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TSL vs the Originals vs the VGA

Started by daventry, October 24, 2014, 02:58:45 PM

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JDHJANUS

#20
Blackthorne, one of the heads of Infamous Quests, told me that since IA has gone commercial, they are no longer working on any of the fan games, to include Kingdom of Sorrow. So, sadly, I don't expect to see that game ever come to fruition.

As far as Roberta's involvement in the Companion, I think that supplemental materials, such as the Companion, the Official Book of King's Quest, the King's Quest novels, etc., can definitely fall in the category of canon, but at the same time, if an official game (or an official source from the game development) contradicts them, I think that's perfectly fine.

For example, despite the Companion noting that Hagatha is the sister of Mordack and Manannan and part of the Black Cloak Society, Roberta herself noted that she never intended for Hagatha to have any connection to any of the other villains of the series. Similarly to how Spear also connected all of the Space Quest villains, even though the Two Guys have noted that Elmo Pug and Captain Quirk were never supposed to be tied to Vohaul.

Also, an interesting thing to point out - Roberta once said that Daventry was actually a real country here on earth, and that it existed hundreds of years ago and has since fallen into ruin. (I personally prefer the Companion's idea of Daventry withdrawing to another dimension, but if we're going with official RW canon, then technically Daventry is somewhere here on earth!)

The novels, on top of having several grammar and spelling errors, also have several conflicting information with the story canon. Graham, for example, having blond hair and a beard! And Rosella and Alexander being a few years apart as opposed to being twins are a couple of the inconsistencies I can think of off the top of my head.

So, in conclusion, I consider the strategy guides and novels to be supplemental material. I like the information in them, and I definitely consider them canon...unless the official games contradict them, in which case I think that the games take precedence over the guides. So, the KQVII and KQVIII thing about them happening at the same time - if that is mentioned in the new King's Quest game, I would be perfectly okay with that, as there's nothing in the games themselves to contradict that. That having been said, if the new game has something completely off, like Alexander being married to some other random woman with no explanation as to what happened to Cassima, I would definitely consider that to be a major problem.

Talk to you later!

JDHJANUS
Josh
Please tell me the answer. Is fate unchangeable? Even at his most powerless, man's existence is never without meaning. - Suikoden's Intro

Numbers

That sucks about Kingdom of Sorrow...oh well.

"Roberta-canon" depends entirely on how seriously you take Roberta. I personally don't take her seriously at all, as she contributed nothing but bad ideas to the series during the latter half of its run. The only reason 6 was as good as it was had something to do with the fact that Jane Jensen was the one in charge of the product, not Roberta. And it was Roberta's idea to turn Mask of Eternity into an action/puzzle/platformer, which is as bad an idea as turning Doom into an RPG...which, incidentally, has already been done.
I have no mouth, and I must scream.

Neonivek

KQ7 takes place, to my knowledge like... over a day or week or something I cannot remember but the game actually does give you a time frame.

The Silver Lining considers Mask of Eternity Canon but MOSTLY doesn't dwell on it mostly because that game creates a LOT of plotholes ("Why hello alternate underworld... Are you going to say anything even in passing why I am here and not in the underworld we know of?")

Mind you The Silver Lining does EASE some of the plotholes by basically setting up that certain elements change depending on the location.

Also I wouldn't take ANYTHING Roberta says about Mask of Eternity as her honest opinion. She is just a team player. Either that or she is kind of mildly crazy (which frankly given her opinion on Phantasmagoria 2... maybe)

QuoteTaking the Companion out of the picture, you could theoretically presume that King's Quest VII and MOE happened concurrently, as there's nothing in the games to contradict this.

Except the... you know... whole Mask of Eternity thing happening and Eternia not being an entirely separate dimension.

It is pretty impossible for Mask of Eternity to happen concurrently with any game in the series because the destruction of the mask of Eternity is kind of... noticeable... and the game makes it quite clear that it isn't just Daventry that is in danger.

daventry

Man i Hate Twitter, it totally Limits your Posts and i can Never get to the Main Discussion of a Certain Topic.

There are so many Reply or Retweet Buttons, in witch i still cant get to the Main Discussion Box where others have replied.

Just Wish Sierra and TheOddGentlemen gets a Forum Board soon.

Anyway, heres the New Gameplay Trailer for KQ2015


Numbers

#24
I'm a bit concerned about that other game they were advertising near the end. A game focusing on flatulence doesn't seem to make any...
(•_•)
( •_•)>⌐■-■
(⌐■_■)
...scents.
YEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH
I have no mouth, and I must scream.

stika

I can't believe I laughed at that pun xD

GrahamRocks!

