It was pretty decent considering the drought of quality Netflix stuff. The AOL bit filled me with some existential fear because it was clearly meant to be historically informative to people who didn't exist yet.
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"High Score", a six-episode Netflix documentary about the “golden age of video games” is premiering on Wednesday, Aug. 19
- Thread starter The Main Event
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Oh god this. I felt it during the Atari, NES and Super Nintendo history bits too, it addresses a viewer that wasn't born yet when these consoles were being sold.
It's either symbolic for his quest to find a game or a stealth promo for The Detectorists (great show BTW.)
Finished watching it, it was good, evoked a lot of nostalgia, the pixel graphics were great in it, well researched.
But it would've benefited a lot more if it were 12 or maybe 16 episodes, condensing the 4 decades and more history of video games in 6 45 minutes episodes just doesn't work and a lot of critical moments in video games history was missed.
Think it was a symbolism for his search for his long lost video game, Gayblade.
But it would've benefited a lot more if it were 12 or maybe 16 episodes, condensing the 4 decades and more history of video games in 6 45 minutes episodes just doesn't work and a lot of critical moments in video games history was missed.
Think it was a symbolism for his search for his long lost video game, Gayblade.
My wife and I enjoyed it. A bit shallow and over the place but good production values and easy to consume. I liked the episodes with Garriot and Romero the most.
Just finished watching. I actually delayed starting it for a few days, because I assumed it was another one of those King of Kong type of documentaries, and I wasn't really interested in watching another one of those just yet. I really enjoyed it, but I think my favorite episodes were 3-5, with the fifth being a major highlight. Even though I'd say a large portion of the information throughout all of the episodes was kind of old news to me, it was nice to see it all done in such a concise way for those who weren't really following video games all that much or until recently, and the additional graphics gave it a sense of humor along with a bit of nostalgia.
Not this again. Zelda is highly influential, but I'll leave it at that. And they did at least give a nod to Breath of the Wild.
Not this again. Zelda is highly influential, but I'll leave it at that. And they did at least give a nod to Breath of the Wild.
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yeah Zelda's place as an RPG has always been debatable, it always falls into the broader "action adventure" genre. The crazy part in the doc was the absolute zero mention of Dragon Quest, all I saw was a glimpse of those blue thingies (yeah Im not that into RPgs sue me :P) in a market in Japan, which from what I know is almost unavoidable.
Yes. Glad some here feel similarly, I definitely an getting some interesting things out of this series. But it's really weirdly focused and paced, like I don't get what the point of this is? They start focusing on stuff that is not important to gaming history at all... not sure why they chose to do it this way.
After 4 episodes think i'm going to drop the last two. The pacing just doesn't work for me. The episode about Sega should have been great for me and yet I found my mind wandering away from it.
It's fine. Watched it while working. The historical timeline is overwhelming warped to make whomever agreed to an interview seem like gods. There are some good bits, but a more critical and investigative documentary that would paint an accurate history is what I was originally hoping for. Honestly, podcasts and wikipedia do better jobs of this.
Started watching it. A few minutes in heard the "100-yen coin shortage" myth narrated from some old TV broadcast and stopped right then and there. Maybe I'm petty, but this thing has been debunked so many times it's embarrassing for a production of this level to start off with something like this. Like, I had zero expectation of it being well-researched at all after that. Reading some of the comments here, I might have made the right call.
Finished it today, it was entertaining and overall did a pretty good job telling the story of the beginnings of the game industry, even if some of the stuff they focused or omitted was questionable. Hope they make another season.
Overall a good series.
I feel like it loses focus in the later episodes or introduces stories that don't pay off. They also follow a tournament winner multiple times and it gets old. The SEGA Mtv tourney guy just wasn't explained very well and didn't lead anywhere. I was excited to learn about the Street Fighter e-sports team but after introducing each kid, they completely drop the story. Again, why introduce these details when you're not going to use them later? The RPG, Sega and Street Fighter episodes could have used some cleaning up.
Everything else is a nitpick in the realm of "I can't believe they didn't mention ____ game!". Not real criticisms just jarring to me as a gamer.
Weird issue - the narrator saying "and where is Mortal Kombat today? Well the franchise is still big!" shows clips of the snes games leading to N64 to PS2...and then back to SNES...were they not allowed to show the past decade of Mortal Kombat?
