Old faithful

It’s been a busy few weeks, between traveling, seeing old friends, and being short-staffed at work in between all that. But it’s finally a weekend where I don’t have anything going on, and we finally had our first snowfall of the year, so I figured this was a good opportunity to get another entry out.

I say “finally” about our first snowfall in early November, because according to people who grew up where I currently live, there used to be snow on the ground before Halloween. Consistently. But better late, than never–I still like winter, despite all the shoveling I have to do as an adult. The colder temperatures just sit well with me. I mean heck, my wife and I had our honeymoon in Iceland, where temps in the 60s (Fahrenheit) are positively balmy. And in a roundabout way, that brings us to today’s word.

geyser, noun – a hot spring which periodically boils over, sending a spray of water and steam into the air

Learned from: Space Quest (Apple IIGS, Mac, PC)

Developed by Sierra On-Line

Published by Sierra On-Line (1986)

The first game in a six-game series, Space Quest was sort of the adventure game version of Spaceballs: all ridiculous situations, jokes, and references to established sci-fi franchises. Star Wars was the main inspiration, but there’s some Star Trek, Dune, and other things sprinkled in there. You play as Roger Wilco, a space janitor who ends up embroiled in a nefarious plot that threatens the galaxy, and only he can foil the villain’s plans and save the day.

After escaping the exploding space station where he, until just recently, worked, Roger crash lands on a desert planet, and must survive the sweltering heat, deadly wildlife, a speeder bike action sequence, and unscrupulous used droid salesmen to get back to space and foil an evil alien plot. One sequence on the planet has you making your way through a cave system with a geyser that you need to plug up with a rock, so the pressure will open a secret door. Adventure game logic is really odd sometimes.

Fun fact about the word, “geyser,” though: It’s actually named after a region (and a town) in Iceland, famous for its various hot springs, mud pots, and yes, geysers. The most famous one (called Geysir–not sure why the spelling changed in English), is now largely inactive. Strokkur is the most vigorous geyser in the area, going off every couple minutes, and it is pretty spectacular.

Fun fact about Geysir, Iceland: Everywhere we went in Iceland, was multi-lingual. Street signs, restaurant menus, signs on businesses; all of them were in at least two languages. Sometimes more. In fact, during our time there, there was only one sign we ever saw that defied this rule; the sign was at Geysir, and it was written only in English. Basically, “Despite appearances, this water is incredibly hot. If you touch it, you WILL get burned. The nearest hospital is over 50km away.”

I have a photo of it somewhere, but it’s on an old laptop I haven’t used in awhile. But yeah, if you ever wonder what the rest of the world really thinks about the United States, this thinly veiled jab toward famously monolingual Americans pretty well sums it up.

Also not my photo. The laptop my Iceland photos are on is old enough that it’s not compatible with Windows 11, so it’s sat untouched for some time.

My favorite time of year

Earlier today, my wife and I headed out to her folks’ place to spend part of the afternoon helping her father harvest grapes, which we will later also help him crush to turn into wine. Somewhere, there’s a photo of me grinning like a maniac, with my arms stained red damn near up to my elbows, like I just murdered somebody. Good times.

Anyway, for me, this is the official start of autumn: being out there with a cool breeze blowing over us, and a beautiful view of the changing colors of the trees on the far bank of the river, foraging through dense vines and leaves, looking for clusters of grapes hidden just out of sight. Again, good times. And that brings us to today’s word.

foliage, noun – plant leaves

Learned from: Space Quest II: Vohaul’s Revenge (Apple IIGS, Amiga, Apple II, Mac, PC)

Developed by Sierra On-Line

Published by Sierra On-Line (1987)

I have very fond memories of the Space Quest games, despite having only played the first two of them (3 and onward never came to the Apple IIGS). Comedies seemed a lot more popular when I was a kid, growing up watching movies like Naked Gun, and Police Academy. And some games got in on the action, too, particularly adventure games like The Secret of Monkey Island, which was a spoof of pirate stories, and Space Quest, which was a spoof primarily of Star Wars, but sci-fi in general. Sort of like a Temu version of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy: not bad necessarily, but certainly not as polished as the name brand. I used to play these a lot with my father, laughing at the ridiculous situations Roger Wilco, janitor turned reluctant hero, would get into, and puzzling over how to get out of them.

