Capn_Ascii

Damn! :P Yeah, I've been playing my Roland recently to try and finish up Playthrough 2 and the various DLC packs before Borderlands 2 drops. Mmm, cyborg ninja.

At the moment, I'm playing Kingdom Hearts: Birth By Sleep on PSP, mostly to kill time until KH: Dream Drop Distance drops (heh heh) for the 3DS in a few days. I'm also playing the Amazing Spider-Man game (based on the movie) and it's absolutely kick-ass. :D I approve! Telltale did a great jeorb job of not only making a new MI game that feels like a natural part of the series, but also giving the original series some sort of closure (not unlike the way VSB and/or Incinerations do with SQ). Reeeeealy? What platform? ;) If it's PS3, I've got a Lv50 Roland who could use a partner in crime... Eh. Sure, the Mass Effect games are unique in terms of plot structure and the player's choice in how things play out, but...well, to be honest, IMHO the actual gameplay isn't *that* good. I've definitely played shooters that were more entertaining in terms of gameplay mechanics, and the RPG elements weren't strong enough to really feel like a full-fledged feature to me. Great game concept, lackluster technical execution.

Alright, I'll pitch my creepy avatar into this thread, if only so that the youngbloods among us might know true terror. My name is Ascii - "Cap'n" Ascii to my friends, although captain of *what* is debatable. The old-timers around here cower in fear at that name - for I am the most *verbose* son-of-a-Blatz this side of Dhiatensor VII, the word processor planet. Back in the day, I was well known for posting long, rambling, time-devouring diatribes on whatever subject was at hand, SQ or not - a habit that eventually became so overwhelming that I was forced to swear off message boards completely for a while. Around the same time, the Space Quest community was on a slow tailspin into nothingness, so I quietly bowed out while the bowing was good. Now it's back, and so am I - albeit with firmer restrictions on the number of posts I make. I can't afford to spend all my time hanging around with you guys anymore - I have something not entirely unlike a life now. :P I am a Space Quest *believer* - 'fan' isn't an encompassing-enough word. SQ had had more of an impact on my life than many of the *real* people I know. One of the earliest memories in my entire life is of watching my father playing a (pirated) copy of SQ2 on our Tandy 1000 and marveling at the idea of a game that you could actually *talk to* with the keyboard - especially because I couldn't yet read at that age. It was the first adventure game I ever played - it and SQ3, although I played less of 3 because as a child I was terrified of the gory pictures on the death caption boxes. Ironically, I'm now firmly in Jeysie's camp of enjoying them instead. ;) I'm a writer - although it's rare I feel passionately enough about something to write fiction, I do have a few pieces under my belt (although some of them aren't the sort of thing I'd post without using a pseudonymn, heh heh). I'm an armchair psychoanalyst - I love delving into the motivations behind characters and design choices in my favorite games and other fictions. I'm a die-hard video gamer, PC, console, and handheld alike - I cut my teeth on an NES and haven't put down the controllers since. I am a role-player - I play virtual tabletop games with an online group that, ironically, was originally started by myself and other SQ fans jumping ship from the sinking Broomcloset forums (right, BLusk? ;) ). Despite my seemingly crass nature (did I mention I'm also a huge Leisure Suit Larry fan?) and love of dark humor, I am a sensitive fellow, and a classic romantic - I've had two wonderful girlfriends over the past several years, and am on the market looking for a third. Not bad for a guy who, in his previous SQ board incarnation, was shy and neurotic to the point of being self-destructive. I've come a long way, baby. :D

