Phil Salvador | The Obscuritory

The Obscuritory at MAGFest!

December 18, 2014 Phil Salvador

I am impossibly excited to announce that I will be a panelist at the upcoming MAGFest 13 gaming festival!

MAGFest is the largest gaming event in the DC-Maryland-Virginia area, with attendance for 2015 expected to reach 15,000. I’ve attended MAGfest since 2012, and I’m unbelievably stoked to bring my obscure game-ery to the show this year.

Specifics like timing are still in progress, but I will be tentatively hosting a panel titled “Obscure Gaming Gems (and Why They Matter).” I’ll be talking about some great obscure games, but more importantly, I want to address why obscurities are important to the gaming discourse. I touched on it a little bit in an earlier essay: when we celebrate obscure games, we’re engaging gaming with an open mind and a curious spirit. It’s good for positivity and inclusiveness, and it makes the gaming landscape more exciting and critically engaging. There’s a lot to explore here, including the forgotten history of the Mac gaming scene, the works of Theresa Duncan, and – of course – Eastern Mind and its unlikely fan community.

I’ll be sure to post updates once we get closer to MAGFest 13 (January 23-26), but for now, I just wanted to share this exciting news. This is sort of a personal culmination of everything I’ve been working towards with this blog. I’m looking forward to spreading the good word about obscurities – and maybe even seeing a few friendly faces!

(If you plan on attending, please drop me a line so we can say hello!)

UPDATE: The official MAGFest schedule is out and has the panel slotted for 6pm on Saturday, January 24th, in the MAGES 2 room. It’s happening!

PSA: Help save young girls’ CD-ROM games!

November 20, 2014 Phil Salvador

I don’t post about Kickstarters too often on here, just because of the extreme volume of retro revivals and similar projects. But this one is pretty special. New York-based digital art group Rhizome is attempting to preserve three CD-ROM games by developer Theresa Duncan – Chop Suey, Smarty, and Zero Zero – that were designed for girls ages 7 to 12. These games were released for Windows 95 and 98, a dark age for compatibility and emulation, and Rhizome wants to curate them for modern audiences. This combines two of my favorite things: Windows 9x CD-ROMs and diversity in gaming.

This is a really terrific cause, and it’s a great example of why obscure games matter. I had never heard of any of these games prior to this Kickstarter, and it excites me so much to know that they made a difference for young girls back in the day. We should be celebrating more of these creative, out-of-the-way games tailored to audiences that are usually overlooked by the industry at-large. They’re special, and they make the world of gaming a little bit brighter. More people should know about them! (Plus, CD-ROMs are super great.)

If you want to learn more about Theresa Duncan and her work, check out Jenn Frank’s article In a Field of ’90s Barbieland Wreckage, Chop Suey Got Gaming for Girls Totally Right.

Please consider kicking in a few dollars!

(Thanks to Eli Abbott for alerting me about this!)

UPDATE: Rhizome has reached their goal! I’ll be sure to post an update once the project is complete some time next year.

Leave a comment CD-ROM, Chop Suey, crowdfunding, preservation, PSA, Smarty, Theresa Duncan, Windows, Windows 9x, Zero Zero

Lunicus

November 9, 2014 Phil Salvador

If you want to see the two diametrically opposed directions of games in 90s, look at The Dig and Doom. One is an adventure game with gorgeous visuals that fleshes out its narrative with character interactions and exploration. The other is a largely plotless first-person shooter that focuses on extreme speed and three-dimensional carnage. Both games succeed on their own terms, but their styles weren’t exactly compatible. At the time, many adventure games used pre-rendered scenery to convey detailed, elaborate settings and stories that were not otherwise possible, and they were, by necessity, a little clumsy. Games that don’t demand intense action can get away with this, but Doom needed to be slicker, quicker, and simpler.

Lunicus, the debut game from experimental developer Cyberflix, attempts to bridge these two worlds. Though primarily a first-person shooter, Lunicus borrows liberally from adventure games, using pre-rendered graphics, cinematic vignettes, and extensive narrative sections. Melding these once-opposed genres is a huge creative gamble, and unfortunately, it doesn’t quite work. But it’s at least an intriguing failure worth a post-mortem. » Read more about Lunicus

2 comments 1994, 90s, aliens, CD-ROM, Cyberflix Incorporated, first-person, futuristic, Macintosh, Paramount Interactive, Windows, Windows 3.1

Win Elvis-n-Space

November 2, 2014 Phil Salvador

The most surprising quality of Win Elvis-n-Space is how relatively normal it is. If you replaced all the Elvis elements, you’d have a competent-but-messy miniature space exploration game in the style of Weird Worlds: Return to Infinite Space. But it’s not. This is a game about a mission to rescue Elvis from aliens. » Read more about Win Elvis-n-Space

6 comments 1993, 90s, aliens, BFM Software, independent developer, real-time, shareware, top-down, weird, Windows, Windows 3.1

Troubled Souls

October 28, 2014 Phil Salvador

Loops and pathways have been institutionalized as puzzle mechanics, popping up in everything from classic board games like Tantrix to modern blockbusters such as Bioshock and Warframe. Something in our reptile brains loves connecting lines into bigger and bigger chains. But it’s telling that these puzzles have been relegated to minigames in recent years: they can be monotonous beyond short-term investment. How do you make these linking games fun?

