Really enjoyed the Lynx episodes on the backer DVD!
I had been a fan of Epyx C-64 stuff back in the day, particularly the "games" series like Winter Games and World Games, even going so far to buy and play knockoffs from outfits like Thunder Mountain in the form of Summer and Winter Challenge, and other dreck like Caveman Ugh-lympics and Knight Games.
The Lynx version of California Games is easily the best version released, even though it was missing the Flying Disc and Roller Skating events. Surfing on other platforms was a mystifying puzzle game that required you to reenter a wave at the exact same angle you left it if you jumped off a wave: on Lynx it was a fun games full of tricks. BMX was fast and crazy instead of slow and painstaking on C-64, and I was "As Good As James." If you're going to play any California Games, play the Lynx version.
All the original Epyx software ended up the only standout software for the system, really, except maybe Electrocop which looked great but was a chore to play (beat it, though!). There are a few later exceptions from Atari that were, as you pointed out, unlikely successful handheld arcade conversions, with about as much depth as your average arcade game. S.T.U.N. Runner stands out as one of these examples, which is also a good example of the unlimited sprite count and built-in spite scaling doing an admirable job of replicating a 3D polygonal racing game that runs at high FPS. The Hard Drivin' port counterexample, at 5 FPS, can show you how ill-equipped the system was for any real 3D. But S.T.U.N. Runner stands as the best home conversion of that game.
Perhaps the shallowness of the experiences on Lynx was most clearly tied to the cartridge format: a hard flat plastic insert housing the game ROM chip in a card-like form, with no room for batteries to allow any sort of save game state, and no mechanism in the system itself to remember saved games. In the long term, this really limited design on the console just after home conversions on NES of arcade games really diverged from their source material and created longer-term experiences that required saving.
Imagine trying to make an RPG on the system with only password-generating saving options! I played Bill & Ted all the way to the end, and those were some long passwords required. I kept a little notebook in my bag that carried the system. It was worth it.
Less so for Gauntlet III, and I may be one of the few regular consumers to ever play this game to the end. Gauntlet: The Third Encounter also used a password to have you "save" and return to levels. But it also had a limited inventory that allowed you to hoard health potions, and had levels later in the game you couldn't beat without a horde of health. So the password system eventually became useless and you had no choice to play it in one go anyway. On the flip side, your limited inventory would fill up with gold and other items, and they would stay on screen if you dropped them, so later there were actual levels designed as puzzles where you would fill up with gold and need to strategically drop gold to make room to proceed, and these became exponentially worse if you came into the level with a full inventory. Shades of a playthorugh I would struggle through years later in Resident Evil 0. What a mess.
To make it worse, every time you shot an enemy they wouldn't pop out of existence but fade away using the hardware scaling effect to shrink the spite away. This had the knock-on effect of slowing down every enemy kill to the point that the game became a mindless grind of slowly mowing down each enemy. The time beat this game became a gulag-like marathon of plugging though to see an ending which was basically just a splash screen of the same castle you can see in the attract mode, after killing a dragon. Beating this game is, in fact, one of my most difficult and challenging gaming experiences. It deserves a grueling fundraising marathon somewhere. Holding the Lynx vertical the whole time was one of the most vexing aspect, and I never understood how that decision was made. At last, thanks for finally positing a reasonable hypothesis on why that horrible decision was made.
Man, when you spent all your money on a Lynx instead of a Gameboy before going off to college the next year, you got really motivated to get your value out of the purchase, I guess.
I am one of the few animal to actually use the ComLynx cable and play multiplayer with a Lynx. I had a buddy with one who picked it up after I got mine, and we did quite a few rounds of Warbirds, blowing each other out of the sky in that surprisingly fun and competent WWI flying ace shooter. We used to play arcade Cyberball together, this friend and I, and thus we waited for Lynx Tournament Cyberball for years while the title was continually delayed, only for it to come out and be a total piece of crap. Madden '93 on Genesis was a better version of Cyberball, so we played that instead.
Chip's Challenge 2 did recently come out on PC after a bunch of legal headaches, where you can also get the first one as well. The game's designer, Chuck Sommerville, seems like a cool character, accepted a facebook friend request, and seems to be designing and building a lot of big LED light rigs for shows and various projects. He put out a more modern 3D follow-up to the game as well, called Chuck's Challenge, which you can also pick up on a number of platforms including mobile. Worth it!
R.J. Mical from Epyx also was kind enough to accept a friend request from a fan. Last I saw he was working in a gaming division at Google, and so I wonder if he has anything to do with the Stadia initiative. I'm glad you got into the real dirt on how Atari Inc did Epyx wrong. I'd love to hear an Epyx-focused episode, maybe something crossing over with the history of Olympic video games, how Mario and Sonic together are riding that equestrian all the way into the ground with the Mario & Sonic at Whatever Olympic Games series, yet how only Epyx has seemed to be able to make them really fun.