"Fight games" also bugged me. No one calls them that. Everyone they interview calls them "fighting games". Martinet even fixes it midway through and properly calls them "Fighting games" before reverting back for the last segment.
Those are nitpicks. For the most part, I loved watching it and wished the season had been longer. I really enjoyed the personal stories about Gayblade, Channel F, the Space Invaders champ just as much as I enjoyed learning about Doom, getting time with the Street Fighter creative team, sitting down with Amano and seeing the Space Invaders creator gently thumb through his sketchbook.
Also a big reminder of why Miyamoto is a fucking genius.
We "yell at him" at lot for getting hung up on quirky things like Pikmin or for giving advice to IS that would lead to the Paper Mario series dropping it's RPG elements, but holy shit this guy was always creating, thinking, inventing. That little story of the dudes who developed the Super FX chip for Star Fox talking about how Shiggy would sneak into their room to smoke and seemingly ramble about nothing like "trees, animals, clouds" until they realized that he was always creating and coming up with new fantastical ideas.
The little anecdote about Miyamoto envisioning Star Fox when he was walking through that bridge was awesome.
I'd love a Season 2 with a bit more focus.
- 3D platformers and the advent of Mario 64
- the fall of Sega/the rise of Sony Playstation
- Microsoft uses Halo and XBox Live to hold their own against Sony
- Indie games
- Handheld gaming and Pokemon
- Half-Life and the creation of Steam, PC Gaming boom
- Adventure games and Metroidvanias
- Couch multiplayer and Nintendo's influence on it - Smash, Mario Kart, Mario Party
HIRE ME!
I feel like it loses focus in the later episodes or introduces stories that don't pay off. They also follow a tournament winner multiple times and it gets old. The SEGA Mtv tourney guy just wasn't explained very well and didn't lead anywhere. I was excited to learn about the Street Fighter e-sports team but after introducing each kid, they completely drop the story. Again, why introduce these details when you're not going to use them later? The RPG, Sega and Street Fighter episodes could have used some cleaning up.
Everything else is a nitpick in the realm of "I can't believe they didn't mention ____ game!". Not real criticisms just jarring to me as a gamer.
Weird issue - the narrator saying "and where is Mortal Kombat today? Well the franchise is still big!" shows clips of the snes games leading to N64 to PS2...and then back to SNES...were they not allowed to show the past decade of Mortal Kombat?
"Fight games" also bugged me. No one calls them that. Everyone they interview calls them "fighting games". Martinet even fixes it midway through and properly calls them "Fighting games" before reverting back for the last segment.
Those are nitpicks. For the most part, I loved watching it and wished the season had been longer. I really enjoyed the personal stories about Gayblade, Channel F, the Space Invaders champ just as much as I enjoyed learning about Doom, getting time with the Street Fighter creative team, sitting down with Amano and seeing the Space Invaders creator gently thumb through his sketchbook.
Also a big reminder of why Miyamoto is a fucking genius.
We "yell at him" at lot for getting hung up on quirky things like Pikmin or for giving advice to IS that would lead to the Paper Mario series dropping it's RPG elements, but holy shit this guy was always creating, thinking, inventing. That little story of the dudes who developed the Super FX chip for Star Fox talking about how Shiggy would sneak into their room to smoke and seemingly ramble about nothing like "trees, animals, clouds" until they realized that he was always creating and coming up with new fantastical ideas.
The little anecdote about Miyamoto envisioning Star Fox when he was walking through that bridge was awesome.
I'd love a Season 2 with a bit more focus.
- 3D platformers and the advent of Mario 64
- the fall of Sega/the rise of Sony Playstation
- Microsoft uses Halo and XBox Live to hold their own against Sony
- Indie games
- Handheld gaming and Pokemon
- Half-Life and the creation of Steam, PC Gaming boom
- Adventure games and Metroidvanias
- Couch multiplayer and Nintendo's influence on it - Smash, Mario Kart, Mario Party
HIRE ME!
This honestly deserves a full length film in the vein of The Social Network for the sheer insanity of it with Nintendo "backstabbing" Sony with Phillips and all. Kutaragi and Yamauchi alone are such big crazy figures. Unfortunately I don't think Nintendo would allow such movie to be greenlighted, not with their IPs.
