Waltorious Writes About Games

Game-related ramblings.

Tag: History Lessons Page 6 of 8

History Lessons: Star Trek: Judgment Rites

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On July 11, 2018

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You can read other History Lessons posts here. And, as always, you may click on images to view larger versions.

Oh dear. When I wrote my History Lessons post about Star Trek 25th Anniversary, I intended to play its sequel Star Trek: Judgment Rites soon afterwards, with only a short break between. A few months at most. But it’s been over a year now. What happened? Oh, right: Solium Infernum happened. I suppose that justifies some delays. Now I’ve finally played through Judgment Rites, although it was too late to fit into my Star Trek watching spree which served as motivation for playing Star Trek 25th Anniversary. I’ve not only finished watching all the old shows and films, I also watched the debut season of the new show, Star Trek: Discovery (brief synopsis: I had many reservations at the beginning but by the end I was entirely on board). Since Discovery serves as a prequel to the original series, and is hinting at more direct connections to original series characters in its upcoming second season, I figured it was high time to finish my adventures with Captain Kirk and his crew.

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Console History: Dragon Quest

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On January 8, 2018

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This is Console History, a special sub-series of my more general History Lessons series, covering console role-playing games, action role-playing games, Metroidvanias, and action-adventure games in nominally chronological order starting in the late 1980s. The chronology is garbled in the beginning as the scope of the series expanded, but it gets more organized later on. As always, you may click on images to view larger versions.

Well, this is getting ridiculous. When I wrote my History Lessons post about Final Fantasy, I outlined an ambitious plan to give the same treatment to the rest of that series (or at least the older entries). Now, nearly two years later, instead of finally tackling the second Final Fantasy game, I decided I really should go through the Dragon Quest series (known as Dragon Warrior in the United States until 2005) too. Maybe I’ll be finished with all of these in a decade or two.

But there is some method to my madness. Dragon Quest was released before Final Fantasy (1986 to Final Fantasy’s 1987, although the games didn’t come to the United States until 1989 and 1990, respectively), and is widely regarded as the game that set the mold for the entire genre of Japanese-style role-playing games. It could be cited as a direct inspiration for Final Fantasy, and it spawned its own long-running series (eleven main games plus a bunch of spin-offs) to rival the behemoth that is the Final Fantasy franchise. While I played some of the original Dragon Quest — which had to change its name to Dragon Warrior in the United States to avoid infringing on the trademark of the tabletop game DragonQuest — I never got far, and I’m less familiar with the series as a whole than I am with Final Fantasy. Playing Final Fantasy for its History Lessons post sparked my interest in the evolution of the Dragon Quest series as well.

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History Lessons: Nahlakh

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On November 25, 2017

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Other History Lessons posts can be found here. As always, you may click on images to view larger versions.

I first learned about Tom Proudfoot’s games years ago, probably around 2007 or 2008. At the time I was looking for some free, classic turn-based role-playing games, and found mentions of his work somewhere online. The first game of his I tried was Natuk, which is the more polished sequel to Nahlakh, but I eventually got bored of it. Later, I also tried a game called Helherron, which is not by Tom Proudfoot but draws heavy inspiration from his games. I eventually tired of that as well, although I was very surprised to see, when looking it up now, that its developer has resumed work on it after a decade of inactivity, with a bunch of new updates this year. Perhaps I’ll take a look at it again soon.

But I didn’t know about that when I saw a discussion of Tom Proudfoot’s games on the GOG forums, and decided to take another look at them. This time I wanted to start at the beginning, with his first game, Nahlakh.

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History Lessons: DROD: Journey To Rooted Hold

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On October 17, 2017

In Uncategorized

Other History Lessons posts can be found here. In this case, you may want to read the History Lesson post about DROD: King Dugan’s Dungeon in particular before proceeding. Lastly, as always, you may click on images to view larger versions.

DROD: Journey To Rooted Hold is the second game in the DROD series, and a direct sequel to DROD: King Dugan’s Dungeon, which was the subject of its own History Lessons post on this blog. But Journey To Rooted Hold is actually the first game in the series I tried. I made two attempts to play it, eventually giving up both times. I feared that the DROD series simply wasn’t for me, until I took a crack at the first game and it finally clicked. After completing King Dugan’s Dungeon, I felt I was ready to tackle Journey To Rooted Hold (originally released in 2005) again.

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History Lessons: Outlaws

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On July 16, 2017

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Other History Lessons posts can be found here. I’ve jumped straight in to talking about the game this time, but I’ve included notes about getting the game to run smoothly on modern machines at the end. Lastly, as always, you may click on images to view larger versions.

Outlaws was released in 1997. Back then, I only ever played the demo, bundled on a CD with a copy of PC Gamer magazine. I’m not certain, but I think I played the demo before the game was released, possibly a good while before. By 1997, Outlaws looked behind the times, using the aging Jedi Engine that had powered developers Lucasarts‘ 1995 Star Wars shooter Dark Forces. This engine simply couldn’t compete with the likes of Quake, which arrived in 1996 and sported impressive fully 3D environments and enemies. Outlaws fell into a category known today as “2.5D”, including games like Doom and Duke Nukem 3D, which featured 2D “sprite” enemies and all had various limitations on their third dimension.