Both of these views are true. :) Roger is definitely an accidental hero by nature - with a downright uncanny knack for finding himself knee-deep in danger time and again - but at the same time, there have been numerous occasions when he *had* the opportunity to escape, but chose not to. To wit: SQ1: Roger escapes from Kerona with the current coordinates of the Deltaur in hand. Logically, most people would probably have made straight for the nearest Starcon facility and called in the authorities. Roger, however, in an unusual burst of insight, realizes that the Sariens could move at any time and that taking the time to find help might let them get away. Instead, he goes after them himself. This instance is particularly notable in that it's A> the first time Roger ever actually takes heroic action of his own accord, and B> his lack of hero experience at this early stage makes this more or less a suicide mission. SQ3: Roger confronts a bunch of dangerous software pirates to rescue a pair of software designers he's never even met, and has no real reason to care about. Possibly justified in that there doen't seem to be any authorities in the backwater corner of the galaxy he's currently puttering around in, but still, he's risking his neck for a couple of strangers. SQ5: Roger enrolls in Starcon Academy with the express purpose of becoming a starship captain. This says a lot about how his disposition towards heroism has advanced over the years; he's now actively seeking out the chance to make the step up from "shmuck" to "hero" (though admittedly, he's probably doing it more for the career upgrade and the respect than a desire to get himself into danger). SQ6: Roger once again sticks his neck out to save someone, this time a close personal friend. :) This one in particular really hits home with me, because it shows how far he's willing to go to help someone he genuinely cares about, as opposed to just "the galaxy" or random programmer weirdos. Incinerations: I won't go into details on this one just in case some of you haven't finished the game yet (hmm, this board needs a 'spoiler' tag to black out text), but those of you who have know exactly what moment I'm talking about. The moment, near the end of the game, where after years of being something of a cowardly lion, a personal crisis and a pep talk from a friend give Roger the epiphany that finally pushes him from semi-reluctant protagonist to Big Damn Hero. Cue the single most awesome endgame chapter in adventure game history, where our hero shows us the sheer amount of ass he can kick when properly motivated. :D Point being, Roger is (or was) definitely not 'into' the hero business at first - but I think the games do a good job of showing that the spark of heroism was there to begin with, and over time it evolved him into something more than just Joe Blow in the wrong place at the wrong time. ;)

Are you kidding? Getting a half-dozen people on the Internet to sit down and even *agree* on any one thing is a miracle in and of itself, let alone getting them to cooperate long enough to do something constructive. ;) In particular, Real Life has a *nasty* habit of butting its big fat nose in and ganking your buddies when you need them most. I've been DMing for an IRC-based tabletop gaming group for years now, and we've had members quit and join on a frustratingly regular basis - people keep trying to 'have a life' and such, and it inevitably interferes with our online schedules. :P Seriously, though, there are other factors. Aome people just plain don't work well in groups - I myself tend to do badly in group-based projects because I have an intense hatred of being held to deadlines (read: I'm a procrastinator). Other people feel like handing off parts of 'their' project to other team members - having someone else draw the stuff you want to show, etc. - feels too much like outsourcing. If you're trying to create something, can you really call it *yours* if all of the graphics and sound effects and programming were done by other people? Yes, there's a certain element of egoism present, but it's not necessarily arrogance - just a desire to *make* something and feel proud of having done so. Collaberation gets the job done, but it also means the result isn't really yours anymore, in a sense - you may still feel pride, but not so much as a creator than as a contributor. Sadly, no. :P The game never even remotely got to a playable stage - most of what I had done by that point was design drafts and the constructing and desc-ing of game objects. Unfortunately, due to two drive crashes I've suffered over the intervening years, anything I *had* done has long since been lost. :( For those who are curious, the (simple) plot involved Post-SQ6 Roger and the Deepship-86 being attacked by the newest model of Gippazoid's killer robots - Arnoid 2.0 (a smarter, more heavily-armed version of the original model). He first attacks the ship - disabling it - but with his own ship getting blown up in the process. Thinking the attacker dead, Kielbasa sends Roger (the only crewmember who isn't needed for damage control) to a nearby starport to aquire some needed replacement parts. Once he gets them and returns, Arnoid (who survived the destruction of his ship) finally finds them again and boards the ship to stalk poor Roger. The Deepship's security forces can't stop him (what with him being invisible and all) and get slaughtered, so Roger is forced to flee for his life through the ship and eventually come up with a way to beat him (with some help from Sidney, who ends up becoming a sort-of sidekick for this section).

