On November 24, 1988, the first episode of a new series aired on local-access cable channel KTMA out of the heart of Minnesota. The series, entitled Mystery Science Theater 3000, was the brainchild of prop comedian Joel Hodgson and feature Joel as a hapless everyman blasted into orbit by a couple of geniuses who forced him to watch bad movies as part of an experiment. To help fight off insanity, and loneliness, Joel constructed two robots named Tom Servo [voiced by Josh Weinstein and later by Kevin Murphy] and Crow T. Robot [voiced by Trace Beaulieu and later by Bill Corbit]. Together they watch bad movies and joke about how bad they are.
The format of the show is as thus: each episode opens with the series opening, showing who all the characters are and explaining the premise of the show in song form. Then there’s an opening sketch scene with Joel, and later Mike, doing something with Tom Servo and Crow. Then, after a commercial break, there’s a sketch with The Mads and the crew of the Satellite of Love, where there’s an invention exchange [mostly just for the Joel era] and then the movie of the day is announced and then sent. The crew goes into the movie theater to watch the movie, where they make witty comments and note the movie’s glaring flaws. Interspersed between segments of the movie are more sketches, usually just between the crew of the satellite. Then, upon the conclusion of the movie, there’s one more sketch between the crew and The Mads. The episode is then rapped up and the credits roll. Beginning in the second Comedy Central season, each episode ends with a “stinger” a humorous clip from the movie, usually just a few seconds long.
After one season on KTMA, the series was picked up by new-comer cable channel Comedy Central. The channel was looking for fresh content and MST3K allowed them to fill up a full two hours of programming and it was cheap to make, both of which were very appealing. This change also brought about several others. The early KTMA episode were mostly ad-libbed, but starting with the first Comedy Central season the episode began to be more scripted. During the third season, Josh Weinstein left, replaced by Frank Conniff as one of the two mad scientists and by Kevin Murphy as the voice of Tom Servo. Mike Nelson was appointed as head writer and also appeared during the sketches between portions of the movie as various characters.
During the fifth season on Comedy Central, series-creator Joel Hodgson left the show over creative problems with series-producer Jim Mallon. Joel hand-picked Mike Nelson to replace him as the show’s host and so began the Mike era. From there, the show’s riffing took on a bit more of a biting, sarcastic tone than the good-natured ribbing that prevailed during the Joel era. The difference is noticeable, but it also helps keep the show fresh. At the end of the sixth season, Frank Conniff, left the show, replaced by Mary Jo Pehl as Pearl Forrester, Dr. Forrester’s mother. Then, following the end of the seventh season, the show was cancelled by Comedy Central. Although it looked as though the show were gone for good, The Scifi Channel picked up the show and it gave it three more seasons. Following that move, Trace Beaulieu was replaced by Bill Corbit as the voice of Crow and Mary Jo Pehl took over as the mad scientist. She was joined by Bill Corbit [as Obeserver [aka Brain Guy] and Kevin Murphy as Professor Bobo, her often dim-witted assistants.
Then, with the conclusion of the tenth season, on September 18, 1999, the show was official cancelled for good. After a few more years of reruns, The Scifi Channel cut the show loose. For the first time in seventeen years, MST3K was no longer broadcast on televion. The era had finally come to an end.
Fortunately, the show has not been forgotten. A steady stream of DVD releases from Rhino Home Entertainment have been coming out with the latest, volume 17, being released in March 2010. The releases have not come as quickly as they might, due to lengthy negotiations being required to get the rights to all of the movies that were used as part of the series.
History aside, MST3K has featured a host of movies over its eleven seasons. Many of them feature a scifi or horror bent, but others are simply bad movies that would have otherwise sank into oblivion were it not for being featured on the show. MST3K has even featured more famous film franchises like Godzilla and Gamera, and the works of Ed Wood and Roger Corman. The movies range from practically ancient to nearly new, covering every decade from the 30′s to the 90′s. In addition to full-length films, MST3K also features shorts, to pad out movies that are too short to fit a 90-minute program. These shorts are off educational or informative in nature, used in schools and colleges, and are often hilariously awful, making them ripe for some great riffing. There are also a few serials such as Commando Cody, The Phantom Creeps, and General Hospital.
So what is it that makes MST3K so good? Because, for most of us, this is the kind of thing that we’ve always wanted to do. It’s great fun to kick back with your friends and just tear into some really bad movie that you wouldn’t really enjoy by taking seriously. That’s what MST3K does and that’s also why it’s best when viewed friends. Not every episode is the funniest thing ever, but with 199 episodes there are plenty that very nearly are. Do yourself a favor and rent a few. You won’t regret it.
Looks awesomer than ever before! To think that Miyamoto was originally just going to release an "enhanced" version of Super Mario Galaxy. This is MUCH better! Play as Luigi from the start! Yoshis everywhere! Rainbow Mario invincible mode, Rock Mario, CLOUD MARIO! It'sa awesomea!
You can pay a penny or you can pay $100, whatever you feel like. An email gets sent to your email inbox that links to a page that lets you download all seven games. There's no DRM at all.
For those that don't know, Guild Wars is an online RPG. It's not quite an MMO because the only places where you'll see other people in town, except for the people you recruit to be in your party. Okay, now you know.
ABF, you wanna go questing together? Going out alone is a bit boring and I'd rather go questing with people that aren't complete strangers.
