Matt Chat

[gimbal]

Originally Posted by Lorfarius

I downloaded Daggerfall about a week before Matt mentioned his upcoming vid. I decided to put it on hold for a bit until I've seen it

When you do play it, make sure you patch it to the last version and you find a tool called "fixsave"; that little baby will save you at times!

[Lorfarius]

Will do

[Zandig]

Other recommended fixes and files for DAGGERFALL:
http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Daggerfall:Files

[gilgamesh]

And here we go, 3, 2, 1 - Matt Chat 118: Elder Scrolls II, Daggerfall
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Is it just me, or has Matt grown more horns as of late?

[gimbal]

Its impossible to cover Daggerfall in a short video like this. I mean now we've seen the intro, the character generation, the started dungeon and a tiny bit of the outside world; basically you've seen nothing of the game yet You ain't played this game until you've entered and completed both Castle Daggerfall and Castle Wayrest What mazes!

A lets play is a more accurate representation. This one is quite good because it doesn't have narration, only text comments.

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One fun detail about Daggerfall: the sound effects used are so common you hear them all the time in movies and TV shows, even current ones.

[gilgamesh]

Matt Chat 119: Josh Mandel's Early Days
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And I still cringe.

[Castelian]

Really enjoyed hearing from Josh Mandel. Thanks for sharing.

[mattbarton.exe]

Hehe, yeah, he told me about that earlier and I was wondering...Should I put it in? I knew it would make people very sad to hear about the damage to his house, of course, but those design docs...horrifying to anyone interested in the history of games. And of course who wants to lose a Vectrex or even a Virtual Boy!

I think he's the only designer I've talked to so far that mentioned Vectrex. Pretty neat system; definitely a super neat collectible.

[gilgamesh]

Matt Chat 120: Freddy Pharkas and Space Quest 6 with Josh Mandel
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See the diplomatic nudge at LA? I don't buy the "we were cool with them" for one second.

Sierra got a little weird when they made the transition to Windows imo. The games suddenly felt experimental, with mixed results.

[mattbarton.exe]

Hehe...Well, when we interviewed Noah Falstein from LucasFilm, he made it clear that they really resented Sierra. According to Noah, Lucasfilm games were only successful in Europe, whereas the Sierra games dominated in the U.S.

I have to admit that I generally prefer the Lucasfilm games myself. They usually strike the right difficulty level and are solvable without walkthroughs. I've never been able to get very far into most of the Sierra games without extensive hints. It looks like Josh's games are more similar to the Lucasfilm games in terms of difficulty and definitely have the charm.

[gimbal]

Originally Posted by mattbarton.exe

I have to admit that I generally prefer the Lucasfilm games myself. They usually strike the right difficulty level and are solvable without walkthroughs.

Well my 9-year old self did need a hint every now and then, especially in Zak Mckracken. What a mindbender!

I've never been able to get very far into most of the Sierra games without extensive hints.

That is true for most later games, but the old pixelated EGA versions (KQ123, Larry 1, SQ1, PQ1) are very doable - if you have the manual. Its in the logic of the puzzles IMO; in Lucasarts games its usually in some way made obvious what you should be using to solve a particular problem, while in Sierra games I caught myself just trying to use every item I was carrying around whenever I found something that was interactive.

On the other hand the Sierra games, before they went point and clicky, had the almighty 'look' command.

[gilgamesh]

I read an interview with David Fox in which he says the very same thing as Mr Falstein. On the other hand, I've seen one on YouTube where he (or was it Ron Gilbert?) says that the LA guys actually looked up to an established Sierra in the beginning, and even had a meeting. Damn can't find it. It's probably in the "Early Years" interview. Eventually Sierra would sue LA over patent infringement.

Sierra had always a more family friendly, conventional approach on story telling. They didn't even shy away form that awful song [ Show youtube player ]

[lordofchaos]

I`m a little late to this party but I`m really enjoying these interviews, it`s always nice to hear from the developers themselves rather than just the PR people. Thanks for sharing Gilgamesh :-)

[mattbarton.exe]

Hi, guys, do any of you have contact info for any cool people you'd like to see me interview? Would definitely help if you know them personally and can vouch for me, since I've been getting lots of rejections lately.

[gilgamesh]

Originally Posted by mattbarton.exe

Hi, guys, do any of you have contact info for any cool people you'd like to see me interview? Would definitely help if you know them personally and can vouch for me, since I've been getting lots of rejections lately.

No pushing and shoving. Keep it civil, guys.

I'd really like to hear from somebody at Shiny, e.g. David Perry. And the Infocom guys, especially Brian "Loom" Moriarty.

How about the Amiga companies? Anybody knows somebody? Alexh for sure...

[gilgamesh]

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Ah Legend. I've only played Xanth and Shannara. Very nice stories and graphics indeed, but these two had too easy game play for my taste. That Crosstime Saloon doesn't ring a bell, though.
Anyway, another game company swallowed and shut down by Infogrames/Atari for good.

[mattbarton.exe]

I'd never heard of it either, Gil, but most adventure game fans seem to regard it highly. What little I played looked interesting, though! You can tell Josh really put his heart and soul into it.

I'm a Piers Anthony/Xanth fan but never got to play the game. I've also read a Shannara book or two and enjoyed them. I actually had a chance to see Piers in person when he came to USF with Harry Harrison and Joe Haldeman. Piers seemed like the nicest, sweetest guy on the planet. Harry was a laugh riot. Joe struck me as a bit pretentious, though, and I haven't read any of his books.

[gilgamesh]

Then you really should try Companions of Xanth. It came with the Demons Don't Dream novel in the box, but I think I bought it mostly because of the cover.

Two things really put me off. Firstly you are offered to choose your companion, and if you choose the wrong one, you die instantly. What's that? Secondly, it's over too soon.

Otherwise it's nice. Defeat the foul censor ship and draw the bridge.

[gilgamesh]

And now the final, Ladies and Gentlemen.
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Btw. http://www.agdinteractive.com/games/games.html

[cosmicfrog]

thanks for posting gilgamesh makes it so much easyer to find matt & keep it up