As the title of the second game suggests, Sludge Vohaul, the series’ villain, is out for revenge against Roger for foiling his plans in the first game. He has goons kidnap you in the opening of the game, and instead of killing you, he has them take you to a remote location so you can be forced to watch the downfall of galactic society at the hands of the genetically-modified insurance salesmen he’s developed. Or something along those lines; it’s been decades since I played it.

Anyway, something goes wrong with the hovercraft the goons were transporting you on, and it crashes into the dense forest of an alien world. As you look around, the narrator comments on the lush foliage–foliage you need to hide within at least once to keep from being found by Vohaul’s reinforcements, as you try to find a way off-planet to foil his latest insane scheme.

It’s an incredibly goofy game, filled with the sort of absolute moon logic that was common to adventure games of the era (e.g., I think you have to discover and mail in an order form for some kind of space-Tazmanian devil thing at one point, to solve a certain puzzle, while making sure the creature doesn’t catch and kill you in the process). But that was part of the fun. And the days of sitting around that 8-inch screen with my dad, tossing ideas back and forth about “well, what if we tried this?” are memories I will forever cherish.

I forgot the sheer *Mystery Science Theater 3000* vibes, in this box art.

History repeats itself

Recently, I took part in an episode of the Friends Occasionally Not Disagreeing podcast about our favorite video game soundtracks. It was a nice, nostalgic break from the state of the world today, since a lot of our choices were from games made in a simpler time, when laws still mattered, and people could generally agree that the Russians were the bad guys. The experience also reminded me of a word I’d learned from one of these games, though not the exact context.

hence, adv. – from this point in time

Learned from: Silpheed (Apple IIGS, PC, and a whole slew of Japan-only computer formats)

Developed by Game Arts, Sierra On-Line

Published by Game Arts, Sierra On-Line (1986)

I actually learned several words from this obscure, isometric shooter, which I’m sure I’ll get to later. All I remembered about “hence” was that it was somewhere in the opening cutscene. (And yes, a game from 1986 had an opening cutscene, complete with rudimentary wireframe 3D graphics!) Going back and looking up the entirety of the text, it’s surprisingly poetic, if grammatically questionable, for a game about chasing down a space terrorist who’s stolen a super battleship. Reprinted in its entirety, odd punctuation and all:

…HOW MANY YEARS HENCE SHALL THIS OUR LOFTY SCENE BE ACTED OVER. IN STATES UNBORN AND ACCENTS YET UNKNOWN.

Five-year-old me didn’t really appreciate it, but this was the ’80s equivalent of Fallout 3‘s famous, “War…war never changes.” And its question mark-less question of how many times this story would be retold ended up being prophetic, considering the absurd number of times this archaic, four-decade-old game has been remade: it’s had reimaginings on the Sega CD, PS2, XBox 360, and even Android devices as recently as 2011! That’s quite the pedigree for a title that despite its early foray into 3D graphics, and excellent MIDI soundtrack, seems largely unknown to most people.

I’m glad I wasn’t one of them, because while the other kids had Mario and Zelda, I sunk countless hours into underappreciated gems like Silpheed that performed graphical feats that by all rights, my parents’ Apple IIGS shouldn’t have been capable of.

And I wasn’t kidding about the soundtrack. It’s only about six songs long, but some of them still pop into my head decades later.

I know I’ve said it before, but I also miss box art like this–or, I guess it’s cover art these days, since hardly anything comes in boxes/cases anymore.

The new normal

Don’t worry, this isn’t going to be a post all about COVID. At least, not directly. Over the past few months, the company I work for has bled off no fewer than seven employees. We aren’t large, so this has really hurt. And because there’s a labor shortage in the US right now (the exact reasons why are a subject for another time), every place is hiring. That means we’ve had a ridiculously hard time getting people to apply–and if they do apply, most of them only stick around for a month or so before leaving to look for something less stressful. “Normal” this year has become an endless cycle of working extra hours because we’re so short-staffed, leading to a more stressful environment among those of us who have stuck around, and the new employees we do get pick up on that, and don’t want to stay, leading to more long hours, and more stress, and…

I miss the old normal. Which brings us to today’s word.

mundane, adj. – normal, ordinary, commonplace

Learned from: The Immortal (Apple IIGS, Amiga, Atari ST, Genesis, NES, PC, Nintendo Switch)

Developed by Will Harvey

Published by Electronic Arts (1990)

The Immortal was an odd, but memorable game. Part-adventure game, part-light RPG, it put you in the shoes of a rather old wizard, trying to find his mentor somewhere in a sprawling labyrinth. It sounds pretty straightforward (aside from the protagonist older than 30–how often do you see something like that, these days?), but the game was anything but. Your adventure was chock-full of clever puzzles to solve (or bash your head against), traps to avoid (or blunder into), monsters to fight (or sneak by, or even befriend), and spells to cast–even spells as “mundane” as fireballs, according to the manual.