It *is* a bit jarring, at least in a narrative sense - but it's also a courtesy from the game designers. It specifically *prevents* you from getting into an unwinnable situation - if the results were delayed until after the crest-cleaning sequence like they are if you pass, you could easily save afterward and screw yourself over. Instead, the game designers take advantage of Shroedinger's Gun to simply have you fail (and die) immediately. Isn't that nice of them? ;) What are you talking about? I hadn't heard of this before, so I loaded up SQ3 and tried it - but no death to be seen. I loaded up a save from having just reached Pestulon, went back on Ortega and walked around in my comfy Thermoweave underpants same as always. The only change is that the land bridge leading to the south is still missing, and the screen occasionally shakes from the newly bomb-inspired volcanic activity. Then again, I *am* playing an older version of the game - an original copy, one that predates the Collection version(s). I seem to recall from a conversation with Frans years ago that it was either a rare version or at least one he didn't have, as he was collecting all the various SQ versions for the SQ downloads he was hosting at the time. Space Quest 3 - Version 1.0P - 3/22/89

Here's my two buckazoids: PC vs. Mac: PC. Why? Because it, you know, actually supports stuff. ;) Sorry Mac, but let's face it - Windows is the consumer standard, and that means 90% of everything on the Internet program-wise is aimed at it. There's nothing *wrong* with Mac per se, but I need something that will actually run programs without someone having to write a port first. Smartphones: I don't even have one. :P Smartphones are oriented towards 1) social networking, and 2) portable Internet access, and neither has any real appeal to me. I dislike social networking on principle - it's pretty much the antithesis of a shy lurker type like me :( - and I'm not *so* addicted to the Internet that I can't afford to be without it for a few hours. Frankly, if I had a 'Net-capable phone I'd never get anything else done. :P As for games, most of the stuff on there is shallow shovelware compared to what I can play on my Nintendo and Sony game handhelds - if you're going to play video games, you may as well go whole-hog. ;) iPad: I really don't see the point. It's basically an iPhone, without the actual "phone" part - all you really get in exchange is a bigger screen. I can see how it could be treated like a laptop computer, except it's even more limited in its ability to interact with the PC/Windows standard than a desktop Mac is. Plus, I want an actual physical keyboard - I hate entering text by touch screen. It's too slow, and as you can see, I have a *lot* of text to put out. :P

Hmm...I think I'll throw my Official Bootleg Astro Chicken Flight Hat into the ring here. Although I'm not sure some of you will like what I have to say this time. Mostly because of this. :mellow: I've seen the various responses in this thread as to why someone would rip/repurpose/alter original resources, but it strikes me as odd that the single *biggest* reason (at least, the biggest one I can think of) doesn't seem to have come up. Maybe the reason they do this sort of thing is because they have no choice. The fact of the matter is, not everyone is an artist. This is a fact that I am intimately familiar with - it's been the source of many a crushed dream and frustrated head-desk on my part over the years. :( I'm something of a dreamer, and there are plenty of ideas floating around inside my armor-plated skull, but thanks to a complete and total lack of artistic talent, I have no way to adequately express them. I can't draw for spit - on a *good* day, my best drawings look like something an 8-year-old did. The closest thing I have to a creative talent is the ability to write - which might be fine for some people, but not for me. <_< I'm a highly audio-visual oriented person who best experiences things viscerally - directly, through the senses - and to me the written word has always come across as half-assed compared to that. It's the difference between actually *seeing* a movie and having someone reading the script of said movie to you - can anyone here honestly say they'd prefer the latter over the former? My point being, I know from first-hand experience the frustration of wanting to create something awesome for other people to enjoy, but not being able to do so due to lack of talent. Once, years ago, I attempted to make my own Space Quest fangame. It wasn't anything fancy - just a short little adventure that was more of a test of my own creative skill than anything else. Since I had no ability to create my own graphical resources, I had two choices: 'borrow' resources from existing games, or make something that didn't require graphics. I chose the latter route, and put together an interactive fiction game (read: old-skool text adventure). Or at least, I *tried* to -like many other would-be fangame authors of that bygone era, I got frustrated and never finished. (Ah, those were the days - a new fangame announcement every few days, and a new cancellation of an existing project just as often. ;) ) In my case, the death knell came when I finally realized that it was the game itself that was making me frustrated. Not because it was hard to make, or because I felt overwhelmed - but because the more I worked on it, the more it *mocked* me and my efforts. I could see all these places, characters, and ideas in my head as vividly as if they were real - but every time I tried to put pen to virtual paper to write the corresponding text descriptions, they came up short. Nothing I wrote could make my ideas *exist* in that virtual world the way I wanted them to.To this day, I'm still not sure if it was because I just wasn't that good a writer, or if I *was* good enough but was being overly critical of my own abilities, or if I was just so used to *seeing* things that trying to approximate sight with words felt horribly clumsy and half-assed from my perspective. :unsure: All I knew was that it wasn't working, so I cut my losses and walked away. There are others like me out there - people who have ideas, who *yearn* to create, to share them with others, but who lack the technical skill to make it happen. I've been in their shoes, and I can tell you from experience that it's not a fun place to be. <_< I can understand 100% why someone would resort to stealing graphics, music tracks, and other resources to make a game - because for some folks, it's the only option they really have. The only other choice would be to not try to share their ideas at all - and in my book, that's arguably worse. :( ...sorry, didn't mean to go on a rant there. ^_^ I used to do sprite/pixel editing as something of a hobby, and I'm thus well-versed in the art of ripping and reworking graphical resources (and pondering the resulting ethical quandaries). Just a frustrated geek who feels the need to vent. :ph34r:

What's the difference? ;) The key to understanding the narrator's treatment of Roger is realizing that, for all intents and purposes, Roger and the player are the same entity. In the early games, there basically was no "Roger", at least not as we know him now. He had no dialogue and no real personality beyond what characterization the story events (such as napping in the closet) and the narrator put on him. Although he started getting a little more characterization in SQ3 (mostly due to the increasing snarkiness of the writing around that time), it wasn't until SQ4 that Roger got any actual dialogue and personality. Up until that point, "Roger" was little more than an AFGNCAAP - an avatar for the player, with no real character of his own. It's a holdover from the days of interactive fiction, where virtually all games spoke directly to the player as if they were the one personally interacting with the game world. It wasn't until adventure game protagonists started graphically appearing on-screen that designers realized they had to start defining certain basic attributes (gender, appearance, etc.) for the sake of designing character sprites. Over time, the trend continued, until adventure protagonists became their own entities. Thing is, the second person narration ("You can't get ye flask!"), using "you" to refer to the main character, kept being used. Superficially, this would seem to indicate that the narrator is talking to the main character somehow - which of course is where the backtalk-the-narrator humor in many games (SQ6, the later LSL games) comes from. But on a gameplay level, the narrator is still talking to *you* - the person at the keyboard - which carries certain implications. ;) Basically, when the narrator is snarking about how Roger is stupid, clumsy, useless, etc., he's not talking about Roger - he's talking about Roger as controlled by you. Think of Roger as a puppet (or a mech suit, if you're more of an anime fan) with you in the driver seat - everything he does is ultimately your doing. If Roger does something brainless (such as blow himself up with an unstable tank shell), it's because you were being stupid. If Roger blunders off the edge of a cliff, it's because you weren't paying attention or didn't have the finger dexterity to guide him around it. Akril's fanfic isn't far off the mark - it's basically a cute way to personify what would otherwise be an abstract game concept, impossible to portray in normal fiction. Gary is ripping on Roger, sure, but only because Roger has the misfortune to be stuck with a shmuck of a player leading him around. ;) Arguably, if we were able to percieve a version of Space Quest where Roger acted of his own accord - one where there is no player, and no narrator - then we'd see him in his "natural" state - that of a lazy, clutzy, somewhat cowardly, but ultimately well-meaning average joe who's more dopey than he is dumb. Then again, without the player's intellect to give him those sudden bursts of McGuyver-esque ingenuity and puzzle-solving insight, he'd probably have been blown up way back on the Arcada... <_<

I'm not normally one for throwing weapons-grade swear words around, but in this case, I think I'll make an exception. HELL FUCKIN' YEAH! It's a great day to be a Space Quest fan. B)While this may not be *quite* as joygasm-inducing as an actual new SQ game, we know from experience that the Guys know their art well and are fully capable of delivering a spiritual sequel. Hell, who knows? Maybe 25 years from now we'll be hanging out in the forums discussing the cancellation of Spaceventure VII and trying to drum up support for the new GalactiTrek series. :P Don't forget - we're also getting new Tex Murphy! :lol: Some of you may not care so much about that one, but myself and a few others (including a certain Diva of Death) are ecstatic. Let's face it: between the SQ fangame triple play and now all this, this is turning out to be the Best. Year. Ever. Now if we can only get someone to option the rights for Space Quest: The Musical...

