"Thanks for playing you've been a real pant load"

It's amazing to me how many times I will see something and compare it to something I have seen in a game I've played. Okay, yeah that seems a little odd and I really need to get out more, but all that does is allow me to continue to see things and hear voices. I was having a few cocktails at a favorite establishment, yes I do socialize without a keyboard. Someone in the group was referring to a funny event and said, "...yeah that was a real pant load." Immediately I went nostalgic,
"Thank you for playing Space Quest 4 and as usual you've been a real pant load."

*Sigh* those were the days.....

Image by timmarshall via Flickr

Image via Wikipedia

What an era in video games. The 80's and early 90's opened up a whole new world for me in entertainment. Names like Ken and Roberta Williams, Lori and Corey Cole, Scott Murphy, Mark Crowe and good 'ole Al Lowe.

These were my heroes, my celebrity's, I think I played almost everything Sierra On-Line produced and what a ride it was. Kings Quest, Police Quest, Space Quest and many more titles made their way into my new found obsession.

Image via Wikipedia

As Gamers we have all had our "first time". That magic moment when you felt funny inside and your knees went weak, wait...that was another first time, but this was kinda of like that.

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It was the time of CGA, the Color Graphics Adapter and a true 2d gaming environment. It was pixels the size of your thumb and very grainy but it had the same impact going from a black and white TV to Color. CGA lead to EGA "Enhanced Graphics Adapter" and then to VGA.

We had it all, at least we thought. How can this get any better. We had the Roland MT-32, well I didn't, my rich neighbor did, but I had an Ad Lib sound card for my IBM and my immersion was complete. I never left my PC for the next 10 years. The soundtracks for these games began to be recognizable as if they were the top ten tunes on the radio.

After my little nostalgic flashback and upon returning home somewhat inebriated, yes it's the voices, I started digging through the old shoe box of games to see what had survived. Have you ever had a tune stuck in your head to the point that you need to listen to it or start chewing on the couch? I wanted to stroll down memory lane to see Daventry, the planet Phleebhut, Help Laura Bow solve a mystery, yeah I have to admit I enjoyed the Laura Bow Mystery series as well, don't make fun of me, talk to the voices.

 The humor was slapstick and one liners at it's best. Space Quest 6 was probably one of my favorites but the rest of the series is very well written as well. Gary Owens who was the announcer for Rowen and Martins Laugh in, the voice of Space Ghost and several other noted persona's, was also the announcer for Space Quest 6. The developers choosing Gary was a perfect match for the way it was written and designed.

Image via Wikipedia

There were so many hours spent in the stories and worlds that 
the Sierra On-Line team created, almost 20 years of great entertainment. I have some great memories of puzzles that had stumped me for days, the satire, the drama and fear.....yes my precious, fear. Gabriel Knight and Phantasmagoria were games to play with the lights out...if you dare.

Image by Michael Heilemann via Flickr

I am going to run off, grab Roger Wilco and play me some Astro Chicken, meanwhile mouse over to these links and check out some memorable moments and ground breaking gaming history.

 Space Quest 4: Memorable Moments

Sierra Games On-Line

Pan and Games?

Move over George Lucas and Steven Spielberg, here comes Mr G. According to a an interview at MTV's Multiplayer Blog. The writer, director and producer of Pan's Labyrinth is heading into the gaming world. Guillermo del Toro who is probably most noted for directing the “Hell Boy” franchise, is going to share his movie/writing/directing talent with the gaming industry.

  MTV's Multiplayer blog

"One of the things we're announcing in the next few weeks is a big deal with a big company. We're going to do games that are going to be technically and narratively very interesting. It's not a development deal. We're going to do it. We're doing them. And we're going to announce it soon enough." ...Guillermo del Toro

I will be interested to see who this “big company” is and what “technically and narratively very interesting” plays like. I like this Celebrity/Hollywood trend and the more attention given to the gaming industry means more excitement to come, and Gamers continue to move into mainstream society. Okay, it's not like gamers are second rate citizens or anything but gamer acceptance has changed over the years.


Over the last 6 years or so we have seen more of Hollywood courting the video game industry. Names like Peter Jackson, "The Lord of the Rings" trilogy, John Woo “Face Off”, George Lucas, Steven Spielberg(though Lucas and Spielberg have been active longer), and lastly Paul WS Anderson “Mortal Kombat” and the first “Resident Evil” have expanded their creative experiences. Whether its because of new opportunities or a recession (Alex Wiltshire article, good read), its really hard to speculate.

When I first heard of a celebrity playing my fav MMO it made me feel less “geeky”, of course these days it's cool to be a “geek”. Back in the day, the idea of a superstar playing video games gave me my much needed retort. “Curt Schilling plays Everquest” was my enervated mythical. These days gaming is not only a major industry but an honorable pass time along with every other form of entertainment or recreation. The collaboration announcement of Curt Schilling; former MLB pitcher, RA Salvatore; Best selling American author and Todd McFarlane; Artist and writer best known for his Spawn comic book character, was exciting, of course the rest is yet to be told.

Game designer, movie director, extraordinary talents stepping into a new medium weaving that voodoo they do so well. This creates the “that was a great movie” conversation right with “That’s an awesome game.” It kinda of brings the whole thing together, sort of like a home coming.