The world usually felt threatening, sometimes alien (the will-o’-the-wisps stand out in my memory), and always lived-in. Even despite the clunky controls, and some would say unfair difficulty (how was I supposed to know that chest was full of spiders, ahead of time?!), I still have very fond recollections of my time with The Immortal. Despite the bland initial setup, the game is anything but mundane.

Believe it or not, EA publishing good, inventive games also used to be normal.

Levity, by way of lexical ambiguity

Apologies again for the long break; politics, and skyrocketing COVID numbers (which, insanely, is also somehow political in my country) have made it hard to focus on projects like this. I’d been trying to distract myself, but it took months to even get a one-shot session of a tabletop RPG off the ground. That finally happened, though, and I’d forgotten how much I liked running games for friends–even over Discord, with all its technical glitches. In a roundabout way, this brings us to today’s word, because of joking around with friends, and also the game’s title.

jerkin, noun – a long, close-fitting jacket, usually without sleeves

Learned from: Dungeon Master (Apple IIGS, Amiga, Atari ST, PC, SNES, Turbografx-CD, Sharp X68000, PC-9801, FM Towns)

Developed by FTL Games

Published by FTL Games (1987)

Dungeon Master was a great first-person dungeon crawler (or DRPG, as the genre is sometimes called today). The puzzles actually made you think, the magic system was very interesting in how spells were put together, and it was pretty damn challenging. It was also rather obtuse at times, particularly when it came to equipment.

Weapons came with different types of attacks (slash, hack, bash, etc.), and you could see via experimentation, which ones packed more oomph. But armor? There was no “defense” rating, or anything like that; all you had to go on was the picture, and the item’s weight. So, while you could infer that a breastplate would protect a character more than a silk shirt, was a tunic better or worse than a jerkin? Impossible to say. So, you just had to kind of guess your way through outfitting your characters, which made staying a live more difficult than it needed to be. Then again, it’s not like real-life gear tends to have numerical ratings for anything but temperature ranges for winter coats.

And now for the lexical ambiguity joke:

Enjoy this stock image, because googling “dungeon master jerkin” brings up some very…different results.

What’s in a name?

If you’re like me, the current state of things has you pretty frustrated. I considered a bunch of words that would reflect different aspects of the aggravation I’m feeling about how poorly people (in my country at least) are responding to the COVID-19 pandemic, when I realized I could sum it all up in one. It’s not so much the word itself, but rather the game it’s from.

halitosis, noun – bad breath

Learned from: Aaargh! (Apple IIGS, Amiga, Amstrad CPC, Atari ST, Arcade, Commodore 64, PC, ZX Spectrum)

Developed by Binary Design, Sculpted Software

Published by Arcadia Systems, Melbourne House (1988)

Aaargh! is an early attempt at portraying giant monster battles in a game. But in the absence of licensed properties like Godzilla, Ultraman, or King Kong, the developers had to make do with a generic giant lizard, and an “ogre” (which, for some reason, they actually drew as a cyclops). The two monsters were basically sprite swaps, since they each had the same moves, though the ogre certainly got the short end of the stick, thematically. Instead of the lizard’s actual fire breath, he was described as having “halitosis, which is so bad it sets things on fire.” And yes, I dug up the manual to find the exact wording, after twenty-odd years. I’m dedicated. 😉

The game itself was technically less about beating up the other monster, and more about finding the eggs of a giant bird, hidden in a primitive village before your opponent did. (The actual type of bird is another word I learned from this game, but that’s a post for another time.) It was…okay for what it was trying to do, but there are reasons it was overshadowed by Rampage, which came out a few years earlier and offered more robust gameplay. Plus, there’s that title…

aaargh

Aaargh! indeed.