Hiroshi Yamauchi was a savage, cut throat president. The more I learn about him and Satoru Iwata ,the more I realize how insanely different they were in almost every way possible.
Just found this imdb review by some dude complaining about "forced diversity".
Halfway through he starts referring to Roberta Williams as a "forced minority" (he actually never heard about her) and I didn't know whether to burst laughing or crying.
source: https://m.imdb.com/review/rw6033592/?ref_=m_tt_urv
Halfway through he starts referring to Roberta Williams as a "forced minority" (he actually never heard about her) and I didn't know whether to burst laughing or crying.
source: https://m.imdb.com/review/rw6033592/?ref_=m_tt_urv
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Are we still going with that particular narrative? If anything it was Sony's fine line agreement of owning all the rights to every Super CD game released, including Nintendo's 1st party, that caused Yamauchi to break the deal.
Just found this imdb review by some dude complaining about "forced diversity".
Halfway through he starts referring to Roberta Williams as a "forced minority" (he actually never heard about her) and I didn't know whether to burst laughing or crying.
So dumb. Roberta Williams is absolute gaming royalty and a true legend, if anything they didn't feature her and her games enough, and Rebecca Heineman was lead programmer on huge games like Wasteland and The Bard's Tale. Hardly picking out obscure minority stories just to be woke. Also, for dude complaining about the desperate attempt to not "include straight white males and there stories", did he miss that half that RPG ep with Williams was dedicated to spending time with Richard Garriott? smh
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This was like saying John Romero got his own half episode because his father has Mexican roots. Couldn't believe what I've been reading there.
Edit: Btw, found the last episode with id software was the best (next to the C-RPG one) :) Lots of room for improvement (historical gaps, too much emphasis on child competitive gamers) but I'm hoping for a second season.
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It's superficial, with many inaccuracies and each episode i've seen tries to tell 3/4 different stories that are completely unrelated to each other as if putting them together helped paint some larger picture, which it often fails at.
It does pick a few minority stories, which is noble but leans a bit too much into tearjerking territory.
Roberta Williams is an absolute legend and if anything, the episode in which she's featured doesn't give her nearly enough space compared to other lesser known stories which are beautiful but ultimately very marginal.
Entirely US centric and with way too much focus on tournaments and competitions, again not as relevant an aspect as they want viewers to believe.
I guess they needed to appeal to the esports crowd ?
Very good production values, well shot and directed, good moment to moment editing.
It does pick a few minority stories, which is noble but leans a bit too much into tearjerking territory.
Roberta Williams is an absolute legend and if anything, the episode in which she's featured doesn't give her nearly enough space compared to other lesser known stories which are beautiful but ultimately very marginal.
Entirely US centric and with way too much focus on tournaments and competitions, again not as relevant an aspect as they want viewers to believe.
I guess they needed to appeal to the esports crowd ?
Very good production values, well shot and directed, good moment to moment editing.
I watched all of it and thought it was okay, nothing great. It's kind of all over the place. They definitely spend way too much time taking about tournaments and participants of those tournaments that nobody remembers.
I'm old enough to remember the Nintendo Championships and nobody thought they were anything but marketing, even as kids.
It'd be awesome if they'd do a series like The Toys That Made Us and delve into Nintendo, SEGA, MS/XBOX, and high profile developers like Valve, ID, etc.
I'm old enough to remember the Nintendo Championships and nobody thought they were anything but marketing, even as kids.
It'd be awesome if they'd do a series like The Toys That Made Us and delve into Nintendo, SEGA, MS/XBOX, and high profile developers like Valve, ID, etc.
Roberta Williams is a legend a she deserves to be in the Videogame Hall of Fame, and same with Becky Heineman.
Up all night with the baby and my brain was fried, was thinking of my own friend named Roberta Jackson, lol
I gave them the benefit of doubt there because they included it as an extract from a TV broadcast.
Meaning they don't take responsibility for those claims; they (probably) know it's a myth but at the same time, they don't mind viewers believing it and they can defend themselves saying it wasn't presented as "this is what happened", rather as "this is what TV was saying back then".
It's dishonest, but I don't think it wasn't researched.
