The Memory of Roller Coaster Tycoon - 25 years on.

 

 

 

 

    After the divorce, I was financially strangled, predominately caused by Child Support on top of the maritial debts, so when the daughters and I were together, we did not venture out much. I bought a computer game, Roller Coaster Tycoon, and late at night both the girls and I played that game into the wee hours.

   Some of my fondest memories after the divorce was of my youngest daughter sitting on my lap as she "moused" her way around an amusement park.

    Last week I spent a couple of days at Disneyland and my mind wandered back to those nights with the girls. I came back from the trip and pulled out my copy of the game.

    Roller Coast Tycoon turned 25 years of age last month.

    I reinstalled the game, adjusted some of my settings and set about playing through the game again, recalling the nights of trying to explain to my children "how to" plan an amusement park. 

    The game lives with the memory of Bumbly Beach and my daughters.

 

Blizzard Entertainment - a Big Fat F.

    In September 2021, Blizzard Entertainment released Diablo 2: Resurrection. This was a game that a buddy introduced me to in about 2001 and we played many a late hour into the night this role playing game (RPG) It was my first foray into the "fantasy" world, and twenty years later, I returned to the remastered original game. On a Saturday morning I sat down to chronicle my return.

0900: Turn on computer, upload game, press play. Entered the waiting cue to access the server as player #238.

0945: Finally entered the game.

0946: Game crashed to desktop.

0947: Reentered the waiting cue as player # 132.

1016: Crash to desktop prior to entering server lobby.

1017: Reentered the waiting cur as player 78.

Approximately 1105:  Server converted me to off line play. Press online and reenter the waiting cue as player #314.

1215: Game crashed to desktop.

    After three (3) hours of "gameplay" I balanced my checking account, requested a copy of my credit report, finalized some end of month bills before they were due, discarded motor vehicle repair orders predating 2015, defrosted some frozen food for dinner this evening, and surfed the yachting classifieds for a replacement.

    Blizzard get a big fat F for their theft of US$60 for unavailable downloadable content. 

2020

  In 1999, I purchased my first computer in Australia, a Hewlett Packard Compaq computer from a big box home store. At the time, I also purchased one computer game to accompany the purchase. The game was a city building strategy game called Anno 1602. The game was a ground breaker in that the Artificial Intelligence progressed in accord with player development.

  At the time, I was divorced and not in receipt of enough income to make my daughters life more enjoyable. The girls and I played that game. Endless hours was spent with my little one sitting in my lap as her older sister cursed at the non player characters (NPC) when they destroyed something she had spent an hour creating.

  When I moved to the United States, one of the few things that was not lost at seas in transit was a box that contained this game. Last week while unpacking I found the game, still in it's original box, and did a Google search on it. In so doing, I discovered that the publishing company had a new version, titled Anno 1800. The game was available by download only, and for less money than I paid for the original game, I treated myself to my first game purchase in about eight years.

  Wow.

  The reviews justify it's nomination for Game of the Year. The graphics are immersive, the game play addictive, and last weekend, I lost both days off playing the game into the wee small hours of the morning.

  The girls are gone from my life - grown up and moved on. Late nights playing Anno on the computer are not the same without my youngest sitting in my lap pointing out the "bad guys" for her sister. Still, what I lost in the companionship with my children, is retained in the memory of the original game.

  20/20 - a year and hindsight.

Speculative Fiction

In the writing world, numerous success stories can be found of fans who have turned their writing into contemporary masterpieces. Author E.L. James like the Twilight series so much, they wrote the 50 Shades series. Last week I was reminiscing about a project that begin some twelve years ago that did not evolve, and I began reading about the "fan fiction" which drives a number of successful spin off series.

Star Wars and Star Trek are two of the most popular, allowing evening the novice writer to be able to compile a story based upon the loose collection of characters, in a world which has been established - but not yet fortified on it's boundaries.

Website FanFiction.Net chronicles a lot of speculative writing, and the pitfalls as well.  Writers who have created characters, fleshed them out and developed stories, don't want to see their hard work copied, even plagiarized. But apparently they are comfortable with endless computer games based on their premises - have you ever counted how many Star Wars games there are?

About twelve years ago while with the computer game company, I attended the preview of a game that enthralled me so much, I wrote about it at a number of game sites. Fast forward, I have now started writing my own speculative fiction, using some of the Artificial Intelligence (AI) characters as background for my own story.

Speculative fiction is back in vogue.

Subsim Review: Navy Field 2

  Many thanks to the staff at the web's #1 submarine simulation site, Subsim, for carrying my review of the Navyfield 2 game.