The magazine's demo also played a role, didn't it?
Definitely. In Great Britain alone, the circulation of OPM was 600,000. In addition, it had offshoots in Germany, France, and Australia. We literally put the game into the hands of millions of people. We are still benefiting from that 30 years later.
Source: crimsom-ceremony-net
Were pirated copies also part of the promo? I myself ripped the game back then. Sorry.
(laughs) You're bringing up an interesting point. Games were very expensive back then, and publishers never paid developers anything anyway (Editor's note: Compensation models were less regulated in the early 90s, and small developers were often taken advantage of). So for us, it made no difference whether a copy was ripped. But: people like you could play these games. And today, when you are older, better off, and wiser, you buy them.
Source: Revolution Software
With "In Cold Blood" around the turn of the millennium, you tried to break out of the adventure pigeonhole. It remained a one-off attempt. Why?
For financial reasons. You have to remember how the industry worked before digital distribution: publishers decided whether a game had financial potential or not. We had virtually no control. By the way, the opening scene of "In Cold Blood" still frustrates me today. It's far too difficult and gives players little information about the controls. In our remakes, we can iron out such annoyances.
That also seems to be the mantra for the "Reforged" versions: the same game, only better. Where do you draw the line?
I was influenced by what happened with "Monkey Island Special Edition" on iOS: the graphic style was completely changed and it was obviously not what the fans wanted. They wanted the original, just updated for modern times. And that's exactly what we do. But we also fix things: In the first two parts of "Broken Sword", for example, there are continuity errors that have annoyed me for years. We can fix those, remove frustrating moments, and offer additional help.
Help systems and accessibility are a fine line. At what point do they kill exactly what an adventure is all about?
The balance is delicate, absolutely. That's why we offer two modes: a traditional one for the hardcore faction and a story mode that subtly nudges players in the right direction when they get stuck. Today, people have too many games and too little time – anyone who gets frustrated simply gives up.
But players should feel clever as they work their way through the story. Puzzles should never become a roadblock – they should feel like part of the narrative. Anyone who figures out the solution should think: "I should have known that" and not: "How was I ever supposed to know that?"
Which brings us to the goat. The most notorious puzzle in the series' history, perhaps even the entire genre, and the only one with its own Wikipedia entry. How often do you still hear about it?
Very often. But instead of telling me how many dozens of hours it cost them, our community has chosen the goat as a kind of symbol of "Broken Sword". For the Kickstarter of "Broken Sword", the hardcore fans founded the "Order of the Goat" to support the campaign.
However, I take full responsibility for the puzzle itself: a few very vocal players complained back then that adventures were too easy. I foolishly listened to them. So I designed normal puzzles for normal players and a real tough one for the complainers. They were happy, everyone else less so. And that was long before the internet, when solutions were still printed in magazines and you had to wait a month for the right issue.
Source: Revolution Software
Speaking of criticism: Parts 3 and 4 dared to jump into the third dimension. Partly with mixed reactions.
Part 4 was received mixed, Part 3 definitely has its fans.
I like it, but the box puzzles…
They were so stupid! And that was my fault. I wanted box puzzles and instructed the designers to include them. No idea what I was thinking. If we ever remake Part 3, they will be radically cut. I promise.
All spin-offs of the series have their fans, but it's the first two parts that fans always return to. Why do you think that is?
Because of the technology. Parts 3 and 4 simply look old today. 2D, on the other hand, ages better. Take "The Jungle Book" as a comparison: beautifully drawn, beautifully animated – it's a timeless classic.
A negative example is "Gabriel Knight 3": Jane Jensen (the developer, editor's note) jumped to 3D far too early and the game suffered massively from it. In an adventure, you read emotions from faces, from animations. Early 3D simply couldn't do that.
Source: Revolution Software
Meanwhile, your fans were so dedicated that they built an unofficial sequel themselves with "Broken Sword 2.5". What went through your mind when you heard about it?
I was very flattered, of course. We even supported them and provided them with graphics. The only rule was that the game could not be offered commercially. However, I must confess, I never played it through. I should catch up on that.
"Broken Sword" established the conspiracy thriller in gaming. Years before Dan Brown discovered the Templars for the book market. Did George Stobbart pave the way for Robert Langdon?
(laughs) Dan Brown, like me, read "The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail". The book that claims the Priory of Sion actually exists. That's complete nonsense. Pierre Plantard, the alleged Grand Master, was a nasty little anti-Semite who deposited forged documents in the Bibliothèque Nationale, hoping someone would find them. Three very gullible Englishmen (the authors of the book, editor's note) did him the favor. This became a misconception that persists to this day.
Maybe Dan Brown also played "Broken Sword".
Some of our fans are convinced of that. Maybe he stole our ideas, maybe not.
Where do you get your inspiration?
On site. I travel to the locations of interesting stories and get excited about the respective conspiracy. A few years ago, I was with my family in a tiny village in the Dordogne. My wife discovered a book with a Templar symbol in a gallery, and the gallery owner turned out to be the journalist who had researched Plantard in the 70s.
The world's best expert on the subject, by chance in a village of 300 souls. Such stories write themselves if you can get excited about them.
Back to the present: What can fans expect from "Broken Sword 2: Reforged"? The same treatment as the first part?
We are even more ambitious. For the first part, we upscaled some things and redrew parts – for the second, everything will be redrawn and re-animated from scratch. "Broken Sword" had 30,000 animation frames, Part 2 has 45,000, and you can see the difference.
Is the second half of 2026 still the release window?
Absolutely, no question.
And then there's "Parzival's Stone", the sixth part was announced at Gamescom 2023. Since then, there has been radio silence.
The announcement came too early and I'm only moderately happy with the trailer. Nice backgrounds, but the characters were still generically rendered. Currently, we are fully concentrating on "Broken Sword II", then we'll see.
One last question: We have just published our 100 best games of all time, chosen by the editorial team and the Swiss gaming industry. Point-and-click adventures made exactly one entry – "Monkey Island 2". You can correct that now: What are your five essential adventures? Your own don't count.
At the top: "Day of the Tentacle". Then definitely "Gabriel Knight 1". "Monkey Island 1" and "2". And as the fifth, "Unavowed" by Dave Gilbert. I started it but didn't finish it. The art style is great and Dave is an excellent writer.
In the early 90s, my older brother gave me his NES with The Legend of Zelda on it. It was the start of an obsession that continues to this day.
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