During the election, FAUX news and the rest of the mainstream media did everything they could to shut-up him up. Now, in the midst of an economic fallout that could come here, people are starting to listen to him.
This article puts into stark relief all the things Sony's said in the past about the PS3 they've since gone back on. It also points out that Sony was never hazy or listing future conditions about those features or decisions, they were flatly declared.
This doesn't even include Sony's various statements about the PSP. I remember when the UMD was something they were dead set on supporting, and then they went back on that when discussing it's removal from the PSP Go. They even promised a method would be set into place for "upgraders" to get their UMD games put onto the new model as digital downloads without having to buy them again. They went back on that later too. The one consolation over that whole mess is, after a number of complaints, they did decide to continue selling the old model alongside the newer model. That can't be said for any of the PS3 decisions.
Oh, and no I really don't mind that they changed their mind on rumble. It didn't hurt any consumers to add a feature that, if annoying, they could disable. What I minded there was their declaritive statement that led some to buy the older model thinking Sony would never upgrade.
So take that into consideration. I am very wary about future Sony game systems after how they are handling this generation. I just can't trust anything they say about their various features on their word any more. They blew it. Heck, their statement declaring PS2 support will "never" return to the PS3 is already questionable, likely simply stated to prevent customers from "holding out" for a better model. Considering recent patents for PS2 game emulation by Sony, I wouldn't be surprised to see the feature actually return in spite of that statement.
There are people who will claim that Western RPGs peaked in the late 90′s and early 00′s, with BioWare, Black Isle, New World Computing, Sir-Tech, Origin, Sierra, and other’s putting out high quality entries in the genre with regularity. There’s no denying that many of those have been placed into the annals of videogame history as classic, but were games truly better then? Well, that’s a question for another blog entry, not for this one. Here we will focus on a single game from Interplay developer Black Isle. The title in question is one Planescape: Torment, based in the titular AD&D universe and headed by Chris Avellone [who went to Obsidian after Interplay folded and is currently working with fellow Black Isle-alum Josh Sawyer on Fallout: New Vegas].
The game begins with a man waking up in a strange mortuary, with no idea how he got there. Actually, he can’t remember a thing at all, not even his name. He quickly enlists the helping a talking skull named Morte who floats in the air. The two make their way out of the mortuary and into the city, where The Nameless One hopes to discover the reasons behind his lack of memories and his seeming immortality. Along the way, you’ll discovery some truly bizarre locations and equally bizarre characters. Much of the game is very heavily based on dialog, it’s even possible to talk your way out of many encounters, rather than resorting to violence. The game even goes so far as to have no penalty for being killed in combat. The Nameless One will simply respawn at a set location. You might be tempted to think that this makes for a very easy game, but that’s really not the case at all.
In a way, Planescape: Torment is almost more of an adventure game than it is an rpg [not of the point-and-click variety, of course], in that the game has a great focus on story and characters than it does on combat. Some will no doubt see this as a negative, but I see this as a positive. There are plenty of RPGs with great combat in them, if that’s what you’re truly looking for, but there are scant few RPGs with such amazing writing. The time it would have taken to put in a more complex combat system would have taken away from that writing, or at least placed less emphasis on it.
Unlike other RPGs, there are no traditional dungeons. The game takes place almost entirely in within populated areas, it’s just that some of those areas happen to have monsters or thugs in them. Sometimes you’ll even be attacked in broad daylight by thugs, right in front of dozens of people. It’s not all that common, but it happens. The plus side to this is that there’s virtually no dungeon crawling or pointless grinding to deal with, with I see as a plus.
The gameplay is real-time, point-and-click based combat seen in many other Black Isle titles like Baldur’s Gate and Icewind Dale. It’s possible to recruit seven different characters, but only five can accompany the main character. It’s clear from the outset that combat is not the main focus of this game, but that doesn’t mean that the combat is just thrown in with no regard. It works very well and there is some depth to it in terms of controlling a party of character in real-time and using their various talents to get through each battle you come across. The combat gets the job done and doesn’t get in the way.
Another area where the game truly shines is in the sound and music. Both of these elements are blended perfectly to create the feeling that you are actually in the places that you see on the screen. While walking through the city you can hear people talking and shouting to one another as their voices blend into a droning din, walk past a bar and you can hear the drunken patrons inside, and so on, all this is done to infuse the world with life. The music weaves through the sound in just the right way, fading when you’re just walking around and suddenly jumping to the forefront when battle is afoot. Although Black Isle was originally going to use a soundtrack by musician Lustmord, his soundtrack was pulled three weeks before the game was to be released so that Fallout-compose Mark Morgan could create an entirely new soundtrack that took the music of the game in a different direction.
The character, writing, and dialog are among the best that will find in any videogame, and the sound and music are no slouch either, Black Isle really went all out with this one and it shows. RPGs since Planescape: Torment have come out have attempted to recreate that depth and that degree of choice in the dialog trees, but most just haven’t even gotten close. Will companies like BioWare, Obsidian, and Bethesda bring RPGs back to this level of detail in the near future? Well, perhaps, but until they do, and even if they don’t, you can always keep playing the one that set the standard in the first place.
On a glowing recommendation, I picked up a copy of MH3 this past week and have been playing it quite a bit. I'd never played an iteration of the series before, and so far I'm quite enjoying it.
Anyone else gotten ahold of one, or is thinking of doing so?