What can I say? There's something about a gorgeous dark-skinned girl with a retro chic sense of style sitting naked in a hot tub that strikes my fancy. ;) Although I admit, Patti wins the "most desirable" award by sheer virtue of personality. She's beautiful, but unlike many of the other girls Larry meets, she's also genuinely affectionate - as opposed to uninterested, manipulative, or outright evil. Or Shablee. :blink: I think my favorite bit of Patti characterization ever is when Larry tries to pick her up in LSL3 before he's gotten a proper divorce. She politely declines to talk to him - she refuses to have anything to do with married men. Her reasoning: It's not fair for married guys to get more than one girl when there are so many *single* men out there who need her company more. :D And of course, there's something to be said for a woman who braves dehydration, perilous pitfalls, feral jungle pigs, and arcade sequences to save the man she loves. Not bad for a lounge pianist armed only with a cocktail dress and various assorted undergarments. ;)

I got a copy of Rex years ago, and it's always been one of my favorite adventure games outside of the big Sierra and Lucasarts series. The graphics are impressive, the noun-centric interface applied to inventory items has a lot of fun with useless comedic verb actions (always a plus), and the humor overall is a hoot, if somewhat less cutting than SQ's sense of humor. Rex himself is a neat protagonist; he's like what we'd get if Han Solo had Roger's overall lucklessness. ;) There's also some funny gender-based comedy, particularly at the expense of males. One particular exchange I remember fairly well - Rex talks to a native woman and tries to prove he's a genuine male (rather than one of the trans-gendered Keepers): I'm pretty sure the "girl Rex looks like Roberta" bit was intentional - I seem to recall reading that somewhere.

Oooh, Legos! One of my favorite toys, and one I still play with to this day. I've got a whole collection of little weapons and armor and accessories and such for this Lego action figure I built years ago and still design stuff for... ...but that's neither here nor there. These are, though: Lego Alluminum Mallard A version of the Mallard I made years ago, using a virtual building block program (I didn't have *nearly* enough pieces of the right shapes to do this one for real). Not nearly as neat-looking as the one earlier in this post (wow, nice!), but at least mine's more or less to scale. ;) Aaah! Spider! Poor Roger running for his life across the dunes of Kerona, pursued by the Sarien's spider droid. Yes, I know, there's a bit of a design mix-up here - Roger is clearly meant to be his blue-suited VGA self, while the droid is the original EGA model. :P

Really? Dang. I wish I had a girlfriend who would watch Invader Zim with me. My last one liked Futurama, but she kept getting this "...WTF?" look on her face every time Zim came on. :P I'm a cartoon man at heart, so most of what I watch falls under that category. I watch a *lot* of everything on Adult Swim, mostly because my work schedule has me coming home late at night (and also because they're hilarious). I'm a big Futurama fan (yes, even after the revival and shift to Comedy Central), and I also rather like American Dad. I used to be a rabid Family Guy fan, but not so much anymore - the show seems to have taken a turn into some surprisingly dark territory in its latest seasons, and I'm finding that the humor and style of American Dad is more to my liking these days. There are two shows I watch religiously, both of which are on The Hub - that channel from Hasbro. The first, of course, is Transformers Prime - I am a TransFan, after all. ;) It's got the dramatic sensibilities of a modern sci-fi show, the graphical aesthetics of the TF movies, and just the right balance of "episodic vs. arc-based" for my tastes. The other show is Dan Vs., which I can only describe as "hilariously wrong". The gist of it: an angry little misanthrope of a man is constantly having Real Life and its frustrations personally wrong him, and retaliates with disproportionately grandiose and mean-spirited revenge plots. It's like My Name Is Earl, except the theme is "spiteful vengeance" instead of "well-meaning redemption". I like to call it the "Where Cap'n Ascii would have been by now if he hadn't met a girl and gotten over some deep-seated personal issues" Show. <_<