I just finished watching the docuseries with my boyfriend--we enjoyed it a lot and hope they make a second season. The coolest part was hearing a firsthand account of what it was like being a Nintendo Counselor. I also loved hearing details about Sega's strategy to take on Nintendo. My main complaint about the series is that they could go much further into detail about how some of the tech works in a couple of areas:
Still, the series was clearly made with a lot of love. I thoroughly enjoyed all of the interviews with people who won competitions in the past. There were also a number of tidbits that were entirely new info to me, and the way everything was packaged was really beautiful. Would love for them to cover Pokemon and Grand Theft Auto in Season 2. Would also love an episode dedicated to flash games.
I'd love to know how the somewhat illegal arcade kits worked--beyond how they'd attach them to the arcade's motherboard. We were also disappointed that they didn't give an explainer at all behind how the Doom devs made sidescrolling smooth on the Apple computer
Still, the series was clearly made with a lot of love. I thoroughly enjoyed all of the interviews with people who won competitions in the past. There were also a number of tidbits that were entirely new info to me, and the way everything was packaged was really beautiful. Would love for them to cover Pokemon and Grand Theft Auto in Season 2. Would also love an episode dedicated to flash games.
Currently watching through this. On the Madden episode right now.
I wish they wouldn't take up so much time on the game competition stuff. They're already rushed for time, and I'd rather have more industry information instead. They can keep Rebecca Heineman though, but for her programming instead. She's very entertaining to listen to, and she has some great stories about the early days of making games.
I also feel like they're leaving a ton out. I know it's just a surface level documentary, but it feels like it is skipping some really important stuff (where is the C64?).
I wish they wouldn't take up so much time on the game competition stuff. They're already rushed for time, and I'd rather have more industry information instead. They can keep Rebecca Heineman though, but for her programming instead. She's very entertaining to listen to, and she has some great stories about the early days of making games.
I also feel like they're leaving a ton out. I know it's just a surface level documentary, but it feels like it is skipping some really important stuff (where is the C64?).
This was super frustrating to watch. There are so many great, interesting stories in gaming's history, and in some cases this series barely gave them 5 minutes, and others are completely ignored. It's awesome to see Nolan Bushnell, but give him more screen time than 3 minutes at the end of the episode!
I don't even know if I want a season 2 of this. I'd LOVE a series like this but have each episode deep dive into one game/story. Seriously, Doom's story is turned into an excellent 10+ hour audiobook. Give me more than 1/3 of a 40 minute episode!
I don't even know if I want a season 2 of this. I'd LOVE a series like this but have each episode deep dive into one game/story. Seriously, Doom's story is turned into an excellent 10+ hour audiobook. Give me more than 1/3 of a 40 minute episode!
I didn't care for it. I watched the fighting game episode and a little bit of the RPG episode and I stopped. The only interesting parts were the interviews, besides that I've seen youtube videos with better and more in depth info. It was a little all over the place.
It wasn't bad, but it just wasn't very interesting to me. I was pretty bored.
It wasn't bad, but it just wasn't very interesting to me. I was pretty bored.
I'm enjoying it but it's frustrating how they keep skipping over some of the more important/interesting details, like ET being found in the landfill and Gayblade being discovered. These things shouldn't be one-sentence footnotes.
I expected it to be terrible, but was really entertained by it. I liked how they hit all the high points, but still got in some obscure and stayed away from the cliches. Unlike others here, I specifically liked how they didn't go into depth on main details of gaming history giving those atypical stories room to breathe. The whole Gay Blade thing was super cool. My only beef is that I wish they'd interviewed Yuji Horii or someone associated with Dragon Quest, because it is, in fact, more important to the development of JRPGs than Final Fantasy. Also, even thought the Amano interview was super cool, they kept showing gameplay footage of stuff he didn't work on too.
just finished it in this very minute.
i think there were a few bits missing:
-yuji naka wasnt mentioned as he was the original creator of sonic(i guess?)
-the original street fighter/II creator wasnt there either.
-sad, that miyamoto was not interviewed.