1,000 Points of Light

By this point, I’m sure most of you know about the situation in Australia. If somehow you aren’t, the continent is on fire. Millions of animals have died, thousands of people have been displaced, and as of right now, the fires show no signs of stopping. Today’s word should be self-explanatory….

inferno, noun – an intense, uncontrollable blaze

Learned from: Shadowgate (Apple IIGS, Atari ST, Amiga, CD-I, Game Boy Color, Macintosh, NES, Palm OS, PC, mobile phone)

Developed by ICOM Simulations, Inc.

Published by Mindscape (1987), (Kemco, 1989 for the NES)

Far from the real-world horrorscape that is Australia right now, opening a door to find just an entire chasm full of fire seems downright passe. Shadowgate was known for being unpredictable. Each door, or hatch, or hallway could just as easily lead to a wizard’s laboratory, or a dragon’s hoard, or a bridge over a sea of flames. The sheer variety of scenes led to an equally broad set of creative solutions in order to progress.

Sadly, there’s no icy crystal orb we can shatter against the ground to put out the infernos raging across Australia. Indeed, once you see some of the photos from the area, it can be easy to feel like there’s no solution at all. And for any one of us, that’s true. Fortunately, fixing this–or any other problem of this scope–doesn’t fall on the shoulders of any one person. The most any one of us can do is what we can. If you’re inclined to spit in the face of impossible odds, and do all that anyone could ask, this article has a list of things you can do to help, at the bottom. Again, no one person could be expected to do all of them, but any of us could do at least one.

Deep freeze

Things have been very, very cold lately, in my neck of the woods, so let’s go with a word that captures that idea this time around.

permafrost, noun – A permanently frozen region of land.

Learned from: Neuromancer (Apple IIGS, Amiga, Apple II, Commodore 64, PC)

Developed by Interplay Productions

Published by Mediagenic (1988)

In retrospect, I probably shouldn’t have been playing Neuromancer as early as I did. It’s a game that involves corporate espionage, existential crises, red light districts, organ harvesting, and a whole slew of other themes I didn’t fully appreciate until years later. Still, adventure games were things I could play with my father, and we both enjoyed the experience of puzzling our way through the narratives. It was also my first exposure to the cyberpunk genre, and it’s a love that’s endured to the present day.

“Permafrost” was a password you needed to give someone on a forum, to enter into a shady arms deal, if memory serves. I’m pretty sure that deal resulted in your character getting arrested, but then, there seemed to be little in that dystopian world that wasn’t illegal, so that’s neither here nor there.

neuromancer

Cutting edge graphics for the time, really.

United States of SMASH

With the release of Super Smash Bros. Ultimate just a few days away, I felt I should do something in honor of the series…in a roundabout way. The first Smash Bros. game I played was Melee, on the Gamecube, yet I learned that word many years prior.

melee, noun – A close-quarters fight among several people.

Learned from: Dungeon Master (Apple IIGS, Amiga, Atari ST, PC, SNES, Turbografx-CD, Sharp X68000, PC-9801, FM Towns)

Developed by FTL Games

Published by FTL Games (1987)

I remember being six or seven years old, and unwrapping this game on Christmas morning, only to see the sticker on the box that said it required an entire megabyte of memory to run. I also remember the feeling of surprise and awe, when my father told me he’d upgraded our Apple IIGS from 512k to a whopping TWO megabytes of RAM for the occasion–to this day, I do kinda wonder if he bought the game as much for himself, as for me.

And I can understand why. Dungeon Master is still close to the epitome of the first-person dungeon crawler, for me. Its levels were huge and mysterious, its puzzles actually made you think, and you were just as likely to die of starvation or dehydration, as you were by falling down a pit or getting killed by monsters, if you weren’t careful. Magic worked by entering the arcane alphabet of each spell, no area was entirely safe, and weapons and armor didn’t have obvious numerical stats, so you had to experiment to see which ones worked best for your party.

This carried over to attacks as well, where one sword might offer a slash and a slice attack, while another might be designed for thrusts. Each type of attack used a different amount of stamina, and seemed to work better against certain types of monsters, though the more stamina used, the stronger the hit, generally. Which brings us to the battle ax, which had a strong (yet inaccurate) attack simply labeled “melee.” As a child of less than ten, I probably relied on that attack (and others like it) way too much, which explains why I didn’t do very well in the game until years later.

And I know a dungeon crawler is about as far from a Smash Bros. game you can get, without delving into sports, but I learned a lot of words from Dungeon Master, so this seemed like a good opportunity to get one out of the way.

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