Back to the Future: The Game

Back to the Future: The Game
Developer: Telltale Games Publisher: Telltale Games Platforms: Windows, Wii Released internationally: December 22, 2010 This game has hidden development-related text. This game has unused graphics. This game has unused items. This game has unused sounds. This game has debugging material.

Set six months after the events of Back to the Future Part III, Marty must now rescue Doc from the past and make sure that everything he knows still exists! This is as close to a proper Back to the Future Part IV as we're ever going to get.

Fair warning: This entire entry is going to be filled with spoilers for all five episodes!

(Note: The content of this page only applies to the PC and Wii versions of the game.)

To do: There's lots of unused lines and voice samples left in the game.

Sub-Pages

Episode 1: It's About Time "You know what this needs? Marmalade."

Episode 2: Get Tannen! "When this baby hits 23 miles per hour, you're going to see some serious cowflop."

Episode 3: Citizen Brown "Relax! We've got everything under control."

Episode 4: Double Visions "Great Scott! This time travel business is trickier than I imagined."

Episode 5: OUTATIME "Hey, it's just a science demo. It ain't a matter of life and death!"

Debug Menu

All five episodes have a debug menu that can usually only be opened in development builds. Once re-enabled, it allows the player to teleport to all rooms, with the option of disabling entry cutscenes.

Unused Gamepad Button Icons

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Icons for a generic gamepad, an Xbox 360 controller, a PlayStation 3 DualShock 3 pad, and a Microsoft Intellimouse are present in all five episodes. While all support gamepad input, none of them use these icons. Episodes 2 through 5 use a different set of graphics for the Xbox 360 pads that includes icons for the bumper buttons and both sticks.

PC Version Leftovers

Throughout the .lua files of the Wii version (maybe in the other versions, and maybe other TellTale games) is the following comment about a missing end to a string:

    -- WARNING: missing end command somewhere! Added here
  end

'setup.lua' contains Leftovers from the PC version's options menu, such as the windowed, fullscreen options, render quality, and a "Project Registry Key" presumably also from the PC version. The Wii version does not contain any video settings.

local kRenderQuality = "Render Quality"
local kScreenSize = "Fullscreen Size"
local kWindowed = "Windowed"

  local regKey = prefs["Project Registry Key"]
  if not RegistryKeyExists(regKey) then
    return 
  end

'directcontrol.lua' contains more options menu leftovers, shown below.

local kWindowSize = "Window Size"

 -- WARNING: F->nextEndif is not empty. Unhandled nextEndif->addr = 11 

Dummy

A dummy action is mentioned within the 'navigate.lua' file, and also some nil which is mentioned throughout the various lua files of the game.

mControllerTurnDummy

Navigate_SetPlayer = function(player)
  -- upvalues: mPlayer , SetRunning , mScene , mPivot , mPivotParent
  mPlayer = player
  if mPlayer then
    Navigate_Enable(true)
    SetRunning(false)
    local pivotName = "obj_pivot" .. AgentGetName(mPlayer)
    if IsToolBuild() and not AgentExists(pivotName) then
      local parent = AgentCreate(pivotName .. "Parent", "dummy", nil, nil, mScene, true, false)
      AttachAgent(parent, mPlayer, false)
      local pivot = AgentCreate(pivotName, "dummy", nil, nil, mScene, true, false)
      AttachAgent(pivot, parent, false)
    end
    mPivot = AgentFind(pivotName)
    mPivotParent = AgentGetParent(mPivot)
  end
  DirectControl_SetAgent(mPlayer)
end

A 'dummy.prop' file, that's all.

Invalid Hint Text String

To do: Get the message to show up someway on the PC or Wii port of the game.

In the 'hints.lua' file, there is text that is usually not seen that will say the text could not be found, or is unreadable.

  else
    Print("Dialog node \"" .. nodeName .. "\" doesn't exist or isn't visible; unable to deliver hint")
    return 
  end

Mentions Of Other Ports

This string in the utilities.lua file mentions all the other ports of the game.

IsPlatformPC = function()
  return not IsToolBuild() or (not LocalizationGetEnabled("PC") and ((not IsPlatformIPhone() and not IsPlatformMac() and not IsPlatformPS3() and not IsPlatformWii() and not IsPlatformXbox360())))
  do return end
  return IsEnginePC()
end

IsPlatformIPhone = function()
  if not IsEngineIPhone() and not LocalizationGetEnabled("iPhone") then
    return LocalizationGetEnabled("iPad")
  end
end

IsPlatformMac = function()
  if not IsEngineMac() then
    return LocalizationGetEnabled("Mac")
  end
end

IsPlatformPS3 = function()
  if not IsEnginePS3() then
    return LocalizationGetEnabled("PS3")
  end
end

IsPlatformWii = function()
  if not IsEngineWii() then
    return LocalizationGetEnabled("Wii")
  end
end

IsPlatformXbox360 = function()
  if not IsEngineXbox360() then
    return LocalizationGetEnabled("Xbox360")
  end
end