-sad, that there was not more older nintendo-material being shown.
other than that, mostly stuff i knew.
what blew my mind and what i expected, that the channel f and the ability to change carts was invented by a black dude WHO WAS FUCKING NEVER MENTIONED. super sad to see this. thanks to netflix to bring up this topic.
it so sad, that it mostly shows the white middle-class of the US, and nothing else.
it would have been interesting to see tidbits such as how they whitened up characters to please the american audience or how the black dude from ghostbusters was cencored out of the game.
i think there were a few bits missing:
-yuji naka wasnt mentioned as he was the original creator of sonic(i guess?)
-the original street fighter/II creator wasnt there either.
-sad, that miyamoto was not interviewed.
-sad, that there was not more older nintendo-material being shown.
other than that, mostly stuff i knew.
what blew my mind and what i expected, that the channel f and the ability to change carts was invented by a black dude WHO WAS FUCKING NEVER MENTIONED. super sad to see this. thanks to netflix to bring up this topic.
it so sad, that it mostly shows the white middle-class of the US, and nothing else.
it would have been interesting to see tidbits such as how they whitened up characters to please the american audience or how the black dude from ghostbusters was cencored out of the game.
Well the production company Great Big Story just got shut down, so it doesn't look likely.
CNN Closes Book on Great Big Story, Its One-Time Answer to Vice and Buzzfeed
CNN is shuttering Great Big Story, a streaming-video hub that launched in 2015 as a bid to compete more directly with outlets like Vice
variety.com
Oh well, that answers that. Will remove of my list.Well the production company Great Big Story just got shut down, so it doesn't look likely.
CNN Closes Book on Great Big Story, Its One-Time Answer to Vice and Buzzfeed
CNN is shuttering Great Big Story, a streaming-video hub that launched in 2015 as a bid to compete more directly with outlets like Vice
I'll probably watch the PS documentary next time I get Prime.
It was fine. It showed a bunch of things I didn't know and highlighted people who were important in various ways but are always left out, giving the impression that the entire industry was 20 year old white guys.
It's also quite impossible to cover everything in six episodes, so it's better to focus on a subject each, which they did. And I think the selection was fine. Show Ultima/Akallabeth as one of the origins (plus Garriott is such a character in himself), and then Final Fantasy as the big game everybody knows. And having Star Fox and Doom as the beginning of the 3D era was also fitting.
If you want game specific episodes, check out Gaming Historian on Youtube. He's done some pretty cool stuff.
It's also quite impossible to cover everything in six episodes, so it's better to focus on a subject each, which they did. And I think the selection was fine. Show Ultima/Akallabeth as one of the origins (plus Garriott is such a character in himself), and then Final Fantasy as the big game everybody knows. And having Star Fox and Doom as the beginning of the 3D era was also fitting.
If you want game specific episodes, check out Gaming Historian on Youtube. He's done some pretty cool stuff.
Agree with a lot of people, that it was simply ok. Weird amount of focus on tournaments that don't seem all that significant, as well as that group of arcade cabinet modders who... I guess just worked at Atari for a bit? I was expecting some big payoff, like they'd be revealed as the founders of some big publisher, but no, didn't even mention anything they worked on after that. Just a really surface level look at a chunk of gaming's history, with the occasional interesting interview sprinkled in. It could be good info for a more casual player, or someone younger, but not a surprise that enthusiasts don't care much for it.
On a similar note, I don't know if there's been a thread for it or anything, but the Console Wars documentary about Sega and Nintendo in the 90's just came out a week or so ago, and it's much better. It gets way in depth on what it was like working for each company during that time, and the strategies they took against each other. Lots of interviews with people you may have heard of. It is definitely focused on the US market, which I know some didn't like about High Score, but I think most people on this forum will enjoy it. It's around 1 hour 20 minutes, and it's on the CBS streaming service, at least in the US. I used a free trial to watch it and immediately canceled, if you don't feel like paying just for this one thing.
On a similar note, I don't know if there's been a thread for it or anything, but the Console Wars documentary about Sega and Nintendo in the 90's just came out a week or so ago, and it's much better. It gets way in depth on what it was like working for each company during that time, and the strategies they took against each other. Lots of interviews with people you may have heard of. It is definitely focused on the US market, which I know some didn't like about High Score, but I think most people on this forum will enjoy it. It's around 1 hour 20 minutes, and it's on the CBS streaming service, at least in the US. I used a free trial to watch it and immediately canceled, if you don't feel like paying just for this one thing.