January, 2012 | The Obscuritory

Monthly Archives: January 2012

Help out the artist from The Labyrinth of Time!

January 30, 2012 Phil Salvador

The Labyrinth of Time is a beautiful, forgotten game. Luckily, the artist is still going at it, and he has a new book coming out! But he needs some money before he can start publishing it.

That’s where you come in. If you have some spare change, please send a little money to Bradley W. Schenck’s Kickstarter project! He has 30 days to raise $7,800. Any amount you can kick in will help the effort – and as with all Kickstarter projects, the money won’t transfer until he’s raised it all.

As I’ve harped about, Schenck’s art has greatly personally affected me. It’d mean a lot if whoever’s reading could send over a few bucks.

Leave a comment art, crowdfunding, PSA, The Labyrinth of Time

HoverSki

January 19, 2012 Phil Salvador

Don’t let the 80s stock photo scare you away!

HoverSki has the foundations of a great top-down racing game. You get a track, a jet-ski, and you go fast. It’s pretty simple. But the game shakes that modesty and tip-toes into the world of extreme sports, and that’s a big misstep. » Read more about HoverSki

3 comments 1997, 90s, developer commentary, DOS, Intense Games, local multiplayer, multiplayer, shareware, top-down, VGA, water

Seize the Day

January 17, 2012 Phil Salvador

Planner programs are one of the many relics of 90s computing. Nowadays we default to Google Docs, Outlook, iCal, or whatever we have on our phones, but before we synced up with the cloud, there was competing planning software. If computers could do nothing else right, they would still store contacts and remind you about your appointments. Each planner had to outdo the others with a richer feature set or a more exciting interface.

Enter Seize the Day. Forget the “daybook” part of this program. The biggest and best feature is its rotating gallery plug-in. Seriously, it’s beautiful. » Read more about Seize the Day

5 comments 1993, 90s, artistic achievement, favorites, independent developer, Living Worlds, Macintosh, Mark J. Ferrari, nature, office software, personal software, planner, still sold, Summit Software, Windows, Windows 3.1

Eastern Mind: The Lost Souls of Tong Nou

January 12, 2012 Phil Salvador

The first time I played Eastern Mind: The Lost Souls of Tong Nou, I mistook it for a fever dream for nearly a decade afterward.

Eastern Mind is, unquestionably, one of the most surreal games of its time. It’s also deeply spiritual. It ruminates on the purpose of the soul while jumping erratically from moment to moment. It defies an easy explanation, but the longer you spend time with it, the more you can come to understand its rhythm, its purpose to help you understand your soul. » Read more about Eastern Mind: The Lost Souls of Tong Nou

20 comments 1994, 1995, 90s, artistic achievement, CD-ROM, developer commentary, Eastern Mind, exploration, favorites, first-person, international developer – Japan, Macintosh, Macromedia Director, multiple characters, mythology, Osamu Sato, OutSide Directors, Sony, Sony Imagesoft, video, weird, Windows, Windows 3.1

Big Rig

January 1, 2012 Phil Salvador

Not many simulation games from the 80s earn their genre’s moniker like Big Rig. The creator, Bill Pogue, must have had a thing for freight trucking when he set out to recreate an accurate cross-country cargo trip. For goodness’s sake, this is a text-based driving sim that keeps track of the weight of your fuel. To the game’s detriment, all that engaging detail reminds you how monotonous the subject matter is. » Read more about Big Rig

13 comments 1987, 80s, Bill Pogue, developer commentary, DOS, EGA, freeware, independent developer, realistic, text-based, transit