I'll say it again like I said on FB.

Footage looks great! Game looks great! Looking forward to it, Matt Korba!

The reporters, though? Ugh... wasn't one of the first things we learned about this game was that Graham was telling stories to Gwendolyn, his granddaughter? How can you forget that, when it's been mentioned in every article?

Heck, watching that scene with the knights, I kinda wanted them to shut up for a bit and just show us the actual scene with the music and all that. I'm trying to enjoy the footage, ya mooks! Why'd you cut it off there? I want more, dammit!

Numbers

Yeah, those are some of the most unenthusiastic reporters I've ever seen. If you don't even know Graham's name, then why are you covering footage of a King's Quest game to begin with?

Looking at the game's graphics now, my updated thoughts: the environments look fine. It's the character design I don't like. They look like they came out of some kind of cel-shaded hell and they clash horribly with the more realistic backgrounds. Graham's eyes are disproportionately large and his limbs look like twigs. And the color scheme on that dragon, man...

I feel like when Graham dropped that beehive on the guards, they should've spliced in Nicolas Cage screaming "Not the bees!" in the background.

Or else just photoshop this image into it.

I have no mouth, and I must scream.

GrahamRocks!

Haha! I love that Linkara joke!

Well, as has been established, Graham is supposed to be rather young. Can't really say for the eyes, but the twigs for arms are because of his age and he hasn't started knighthood yet. You think he always had those muscles we see in 5? Takes months or even years of training to get those.

Now if years pass, and he's STILL skinny as he'll like that in say a KQ5 era episode, THEN I'll be concerned with his design.  But for now, not really.

Yeah, they ARE unenthusiastic, aren't they? Speaking in the same bland tone of voice. And telling us stuff we already know too.

What I'd love to see is some competent reporter interviewing Matt and Lindsey and instead of talking over everything, they go like:

Reporter: *asks question*

Matt: *answers and shows clip to demonstrate*

*clip plays and they stay quiet*

*back to interview*

I know, I know, that sounds obvious. That's typically how interviews go, I know. You know what I mean though, right?

Also, I like that little wave Graham gave to the dragon.

Neonivek

In all fairness... I like a Retcon of making Graham more of a weenie in the first game.

Because as someone who played the entire series and seen how many ways Graham could die...

Graham is kind of a amazing in the very first game (for example that dragon? Graham just throws a dagger at it)

GrahamRocks!

Character development! Everyone loves that.

Numbers

Somehow, I don't think Graham's character development in this reboot is going to amount to anything other than "I came, I saw, I kicked ass." TSL, some awkward writing fumbles aside, is where to look for character development in KQ. There wasn't really much character development in the official games or even the fanmade remakes. Hell, Connor's characterization was basically, "The weight of the world is on my shoulders? Cool!"
I have no mouth, and I must scream.

GrahamRocks!


Numbers

The funny thing is, at first I didn't realize that "We came, we saw, we kicked its ass" actually came from Ghostbusters. The first time I heard it was from a Duke Nukem game. Another thing that I first heard from Duke Nukem that came from something else was "It's time to kick ass and chew bubblegum, and I'm all out of gum," which is actually a paraphrased quote from They Live. And of course, "Hail to the King, baby."

I guess what it all boils down to is Duke Nukem has no original one-liners; they're all from pop culture.

Recently, I played this game called Samsara that crosses over multiple 90s FPS games, including Doom, Heretic, Hexen, Wolfenstein 3D, Marathon, Quake, and even Chex Quest, but Duke Nukem is one of the playable characters, and they actually give him some original lines for once. "Well, it's gonna be a closed casket now" and "Of all the death screams I've heard, that was one of the worst," among others.
I have no mouth, and I must scream.

GrahamRocks!

I thought the kick ass and chew bubblegum was from Evil Dead or Army of Darkness? Huh. Shows what I know.

Jack Stryker

Did you ever play Blood?  That game was chock full of movie references.  I'll name all the ones I can remember:

- In the first level of episode 1, when Caleb comes out of his grave, he says, "I live again!"  Evil Dead reference.

- In that same level, a hidden area of the cemetery has Eric Draven's open grave from The Crow.

- In the train wreckage at the beginning of the carnival level, you can find Richard Kimble's prison uniform from The Fugitive.

- Duke Nukem's hanging dismembered corpse can also be found in a hidden area of the carnival level.  3D realms was working on the game, but sold it to Monolith so that they could work on The Shadow Warrior.  It's also a reference to Duke finding the Doom marine's corpse in Duke Nukem 3D.