The solution might lie within Troubled Souls, one of the better puzzle game derivatives from the 90s. Beyond its heavily Gothic, body horror-influenced theme, Troubled Souls adds a clever progression system and forgiving mechanics that keep the game lively and constantly moving. And as a bonus, it’s scary. » Read more about Troubled Souls

3 comments 1994, 90s, independent developer, Macintosh, MacSoft, Randy Reddig, Varcon Systems

Stop by on Tumblr!

October 8, 2014 Phil Salvador

In the interim between the sporadic articles I post on here, I’ve been posting screenshots, videos, and other tidbits to the Obscuritory Tumblr page. I use Tumblr as sort of a clearing house for all the content that hasn’t made it onto this site, which often means artistic screengrabs, quick blurbs for games I haven’t written articles about, and updates on weird stuff I’m adding to my collection (like my copy of Iron Helix!) I try to post new content every day, so there’ll always be more obscurities to check out. If you’re on Tumblr, swing by and say hello!

Six years in: reflections on gaming culture and a revised mission statement

August 26, 2014 Phil Salvador

About six years ago, I realized that I wanted to share my love for forgotten games with the rest of the world. A lot has happened since then, both personally and culturally. I have largely left the “core” gaming world and found some much-needed perspective that I would feel negligent not to discuss here. Put simply, the insularity, prejudice, and anger that surrounds video games is horrifying and, if left unchecked, will surely destroy this terrific and expressive medium.

More now than ever, I find it essential to celebrate the weird and out-of-the-way games of yesteryear. Serendipity and discovery are merits on their own, but they also promote a healthier, more fun, more vibrant, and more inclusive culture. I want to reaffirm my commitment to this site and to emphasize the good things that obscurities can bring about. » Read more about Six years in: reflections on gaming culture and a revised mission statement

5 comments Obscuritory

Noctropolis

May 10, 2014 Phil Salvador

It shouldn’t be controversial to suggest that big ideas need great talent to pull off. Richard Garriott nearly single-handedly created Ultima, but he was a designer of immense skill and vision. Not everyone can execute a game of that scale, and if you don’t have a capable team, the results will not match the scope its design.

Noctropolis is a notable casualty of a developer tackling an ambitious concept that it could never see to fruition. In an ideal world, Noctropolis would be a rollicking comic book adventure with high energy, snappy writing, and grand stakes. But that is not this game. Noctropolis is an endless series of failures and mistakes, a parade of terrible acting, nonsensical plotting, and unchecked psychopathy. Flashpoint Productions tried so hard to make the ultimate original adventure franchise, and wow, what a spectacular mess. » Read more about Noctropolis

3 comments 1994, 90s, CD-ROM, city setting, comic, DOS, Electronic Arts, Flashpoint Productions, live action, Noctropolis, still sold, third-person

PSA: Get Pegasus Prime! Now!

April 14, 2014 Phil Salvador

I make no bones about the fact that The Journeyman Project is one of my all-time favorite games. It’s a classic of its time, but apparently not resting on their laurels, Presto Studios produced an FMV-tastic remake in 1997. Sadly, it was only released for PowerPC Macs and, bizarrely, the Apple Pippin, leaving it to languish on a shelf of unplayable could-have-beens for nearly two decades.

Seventeen years later, The Journeyman Project: Pegasus Prime has been released for Windows and OS X! This is a big moment for a series that’s seen a tremendous word-of-mouth comeback thanks to fans and availability via GoG.com. I will always have a special place in my heart for the original Journeyman Project, but this redux gives the game a facelift and story overhaul that puts it in sync with the rest of the series. (Above is Agent 3, Michelle Visard, a key character who originally didn’t appear until the second game!) And now that Pegasus Prime is available for anyone with a modern PC or Mac (in contrast to the original, admittedly hard to get running nowadays), there’s no excuse not to play all of them.

As of this writing, Pegasus Prime is only $8.00 on GoG. Please buy a copy! Then buy everyone you know a copy!

Leave a comment Presto Studios, PSA, still sold, The Journeyman Project

GADGET: Invention, Travel, & Adventure

March 22, 2014 Phil Salvador

GADGET is a nightmare. I don’t mean that in a pejorative sense. It very much has the qualities of a nightmare. The game ambles in repetitive and disorienting directions, chained together by irrational, non-sequitur plot developments. Imagery is bold and surreal, punctuated by out-of-body experiences and blurry detail. It is unsettling.

Developed by Japanese studio Synergy Inc., GADGET: Invention, Travel, & Adventure lacks much of the mechanical structure we associate with games. There is little meaningful interactivity. But because the experience is so un-game-like, so rigid and suffocating, it evokes genuine confusion, terror, and discomfort. This is not a game that will make you jump, but once you’re deep within GADGET‘s pseudo-Soviet web of intrigue and conspiracy, some gut reaction will tell you that it should not be happening. » Read more about GADGET: Invention, Travel, & Adventure

17 comments 1993, 90s, ambient, CD-ROM, favorites, first-person, international developer – Japan, Macintosh, Macromedia Director, Synergy Inc., transit, weird, Windows, Windows 3.1

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