In this episode, Guido talks about his early days, focusing on the difference between the German and UK and US computer game scenes. How are German gamers different? Watch this video to find out! We also chat about Guido’s first games, Ooze and Hellowoon.
Please support Guido’s kickstarter Deathfire here:
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/g…
Download the mp4.
This episode is the first part of my chat with Deathfire developer Guido Henkel. We chat mostly about his new Kickstarter project, Deathfire: Ruins of Nethermore, which is shaping up to a new classic–turn-based combat, full party creation, and a deep storyline. I think you’ll really enjoy hearing all of Guido’s thoughts on its design; he obviously knows what folks like us prefer to play!
Download the mp4.
Want to play Guido’s classic Realms of Arkania? Buy them using this link from GOG.com, and I’ll get a kickback at no extra cost to you!
I’ve been noticing a trend lately (inevitable, I guess) in the number of Kickstarter updates along these lines:
Okay, I made the last one up, but I bet it’s true for at least a few projects. But I’m not just posting to complain about all this. After all, it’s only human to make mistakes, especially when it comes to overestimating our abilities (especially our self-discipline). Likewise, there’s no denying that, as much as we like to bash them, publishers do bring certain things to the table: forcing everyone to stick to a schedule, cutting costs at every corner, saying “NO” to things that would disrupt the schedule or the budget. Kickstarter-funded developers, of course, are still accountable, but the folks who funded them aren’t in a position to get their money back or fire them.
This episode is a retrospective of Albion, a terrific CRPG from Blue Byte. This game started off as an Amiga game, but was only released for MS-DOS. At any rate, it’s a truly epic CRPG that has unfortunately not enjoyed the publicity and recognition it deserves.
This week, I’m joined by fellow author and game historian David Craddock, who has recently published the first volume of his extensive history of Diablo. You can get his book in a variety of e-formats here.
Man, I love Kickstarter. Where else would you get the chance to fund awesome looking games like Deathfire: Ruins of Nethermore? This bad boy has everything I love in CRPGs: you get to create a full party YOURSELF, all combat is tactical turn-based, and there are plenty of rats in dire need of an axe. The brain behind this project is Guido Henkel, who, yes, I’m arranging now to have on Matt Chat. Guido is German (with perfect English) who has worked on games such as Planescape: Torment and Realms of Arkania. Need I say more?
I can’t quite figure out from the video how movement will work in the game, though. It looks a lot like Legend of Grimrock, and I’m wondering if there will the same kind of pressure plate puzzles and such here. That wouldn’t be a bad thing at all in my opinion! Still, as much as I liked that game, I do enjoy getting outdoors and settling down for a few pints of fine ale at a tavern or two.
Keep your fingers crossed that I’ll be able to Guido on the show soon to talk about this (and hopefully his earlier work, too).
Back in 2004, I posted an article on my website called “Embrace the Wiki Way,” which was a brief essay for writing instructors who wanted to integrate wikis into their classrooms. Sadly, the original site went down a few years ago, taking most of the data along with it. Fortunately, however, I was able to use the Way Back Machine to recover the original article, so I’ll post it here for anyone who cares to read it.
Bill Barrett, the voice actor for Dan Carlin.
I talked yesterday to Bill Barrett, the same awesome voice actor who does the liners for Dan Carlin’s podcasts. I was expecting his fees to be far beyond what I could afford, but it’s actually not bad at all. So, now all the pieces are in place–just need to start thinking about how I want to go about the podcast.
My purpose here is to create a rather excellent podcast that will be entertaining, informative, and inspiring. To that end, I’ve started re-reading my favorite books and articles on the subject, including my all-time favorite: Hackers by Steven Levy. If you haven’t read this book, go ahead and order it now–I haven’t read anything nearly as good on the topic. Levy does a superb job making his history read like a great novel without skimping on the details. It’s the kind of book that’s much more than just a good read, though–you almost can’t resist doing some coding or messing around with some hardware after you put it down. He also does a great job sketching the personalities involved. I’d love to capture some of that style and energy in podcast form.
Dave returns for his third and final installment. In this part, we chat about the other games in the Wadjet Eye lineup, including Resonance, Da New Guys, and Primordia. We also talk about his latest Blackwell game and his thoughts on adventure games and the state of the market.
I don’t know how many of you out there love audio podcasts as much as I do, but I’m a big fan of the history podcasts by Dan Carlin, Mike Duncan, and, more recently, Benjamin and Adam. I was thinking that it’d be pretty fun to do my own dedicated history podcast about gaming and computers. If I go down this route, I want to really make a determined effort to get it right the first time. In short, I want to do something really slick and polished that would have a decent shot at getting featured on the iTunes store.