But I don’t remember being bothered by that at all, which is why I think I may have played the demo early. Instead, I thought that a first-person shooter was a bad fit for a Western game. First-person shooter design had not yet reached the point where a game like Call of Juarez was possible. Games of the time, like Dark Forces and Duke Nukem 3D, were about running around, exchanging gunfire with enemies, collecting ammo and health pickups, all in environments that bore little resemblance to real locations (Duke Nukem made some effort there, but I hadn’t played it back then). Playing the Outlaws demo, I found myself running around a Western town, shooting at bandits and collecting ammo and health pickups, and it just felt wrong. Westerns should be slower, more considered, shots should be deadlier.

So, when Outlaws was re-released on GOG, I was surprised to hear so much excitement. The game has some ardent fans, enough to make me think I judged its demo too quickly. But the real reason I decided to play it now was all the praise for its soundtrack. I’ve been on a cowboy music kick recently — it involves a lot of Calexico — so a soundtrack inspired by Ennio Morricone’s classic Western film scores appealed. Plus I’d get to check out the game itself again and see what all the praise is about. It was a win-win.

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History Lessons: Star Trek 25th Anniversary

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On May 9, 2017

In Uncategorized

Other History Lessons posts can be found here. As always, you may click on images to view larger versions.

Roughly two years ago, I decided to watch all of Star Trek. This began with the original series, which I’d never seen before; I was only familiar with the original cast from the films. Not long afterwards, I saw that Star Trek 25th Anniversary — a game starring the original cast that I played a lot after its original release in 1992 — was re-released on GOG, and I snapped it up. The timing seemed fortuitous, but I wanted to finish watching the original series before playing, so I played some other games instead. Then it got lost in the shuffle. Now, I’ve almost finished watching every Star Trek episode, across its five different incarnations (I did take a few breaks, mind), and I realized I had better play Star Trek 25th Anniversary before that happens.

I also realized that the timing is perfect yet again, because I’m playing Star Trek 25th Anniversary 25 years after its release. I promise I didn’t plan it that way.

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History Lessons: DROD: King Dugan’s Dungeon

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On September 4, 2016

In Uncategorized

Other History Lessons posts (including my Introduction) can be found here. As always, you may click on images to view larger versions.

DROD stands for Deadly Rooms of Death, although it is almost universally referred to by its acronym. I’ve actually mentioned it on this blog before, as part of my post about games without stories. In that post I was hopeful that I’d continue to play through Dustforce and DROD alongside whatever else I was playing, but DROD is the only one I stuck with. Now that I’ve finally finished it, it’s time to write about it.

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Console History: Final Fantasy

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On April 17, 2016

In Uncategorized

This is Console History, a special sub-series of my more general History Lessons series, covering console role-playing games, action role-playing games, Metroidvanias, and action-adventure games in nominally chronological order starting in the late 1980s. The chronology is garbled in the beginning as the scope of the series expanded, but it gets more organized later on. As always, you may click on images to view larger versions.

I’ve written about a lot of Japanese-style role-playing games on this blog, but most have been smaller, free offerings created with a tool like RPGMaker. I haven’t really dug into the big names, in part because they’ve traditionally been tied to console systems that I do not own. And when trying to take a historical look at games like Final Fantasy, the first entry into the phenomenally successful and long-running Japanese role-playing game series, this leads to another problem: while console games are often re-released so they won’t disappear along with the older consoles they ran on, they are often modified significantly in the process.

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History Lessons: Call Of Juarez: Bound In Blood

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On March 14, 2016

In Uncategorized

If you haven’t yet, you should read my History Lessons post about the original Call of Juarez first. Other History Lessons posts (including my Introduction) can be found here. Lastly, and as always, you may click on images to view larger versions.

Back when I wrote my History Lessons post about the original Call of Juarez, it was already a bit of a stretch; the game was only seven years old at the time. But that game was fascinating in how it straddled different eras of first-person shooter design, so I found myself interested in its historical context as much as anything else.

I did not originally intend for my post about the prequel, Call of Juarez: Bound in Blood, to be another History Lessons post, even though I took so long to get around to it that the prequel, itself, is now seven years old. As I played it, however, I realized it’s a perfect illustration of all the design tenets that have become commonplace in first-person shooters since the original game, making it an excellent counterpoint. In short, I was once again interested in its historical context, so here we are.

Before I continue, I should restate that this piece will be making numerous comparisons to the original Call of Juarez, so you really should read my History Lessons post on that game first.

Finished? Read on.

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History Lessons: Divine Divinity (part 2)

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On December 8, 2015

In Uncategorized

You should read part 1 first. New readers may also wish to read my History Lessons Introduction before proceeding. Other History Lessons posts can be found here. And, as always, you can click on images to view larger versions.

Well, this didn’t go as planned. After writing part 1, I was ready to finish the game and share my final thoughts with part 2, but then I found myself without the time to continue playing for nearly a month. I did finally get back on track, however, so here is the belated post.

I’ve covered a lot of things already, but I wanted to go into a little more detail about developing my character, the combat that is so prevalent throughout, and how the story and later stages of the game shape up. Read on!

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