Riks Random Retro

Livestream 4/28/2022 – Starcraft

If there was one game to truly solidify Blizzard as one of the major players in the RTS genre it was Starcraft. While the earlier releases of Warcraft and Warcraft 2 brought them major success Starcraft became an international phenomena. LAN parties across the globe lit up pitting the different factions against eachother. Online matches were fought bitterly to the last unit. A new generation of competitive RTS game had arrived. Part of the esports world grew out of Starcraft as it expanded its reach.

While the multiplayer aspect of Starcraft is what gave it the lasting power it still has, the singleplayer campaign is what hooked me. Weaving a tight narrative that borrowed heavily from properties like Aliens and Starship Troopers, it set itself apart. I was glued through the whole campaign which played very different between the 3 factions because they were indeed extremly different. Blizzard’s polish shines through with each faction being so balanced even with those glaring differences.

Revisiting the game is a total blast from the past so check out the replay below. This was a hard one to stop for the night for!

Doom Gets Ray Tracing

You don’t need to spend much time introducing Doom. It’s Doom! But while the game may hold a special place for many retro gamers, there are many ways to play it on modern machines. One such option is using the modern engine prboom+. This is similar to gzdoom allowing it to run on current hardware at higher resolutions and many quality of life improvements. A recommended way to play the game on your modern computer.

This opens the door up to some more modern mods as well. One such mod is the one just released by sultim-t where they added ray tracing into the game! It’s no secret that I’m a big fan of adding ray tracing to older games as it often fits the “simpler” geometry very well. Look at Quake 2 RTX as a more recent example.

So what you get is a much more atmospheric, deeper Doom than you might be used to. Shadows are truly dark, the foreboding feeling of dread lurking around every corner. Ray tracing and Doom were made for eachother. I was so excited to see this I had to make a video on it so check it out below to see it in action.

Livestream – 3/24/2022 – Max Payne

While many games try and emulate the experience of playing a movie few get quite as close as Max Payne did in 2001. Dipping deep into the crime noir-thriller with comic book styled story panels, and constant narration done go into the mind of Mr Payne and his motivations, it was something new. At least when I played it back then!

The game was also the first one to utilize the “bullet time” system where you can press a button to slow down time and make glorious dives while unloading 2 guns at the same time, John Woo style. The game holds up surprisingly well with design ideas still being seen in modern shooters. Narrative game design is something we are used to any more but the way this game does it was definitely novel, at least to me, back then.

While this game is somewhat unforgiving to my mediocre skill level it’s still really fun to play. Most people seem to have played it which helps make it more fun to stream as well. Check out the replay below!

Prepping for a LAN party

There is a large, modern, LAN party that happens here in town a couple of times a year. We’re talking a big one with hundreds of participants playing a variety of modern games. Last time I went I decided to be special and bring with me a retro computer for fun. The response of the guests varied from “What kind of sleeper is that?” to “Oh my goodness I haven’t seen one of these in years!”. All in all good fun!

I hadn’t decided if I was going to go for this event but not long ago, the owner reached out to me via email and asked if I’d come back but this time bring a couple of machines networked together. I couldn’t say no to that opportunity! It’ll be great to be able to chat about the setup, show off the machines and above all let people have a chance to play with them.

That said to have these machines fully ready for the event there were some things that had to be taken care of first. I opted to film the process so people can see a bit of what goes into getting computers like these fixed up and ready to go for an event. A follow up video will come later where I’ll go over the event itself and the experience there. Check out the video below!

Livestream 3/9/2022 – Amid Evil

There is no denying the “boomer shooter” has seen a huge resurgence as of late. And that term can be loosely used to describe most of the throwback shooters that try and emulate the style from the 90s. Games in that category could be Ion Fury, Dusk or in our case here: Amid Evil. Let’s be clear too that the return to form from the original grandaddy of the shooters, Doom, had a big part in making these popular again.

Amid Evil leans heavily into the style of Heretic or Hexen, presenting the player with a fantasy driven environment in which to virtually destroy anything that comes across your path. No skill trees, no complex story, no depth beyond blast anything you see. The game is really amazing to play thanks to sticking to that simplicity, as well as having a fantastic arsenal to blast baddies with. We had to be special of course and for the stream I played the game entirely on a CRT in 4:3 aspect ratio. This in turn allowed me to crank the raytracing settings really amping up the moody look of the game. If you haven’t checked this game out yet I highly recommend it. It’s everything you’d want in a retro style shooter! Check out the livestream replay below.