I miss feelies. :( Have you ever actually *played* the LSL games? They're *supposed* to look like that. ;) Sometime after LSL3, during the Sierra-wide transition to 256-color graphics, Al and his Larry team realized that, while the other game series were heading towards more realistic-looking graphics, LSL could benefit from going in the opposite direction. Thus, the Larry games achieved an exaggerated, 'modern art' spin - specifically designed to make the games fun and entertaining to watch even when nothing explicitly funny was happening on-screen. It worked like a charm, and I wouldn't have LSL any other way. :D See, this is exactly what I'm talking about. :lol: Part of the reason I love the LSL games is because they weren't afraid to emphasize the "art over realism" school of thought as opposed to other games of the time. The so-called "whacked out" (snicker) art style stayed mostly consistent between LSL games, albeit with slight tweaks: --LSL5, as Spikey said, applied the art deco look to the then-modern-day world, with exaggerated architechture and characters. --LSL1VGA did the same thing, except with a heavy retro feel meant to evoke the earlier 80s setting and the 70s mindset that Larry was mentally stuck in at the time. --LSL6 kept the art style of LSL5 with regards to buildings and environments, but the characters (except for Larry himself) were made realistic again. --LSL7 again kept the same environment design, but applied a layer of cel-shaded cartooniness to everything - lightly on the backdrops, more heavily on the characters. The remake seems to be emulating this style, which makes sense, as it was the style of the last classic LSL series game to be released. --Magna Cum Laude, though not strictly a part of the original series of games, nonetheless sucessfully transitioned the exaggerated art style into 3D. Like LSL6, the characters are realistically proportioned, but there's a slight degree of LSL7-esque cartoonishness to the designs that keeps them from looking too photorealistic. It should be noted that in *all* cases, a universal exception to the "art deco" design of the later games was the girls - all of the Larry babes in each game stayed as realistic-looking as possible, mostly because it's hard to find a Picasso-style cubist chick sexy. Unless you're into that sort of thing. ;) Speaking of which... Saving the best for last, dude. LSL is all about girls, girls, girls - if we see all the hotties up front, what will we have to look forward to in the actual game? ;) (Although they're going to have their work cut out for them to out-sexy some of the classic LSL girls. Eve VGA? Good *god*. :wub: )

I never got to read this one - instead, I had a copy of "The Official Guide to Roger Wildo's Space Adventures, Second Edition". Like the Companion, the 'second edition' was updated to include then-new Space Quest 5 stuff. Unlike the Companion (to my knowledge), the story presentation in the Guide is done in first-person - Roger himself is basically writing the book from his POV. Since the early SQ games had little dialogue or meaningful character interaction, the SQ1 thru SQ4 sections end up as a sort of stream-of-conciousness bit - virtually everything is presented as Roger's mental reactions to game events, with the events themselves not being directly presented. The Space Quest 5 section eases up on this forced perspective a bit to allow for more realistic conversations with Roger's crew and such. It may not be a great work of classic Western literature, but I read and re-read that book so many times that the cover came off, the pages dog-eared, and the paper yellowed. I still have it in my desk drawer - I'm afraid to take it out for fear that it might fall apart completely one of these days. :unsure:

Save early, save often. ;) And for god's sake, save in multiple slots. I've been screwed over plenty of times because I just kept saving over the one or two slots out of laziness. <_< Now I have the opposite problem - by the time I finish an adventure game, the save directory has some 20-odd savegames, numbered by relative game progress (Save1, Save 2, etc.). Not a biggie on the older games, but some of the more recent indie adventures and other AGS stuff has some surpisingly large save files. :huh: I'm not sure which is worse - spending all that time and effort on an entirely optional puzzle, or doing it the right way and having Roger sashaying around in drag. :wacko: God bless the Internet. :D I first discovered the online SQ community when I first got my copy of SQ6 and got stuck for six months on the endodroid freezing puzzle - I couldn't find the valve behind the bar (stupid pixel-hunting). Six months later, my family got our first Internet-capable PC, and my first stop was a SQ6 walkthrough. :rolleyes:

Pfft. Astro Chicken isn't hard at all once you understand how it works - it's a lot like that Lunar Lander game, only with more feathers. You have to use a light touch, like a guy who burns down a bar for the insurance money - take your time to line yourself up properly and take the descent niiiiiice and easy. ;) I'd record a demonstration, but I have no video capture software. Grr. But yeah, I'm in the same boat as Troels, albeit for different reasons - while I never had any trouble with Astro Chicken, I didn't realize when I first played the game as a kid that the game had any *purpose* beyond simply being an entertaining diversion. It was there, and it was fun, but I didn't play it long enough to get the secret code screen - instead, I just moved on to Ortega, mostly because it was the only planet I hadn't explored yet. I vividly recall one particular quote from this 'alternate' playthrough - when Roger looks through the survey scope at the shield generator on Ortega, the narrator posits that the device (which Roger doesn't recognize because he didn't get the secret message) might be "some sort of TV transmitter, beaming pay-per-view wrestling to the stars". :lol:

Ah, yes, the dreaded arcade sequence. What was that disclaimer from Space Quest 4 again? Something like... Between that and the cop-out button, it was clear that they had become aware of how many people seemed to dislike them. Which I never understood, because I for one enjoyed them - but then, I play a lot more action games than some of the...ahem, 'reflex challenged' around here. ;) It's not just arcade sequences, though - the SQ games are infamous for having unexpected genre shifts, unintuitive and/or nonsensical gameplay segments, ever-annoying maze sections, and otherwise parts that are just plain argh-inducing. To wit: --SQ1: The skimmer sequence, the plot-mandated gambling minigame (with instant death chance, no less), the quick-draw shooting on the Deltaur --SQ2: The root monster, the underground tunnel maze --SQ3: Nukem-Dukem Robots, the dramatic dogfight escape --SQ4: The Skate-O-Rama escape, the Monolith Burger sequence --SQ5: The EVA pod rescue, the Goliath airvent maze --SQ6: The Datacorder logic puzzle in the manual - some of us suck at those... <_< ...and a number of others I've probably forgotten off the top of my head. The point is, as frustrating as they may be, they're still an integral part of the Two Guys experience. Besides, as Akril mentioned, they make for good 'palatte cleansers' - a refreshing change of pace to break up the monotony of brain-wracking puzzles and feats of MacGyver-esque ingenuity. Personally, I like a game that throws you a curveball at times without warning - keeps you on your toes. B) I both expect and fully endorse arcade sequences and other forms of player-frustrating nonsense in whatever the Two Guys manage to come up with - I wouldn't have it any other way. :D

Fixed. Apparantly, HTML-style link tags don't work the same in DeviantArt file descriptions as they do in the file itself. My mistake - I've only recently decided to actually *use* my DA account for stuff and don't know a lot about how things work yet. Speaking of which, I have some other SQ goodies that will be linked to shortly. Support? I'm cramming them down the proverbial throat of *every single person I know*. :rolleyes: Who is this enigmatic "Chris" you mention? ;) Pardon my stupidity, but I've been away for a while and only really know a lot of folks by their screen names...

Yeeeaah...I'll take your word on that, Frans. :blink: *grabs a fresh chair* Also, remember what I was just saying about my old login still being here? Well, scratch that. <_< The new board upgrade caused some sort of issues with my login - presumably because it has an apostrophe in it. (Stupid nonstandard characters). I've had to set up a new account, with a new, delightfully creepy avatar - bonus points to anyone who recognizes it, mostly because anyone who does probably won't want to admit they played the game in question (although for the record, it's one of my favorites). Any and all Ascii-related queries should be directed at *this* account - the other will no longer be used.

Aww, thanks guys. You're the best. :cry: It's always nice to return to an old stomping ground and not be chased away by a torch-and-pitchfork-bearing mob. ...wait, what sources? :| Sadly, I can say more or less for certain that BLusk and Jeysie probably won't be back anyime soon. The three of us used to participate in an IRC pen-and-paper roleplaying group - I still do, actually (I DM for them, even), but the other two have since left. BLusk has been having more kids, and by this point is knee-deep in responsibility - between his rather time-demanding job and family, he wasn't able to stick to our RP schedule (although he still sometimes drops by our chatroom to chat a bit now and then). Jeysie, meanwhile, is suffering from finincial issues that have her a bit too stressed out to hang around like she used to. She *does* still participate in a fan community - just not this one. ;) I may have 'accidentally' gotten her to watch the Transformers live-action movie back in 2007 and managed to convert her into a TF fan. Heh heh. :roll: She's still around, though. I also stay in contact with Vizz via e-mail. In fact, he's the one who delivered the news to me that the SQ2 remake, VSB, and Incinerations were finished and got me into this whole mess to start with. Thanks a lot, buddy. :D