Games made into movies or movies made into games are not as appealing to me, as a Game industry talent making a movie or Hollywood talent making a game, but more on that another time. Right now....C'mon Brad McQuaid, makes us a movie.

"FTP" it could have saved them all

If you haven’t heard by now then you are just not paying attention. Of course this would be true if you are an avid gamer, a follower of the “Whats New”, one who has their pulse on the industry or simply a player of Everquest II. The inter-webs were flowing with the Free to play announcement by SOE. Yes it's true...cows do fly...

Click here for announcement

Now I don’t have a real strong opinion on a FTP service. For that type of debate, rant, zerg, you would need to head over to the EQII forums for a solid serving from both camps. However I do have one small thought just from the many people I have met over the years. Through many adventures in the on line gaming world, in a pay to play MMO environment, I have seen the extremes of how people play the game.

I know there are many levels but there are only 2 ends of the spectrum. The 60 hour a week energy boosted, king of all that he surveys and the Saturday night 3 hour lifer, who is still level 26. Of course the bottom line is, regardless of how a gamer games, “is it fun”.. .this brings me to my point. This would be for all those people I've met who gave up the game, because the 3 hours a week didn’t make sense at $15.00 a month. I don’t know anything that is worth doing for $5 an hour.....and be legal.

Free to Play is a great option for those with limited time and what I have seen so far, there is enough to keep “Mr 3 hours a week” busy gaming for a long time.

I give this latest endeavor of SOE 3.5 stars, 4 stars if they would move that damn “Upgrade Pop-Up” from the center of the screen.

"If it Ain't Broke Don't Fix it" if it is broke, welcome to Hell

Agreed, There are so many variables with a PC and so many complications and solutions sound the same, and the "if it ain't broke don't fix it" is always great advice. Symptoms can branch out into several more problems and before you know it, you have a dozen things not working and then trial and error for the novice begins.Yep, one day it's all cake and pie and the next days its a poop sandwich.

"The PC was just fine, really, it was running fine just 3 seconds ago...."

Upon purchase I added a Hard Drive, PSU and Vid Card (Radeon HD 4670 PCI-E) this has been over a year ago. Some time ago the Vid Card would just stop sending a signal, Pc would stay on but no video. This would happen in a certain game that was played and would happen once every 5 times playing.

Recently the PC was powered up, but no video signal. The on-board video worked fine, I unplugged the cable from the video card to the integrated video. Re-booting, results were the same. BIOS shows PCI-E as primary, all drivers up to date. No heat issues, no PSU trouble. I have 3 PC's with Antec 650w PSU's and PCI-E video, I have done a lot of swapping. This led me to the conclusion the the MB or the PCI-E slot was bad. Actually, it led me to the million Tech forums and the billion people that post on these forums that are smarter than I.

It was suggested on one of these forums that other driver updates, PC, Vid Card, etc, etc, that the Video Bios and/or BIOS might need to be updated. There was a newer version of the Video BOIS. I read it as a newer or updated BIOS and flashed it. Flashing your BIOS is a really cool technical term that makes you sound like a real professional Geek, but if you don't know what you are doing you are just a geek wannabe and I am.

BSOD(Blue Screen of Death)after re-boot, that would flash the blue screen and then re-boot. System restore was suggested by several tech boards. Opinions and advice. One would try so hard to save money and fix something that isn't working right, he would listen to his dog for advice. Yes, grabbing at straws begins here.

System Restore, Rollback, Restore Point, Recovery Console, System Recovery, a smorgasbord of sounding the same but being slightly different. NO recovery Disks, there are restore files on a partition and of course there were no restore disks made when prompted upon purchase that would just make too much sense. After all, nothing bad has ever happened to me.

Okay, Restore point sounds safe, executed and time for re-boot...."Code Purple"..wonderful. No real reason here just frustration, pulled the Vid card and rebooted PC, "Code Purple". Between the Blue screen and the Purple error you would think a Smurf got caught in my PC. Next step, remove extra Hard Drive and that allowed me to boot up. PCI-E card and any PCI-E card I tried was not working, just the integrated. PCI-E card was never recognized, it's like it did not exist.

Next step which was a few steps actually and not in any order, but repeated for luck with abusive verbiage. Unplug PC, hold power button in for a few seconds, clear CMOS, Set BIOS to default, set PC upside down..okay that was the dogs idea, nothing changed. PC works fine with integrated video but will not recognize any card in the PCI-E slot.

I re-installed the extra Hard drive to try and figure out why "Code Purple" shows up with it only, and attempt the workarounds found here http://www.billoblog.com/billoblog/?p=152#comments. Who would have thought Tattoo's were that popular, and how crazy is that. The link is worth the read.

Nothing changed until I removed the HD and rebooted, the PCI-E slot worked. If I reboot the PC, the PCI-E slot does not work until I attach the extra HD and attempt to boot up, get the "Code Purple" error and reboot with out the extra HD. I have repeated this several times and its consistent.

So, at this point the fix is..keep the extra HD handy and if the PC powers down, jump through some hoops to get it operating.

After all I have been through, the workaround is like walking the dog.