30. Don't lose that retro feeling

You are listening to the Ericade Radio Network. Time for another episode of Amiga Flashback, the show that takes you back to the 80s and 90s. So I am back from a nearby city here in Sweden. And today we're going to talk about two things. The first thing is the retro feeling. And the second one is the retro spirit. It's about retro done right. It's about retro done today, but feeling retro.Yeah, and of course you're getting the best new music on this station.

another girlfriend. And before that it was Boon of Bad Karma with Flimbo's Quest and I am not sure if that is related to the game. I checked it on YouTube and the music is similar but it seems like that exact tune isn't there so it may have been some kind of tribute. So what about the retro feeling? Well the retro feeling is something that tries tofeel retro but really isn't. And when it's bad, well it looks like a cheap imitation but when it's good, it's living up to everything that we learned or maybe it's kind of adhering to some kind of tradition that we expect from an old style game or movie or something. Then we have something that I call the retro spirit and yeah of course I stole that from a certain site in Norway.But that's simply keeping the spirit of a long dead phenomenon alive, which is what we do. But we will not be talking about the retro spirit, it's about the feeling right now. So on this podcast, get ready for some games and stuff that really lives up to everything we hoped they be.

Feel the sound of the doctor shot on the wait for this night to begin When the dawn starts to creep back into the sky And it's time to leave We can still feel the draw And it's pulling us right back to where we begun So we wait for the time And we feel the sound of the sun to shine Till the night falls in And weErik Zalitis

Hyper Unknown and Snowfall. Case in point, the first game of todays podcast that has that real retro feeling. Yep, that would be Thimbleweed Park. It's a classic point and click adventure. And I don't know if you heard about Ron Gilbert. He was the man behind Maniac Mansion and also Monkey Island 1 and 2.A lot of people feels he is kinda the Sid Meier of adventure gaming, at least the old school type of adventure gaming. And maybe he is. See, a lot of people feel that Monkey Island franchise should have been given back to him, there was even a petition for it, but such thing has not happened yet, and probably will not. So in 2017 he released this Thimbleweed Park, which isa spiritual successor to the Maniac Mansion. It's a little town and you, a Fox Mulder copy if you will, and your friend and colleague who is well, a Scully, I think it was Donna Scully. So it's basically the X-Files as an adventure game and it has the same really funny humor that you expect from Monkey Island and Maniac Mansion and maybe Day of the Tentacle as well.So you start off trying to investigate strange stuff because yes, that's what it is. And the only thing I can't stand with that game is that sheriff who says a Reno to everything. It's good. Reno nice Reno and stuff. I. But that's the only complaint. It is a logic puzzler and has a graphic that's very reminiscent of games of the time. It seems like. Yeah, you know, the pixelated 8 bitor 16-bit graphic what you want to call it. Bit mapped and beautiful really. It is not a retro game because 2017 is modern time but it feels very much like it's keeping in spirit with it so to speak. It's a fantastic game you can get it on steam and unfortunately there seems to be no plans for a follow-up.

I hope there will be a Thimbleweed Park too, because it's a fun game to play.

Ajax Lemon ship never dies and I certainly hope it will not. So the next game that has this retro feeling, well I learned about it when I was researching Jack Jazz Rabbit. It seems like one of the animator for that true retro game was Dean Dodrill who later made his own gaming studio and also released a game called Dust Anilision Tale.And in that game, you are immediately greeted by a really retro experience. It's a classic side-scroller, feels a little bit like the games used to be in the early to mid 90s. Your gaming console games that is. And some Amiga games probably too. The story is simple, you wake up, have no concept of where you are and who you are. But you're told by a sword...pops into existence that yeah, you summoned me where you feel like what did I and no warning and another character pops in a bat cat flying fairy weird neurotic whatever called fidget and she tells you sorry my sword but you are now holding the sword so she kind of concedes that yeah maybe I shouldn't fight with a guy who hold the sword so sheTags along for the journey, hoping to get the sword back when you're done. Okay? The story is all about exploring the towns, but it's not a role-playing game in itself, so much as it is role-playing sequences stopped by fighting, and you fight a lot. It seems to be a very fun game. I haven't played it. It's way too fast for my aging brain, but I've looked at YouTube, and the dialogue between the charactersis marvelous and the whole story progresses in little riddles. It's not a complex story, it's not a very well fleshed out story, but it is a nice one and the graphics looks very kind of old timey. The backgrounds that used to be a thing back then before the first person shooters came, they are beautiful, really beautiful and the characters are kind of wacky. So I would say that is a true retro feeling game.

but you have to be really fast or as fidget says, mash the buttons.