- In the first level of episode 2, as Caleb is arriving by boat, he references Jaws by saying, "I'm gonna need a bigger boat."

- At the end of the level preceding the hedge maze level, there's a silhouette in a window that resembles Norman Bates' mother from Psycho.

- In the hedge maze level, you can find the frozen corpse of Jack Torrance from the Shining.  Caleb will even say, "Here's Johnny!" when you approach.

- In the sick ward level in episode 3, you can find a baby carriage with a demonic hand hanging out.  Upon approaching, Caleb will say, "I don't know nothin' about birthin' babies, Ms. Scarlet."  Reference to It's Alive!

- Just before facing off against the Cerberus boss in episode 3, Caleb will say, "Cujo?"

- A level in episode 4 has Freddie Krueger's hat and sweater hanging on a wall.

- The next level, "Crystal lake," has Jason Voorhees' mask and machete hanging on a wall, as well as his mother's severed head on a table next to some candles.

- And finally, when Caleb defeats the final boss, he says another Evil Dead line: "Good, bad, I'm the guy with the gun!"

Numbers

Oh, hell yeah, Blood.

While Duke Nukem was all about pop culture references in general, Blood was all about horror movie references, in particular the severed hands that say "I'll swallow your soul!", the little Calebs that burst out of mirrors and spout one-liners in Caleb's voice except very high-pitched, and the axe-wielding zombies that yell "More brains!" when they charge at you. Caleb occasionally sings nursery tunes in a sinister voice as well. There's also that one scene...you know the one I'm talking about, the blood drinking scene. For those of you who don't know, Caleb, the protagonist of the game, comes across one of his former comrades mummified in a spider web, hanging lifelessly from the ceiling. Caleb kills the huge spider who did it and saunters up to his webbed up friend...and then punches his fist through the guys stomach, rips out his intestines and heart, and starts eating them while quoting a verse from the Bible about feasting on the flesh of man--all while the spider corpse lays upside-down, legs still twitching, in the background. Looking back, the CGI animation of the cutscene really hasn't aged well, but at the time, it was the most nightmarish thing I'd ever seen in a video game.

Then Blood 2 came out, and God, what a disappointment. Caleb was downgraded from being a menacing and vengeful badass to an apathetic d0uchebag who didn't care about anything that happened around him. He spent the entirety of the first Blood getting revenge on the dark god who killed his friends, and then in Blood 2, when his friends miraculously return from the grave, he literally tells one of them to "go talk to someone who cares." Bullshit. The Blood 1 Caleb would be enthusiastic to see his friends again. The Blood 2 Caleb doesn't care. And if the main character doesn't care about anything, then why should we? It gets even worse in the expansion pack, where it appears his friends don't give a crap about him either. The opening cinematic is Caleb and friends sitting around a campfire telling stories to one another, and as Caleb is talking, a rift opens behind him and sucks him inside. His friends' reactions? "He always was bad at telling stories." Seriously? You're not concerned about the fact that your friend just got sucked into a black hole that spontaneously appeared and you have no idea where or when he could be, and your reaction is just "eh, whatever, it happens"?
I have no mouth, and I must scream.

Jack Stryker

Yeah, I can't say I cared much for Blood 2 either.  I watched my brother play through it once and didn't find it that great.

I wish I had something more on topic to say. :(

Numbers

I miss those games. Games where you could blow up the bad guys and your character would make little quips about it. Duke Nukem 3D, Blood, Shadow Warrior, Redneck Rampage...those days are long gone. The most recent game I can think of is The Adventures of Square, which uses the Doom engine and deliberately MS Paint-esque visuals to create a colorful cartoonish atmosphere.



In it, you play a purple, cigar-chomping square who must battle evil blue circles with all manner of weapons--including a defibrillator--all the while making painful, geometry-based puns. Whenever you blow up an enemy, he says something like "Cornered!" or "Get off my plane!" And yes, it's every bit as glorious as it sounds.

You can download the game for free here: http://adventuresofsquare.com/downloads.php I highly recommend it if you're looking for old-school FPS fun and have plenty of time to kill. Although, you should probably play at an easier difficulty to start with; on the hardest settings, it's nightmarishly difficult.

Wow, things really got sidetracked fast in this thread.
I have no mouth, and I must scream.

stika

#39
I loved Blood but I actually never played the sequel. Everyone I know who HAS played the sequel told me it was disappointing. What' wrong with it?