Ah memories. Thanks, good show!
I had been a fan of Epyx C-64 stuff back in the day, particularly the "games" series like Winter Games and World Games, even going so far to buy and play knockoffs from outfits like Thunder Mountain in the form of Summer and Winter Challenge, and other dreck like Caveman Ugh-lympics and Knight Games.
The Lynx version of California Games is easily the best version released, even though it was missing the Flying Disc and Roller Skating events. Surfing on other platforms was a mystifying puzzle game that required you to reenter a wave at the exact same angle you left it if you jumped off a wave: on Lynx it was a fun games full of tricks. BMX was fast and crazy instead of slow and painstaking on C-64, and I was "As Good As James." If you're going to play any California Games, play the Lynx version.
All the original Epyx software ended up the only standout software for the system, really, except maybe Electrocop which looked great but was a chore to play (beat it, though!). There are a few later exceptions from Atari that were, as you pointed out, unlikely successful handheld arcade conversions, with about as much depth as your average arcade game. S.T.U.N. Runner stands out as one of these examples, which is also a good example of the unlimited sprite count and built-in spite scaling doing an admirable job of replicating a 3D polygonal racing game that runs at high FPS. The Hard Drivin' port counterexample, at 5 FPS, can show you how ill-equipped the system was for any real 3D. But S.T.U.N. Runner stands as the best home conversion of that game.
Perhaps the shallowness of the experiences on Lynx was most clearly tied to the cartridge format: a hard flat plastic insert housing the game ROM chip in a card-like form, with no room for batteries to allow any sort of save game state, and no mechanism in the system itself to remember saved games. In the long term, this really limited design on the console just after home conversions on NES of arcade games really diverged from their source material and created longer-term experiences that required saving.
Imagine trying to make an RPG on the system with only password-generating saving options! I played Bill & Ted all the way to the end, and those were some long passwords required. I kept a little notebook in my bag that carried the system. It was worth it.
Less so for Gauntlet III, and I may be one of the few regular consumers to ever play this game to the end. Gauntlet: The Third Encounter also used a password to have you "save" and return to levels. But it also had a limited inventory that allowed you to hoard health potions, and had levels later in the game you couldn't beat without a horde of health. So the password system eventually became useless and you had no choice to play it in one go anyway. On the flip side, your limited inventory would fill up with gold and other items, and they would stay on screen if you dropped them, so later there were actual levels designed as puzzles where you would fill up with gold and need to strategically drop gold to make room to proceed, and these became exponentially worse if you came into the level with a full inventory. Shades of a playthorugh I would struggle through years later in Resident Evil 0. What a mess.
To make it worse, every time you shot an enemy they wouldn't pop out of existence but fade away using the hardware scaling effect to shrink the spite away. This had the knock-on effect of slowing down every enemy kill to the point that the game became a mindless grind of slowly mowing down each enemy. The time beat this game became a gulag-like marathon of plugging though to see an ending which was basically just a splash screen of the same castle you can see in the attract mode, after killing a dragon. Beating this game is, in fact, one of my most difficult and challenging gaming experiences. It deserves a grueling fundraising marathon somewhere. Holding the Lynx vertical the whole time was one of the most vexing aspect, and I never understood how that decision was made. At last, thanks for finally positing a reasonable hypothesis on why that horrible decision was made.
Man, when you spent all your money on a Lynx instead of a Gameboy before going off to college the next year, you got really motivated to get your value out of the purchase, I guess.
I am one of the few animal to actually use the ComLynx cable and play multiplayer with a Lynx. I had a buddy with one who picked it up after I got mine, and we did quite a few rounds of Warbirds, blowing each other out of the sky in that surprisingly fun and competent WWI flying ace shooter. We used to play arcade Cyberball together, this friend and I, and thus we waited for Lynx Tournament Cyberball for years while the title was continually delayed, only for it to come out and be a total piece of crap. Madden '93 on Genesis was a better version of Cyberball, so we played that instead.
Chip's Challenge 2 did recently come out on PC after a bunch of legal headaches, where you can also get the first one as well. The game's designer, Chuck Sommerville, seems like a cool character, accepted a facebook friend request, and seems to be designing and building a lot of big LED light rigs for shows and various projects. He put out a more modern 3D follow-up to the game as well, called Chuck's Challenge, which you can also pick up on a number of platforms including mobile. Worth it!
R.J. Mical from Epyx also was kind enough to accept a friend request from a fan. Last I saw he was working in a gaming division at Google, and so I wonder if he has anything to do with the Stadia initiative. I'm glad you got into the real dirt on how Atari Inc did Epyx wrong. I'd love to hear an Epyx-focused episode, maybe something crossing over with the history of Olympic video games, how Mario and Sonic together are riding that equestrian all the way into the ground with the Mario & Sonic at Whatever Olympic Games series, yet how only Epyx has seemed to be able to make them really fun.
Ah memories. Thanks, good show!
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