That was KG wannabe prods. What a bad name. And the song is called Club Anthem 2001. So we have retro feeling in a lot of places, sometimes really uncalled for. You know those cheap plastic telephones and radios and whatnot that has some kind of plastic wood like veneer and just a feeling of being cheap gimmicks. But they try to lookretro or vintage or whatever. We have other things like Tube Warm. I spoke about that a few weeks ago. You know the idea that tubes gives a retro feeling in the sound and that's better. But we also have a lot of computers and retro stuff popping up in movies. I haven't seen the TV series but it's called Stranger Things. It seems to take part in the 80s.and it's retro enough for what little I've seen of it and seem to pop in a number of Commodore 64s and stuff really funny. So not everything has to be game based, but retro is kinda in and that's because the large amount of us we are in our 30s and 40s. So we remember when retro was just here and just now.

Jeremy of Replicas in the Nick of Time spoke to my mother a few months ago and she said about this retro thing. It's a guy thing. It's a thing that only men do. That's what she said actually and I think, huh, okay? But it seems to be some kind of logic with it because if you just think about your average retro whatever like vinyl recordscassette tapes, Amigas, Ataris and whatever retro stuff you could be into, like replica guns or something. Well, there are very few women there. And that is a thing. I also spoke with a colleague and she said like, yeah, she felt the same way. She wouldn't really understand what's in this retro thing at all. I don't know why this is or if it is that.way at all, but seems to be something to it. It's a bit sad actually, I would like it very much more if more women were into stuff like this. The Amiga is kinda a female name isn't it? It means a female friend. Basically, so why not?

Polar Chase, Flashbrain of the Crusaders. It's some kind of Bond fight going on there, it feels like something that could accompany a Bond movie. And that's retro too isn't it? We kinda look back into a really big, like you know, knowledge base of cool stuff that has been, and we don't seem to be able to leave it. If you just think about it, what's up from now with the movies? It's all aboutthose superheroes that were all started somewhere in the golden age of animation and comics during 30s and 40s and well it continued through the silver era into today and it makes me wonder a bit why we could become this nostalgic. A friend of mine he has a number of those Star Wars figures that he bought when he was a kid. His own kids are playing around with them now and I think why are we collecting this?I can't really say. But it is what it is. And it seems like the industry like this kinda retro thing because it's guaranteed to be a success. The whole Marvel Universe thing seems to be one string of a movie success after another one. We can't get enough of them. Think about it, over 20 movies done today. To this day.and they are all more or less guaranteed cash cows and total successes. Now, there is something to retro, isn't it?

youErik Zalitis

So it's Trigger again and Lomalis revenge. dear Lomali who hurt you? I don't know but revenge is due obviously. So when we're wrapping this thing up isn't it kind of amazing to think about the fact that we always seem to be retro nerds if you want to 20 years back in time or maybe 30 somewhere around there.In the 50s there was a very very strong retro wave towards the 20s. The roaring 20s were popular. I know this is kind of fun because roaring 20s are popular again. Why not? I mean we have a pandemic, we have an economy heading for a crash and a lot of good music. So I don't know. But still it is pretty clear that this retrothing with Amigas, C64s and Ataris and Sinclair Spectrums and stuff. That is a wave we're surfing on. A few years from now I don't think we will be caring too much about it. I hope we will but I cannot guarantee it. And then maybe the next generation will look into our time and be really really retro nostalgic about iPads, mobile phones, smartphones and whatever TikTok is because I have no idea.I'm too old for that. anyway, so I hope you like this one and we really like to spread this retro feeling to whoever is listening.

youErik Zalitis

Rabi and Gravik of Waste lost crossroads. So we need to, you know, part roads here. I will be going away and I will be back next Saturday on this station and next episode on the podcast. This has been a lot of discussion about this retro feeling that we still can see somewhere.where new stuff is created and I'm thanking you for listening to the podcast and I thank you for keeping this whole retro thing alive although it is a dearly departed friend in a way. So this is DJ Demon signing off for now and leaving you with some more music to lead you out into what we used to say the good night.

10 000 bookstranslated to 10,000 German fags or something. It's actually Hassan calling to European Union Information Center of sorts. This was when we were about to join the European Union and simply telling that, hey, we can't join the European Union. There will be 10,000 German gays coming to visit or something like that. Pretty much playing around with homophobia.and you know the person on the other end of the line had to behave professionally making it hilariously funny. It was a really nice little radio program. My favorite is when they called the Swedish Infantry Unit here in Stockholm and said hey we want some kind of you know play around execution the guy should know that it's not for real so yeah.and they had to politely decline because you know the military here in Sweden doesn't do stuff like that. Anyway thanks for listening and have a really nice week. We will be back next Saturday as I stated.