Ah, gaming - my forte. ;) Unlike a lot of folks here (I assume, at least), I'm primarily a console gamer - my PC is over a decade behind current specs and is in no shape to play anything made after 2005 or so. :| Currently, I'm playing Prototype 2 for the PS3. It's the heartwarming story of a soldier whose wife and daughter are killed in a viral outbreak, pushing him over the edge into a vengeful death-seeker who attempts to kill the man responsible for the outbreak, only said man is actually a shape-shifting mass of viral biomatter with Hulk-level strength and superpowers who for unknown reasons deliberately infects the soldier and turns *him* into a shape-shifting mass of viral biomatter with superpowers, who then proceeds to use said superpowers to kick all kinds of butt up and down New York in his self-destructive quest for vengeance. ...wait, did I say "heartwarming"? I meant "awesome". I've also been playing Red Dead Redemption, an open-world sandbox game set in the Wild West (from the people who make Grand Theft Auto). It's a deconstruction of westerns in general that serves to drive home the point that the Wild West era was not nearly as exciting and romantic as people might like to think - the heartrending ending drives that point home quite well. I didn't cry, honest. :cry: There's also the portable systems, which I play religiously because I have plenty of free time at my desk at work. Been playing Kid Icarus: Uprising a lot - it's a surprisingly good shooter when you finally get used to the controls - as well as Resident Evil: Revelations (aah! zombie hickies!). Odd? Heck, Mario's got some of the best RPGs in the business, if you're looking for something outside the Japanese CRPG mold and want something that requires more player involvement than "choose from menu". Mario RPG plays like some bizzare hybrid of Mario and Final Fantasy (which is a good thing); the Paper Mario games continue its tradition, albeit without the Square influences. My personal favorites, though, are the Mario and Luigi series for Nintendo's portable systems (first Game Boy Advance, then DS) - the battles rely heavily on the player's reflexes and timing to launch attacks and deflect/avoid blows, meaning you spend fights actually *participating* rather than just sitting there watching stuff play out. They're also some of the only Mario games where poor, neglected Luigi is on equal footing with his brother instead of just being Player 2 or left to house-sit, or whatever. :D I haven't played Witcher, but I have been greatly enjoying Amalur. It's sort of like the lovechild of a single-player World of Warcraft and Skyrim, in particular sharing the latter's 'open class system' where you can make your own char however you want with skill points instead of being pigeonholed by class choice. I've been having great fun playing a thief-type, sneaking around, stealing stuff, and backstab-killing all who would dare try to stop me. 8)

o/~ "...and you smell like one too!" o/~ Seriously, though, happy birthday, dude. You should definitely celebrate - it's not every year you get older. Oh, wait... Still, I'd be thankful you're at least around to celebrate it. ;) *My* most recent birthday (back in December) ended late at night with a head-on car collision and a trip to the emergency room. :? Nothing serious - just some broken face and finger bones - but there's nothing like a brush with death on your b-day to put your own mortality into perspective. Enjoy your birthdays - and friends, and life in general - while you can, man. ;)

HHHEEEEUUUUURRRRRRAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!!! :shock: Well, they did it. They finally did it. I was perfectly content to finally let go of my mental death grip on Space Quest and allow myself to drift off into the far reaches of the Internet. SQ would be nothing more than a memory - a part of my life whose time had passed, but whose spirit would always stay with me in my heart, warming my soul and carrying me forward to greater things. And then hell froze over. Suddenly, I felt a powerful pulling sensation - as if some unseen force was trying to snatch me away from my comfortable burrow in the dark corners of the Web. I tried to resist, tried to fight it - but it's no use. Space Quest is back...and so am I. :D The long-timers will probably remember me - I'm that long-winded, vaguely annoying fellow prone to making long, wordy posts full of unsolicited opinions, unwarranted rants, unapologetically lame jokes, and an undeserved sense of self-satisfaction. I'm a pretty un-assuming sort of fellow overall, in fact. :P (See? There's one now.) All joking aside, though, it's fantastic to see so many familiar names on the forums, including some I haven't seen since long before the fall of SQ (Holy crap, Troels is here!?). Now that there's actually Space Quest stuff to talk about again, you can go ahead and brace yourselves for the inevitable hurricane of prattle coming your way, courtesy of me. First on the list: an in-depth analysis of why exactly VSB and Incinerations are so freakin' awesome, to be posted in the near future. And one final note: those of you who think the title of this post is just a trite phrase? Think again. P.S: Hey, my old login from 2006 is still here! How cool is that? :D