ScrambledPawn
Log Status
Completed
Playing
Backlog
Wishlist
Rating
Time Played
--
Days in Journal
2 days
Last played
April 11, 2024
First played
April 10, 2024
Platforms Played
I genuinely love how intimate this one is compared to Atari 50 and The Jeff Minter Story; a good 50-60% of the video segments are just Jordan Mechner and his father going down memory lane while presumably one of their family members shakily holds the handicam. The pure reminscence and wonder of Francis Mechner as Jordan reminds him of his involvement in Karateka is infectious and it really makes for some beautiful documentary moments.
There may not be nearly as much in the way of variety of games here, but it more than makes that up with prototype progression; seeing Deathbounce slowly come to fruition only to be rejected and then reborn under Digital Eclipse's development team is vindicating and serves as the perfect precursor/prologue to the main course, especially as we learn that Mechner was always ahead of the curve with other project ideas but never pulled the trigger, with games like King's Quest beating him to the punch when it came to revolutionising the point and click genre. Similarly you really get to grips with the progression of the Apple II version of Karateka and are ready and able to jump in at any moment of each iteration thanks to a fully explorable interactive demo playthrough, which is a genuinely nice touch.
What there could have been though, is a smorgasboard of available emulation of the many versions of Karateka that are summarised in the last few points of Chapter 4; if I could play the IBM, Atari ST and Amstrad versions I really would consider this the ultimate package. I know for a fact that emulation of at least the Atari ST is stable (and considering the Atari 800 version is included it's safe to say they're on board) but we only get the "holy trinity". I want to see just how bad ports for this game got for history. Ultimately this package this is a much more intimate look at only two games compared to Atari 50 or The Jeff Minter Story, so it would make sense to pack as much of its star attraction as much as fully and legally as possible. I would happily forgo the 16 minute audio podcast oozing over the original soundtrack and the blown out 6-12 minute talking heads segments that can easily be condensed into 4-7 if it meant providing something more of merit like a fully encompassing library across emulatable platforms.
That being said, Digital Eclipse's remaster of Karateka is genuinely quite amazing; they somehow manage to capture a lot of the primitive nature of the original while fixing a lot of the problems caused by its hardware. This is still a very strategic-yet-basic side scroller but its thankfully devoid of a lot of what made it frustrating.
These collections truly are worth these reimaginings of classics. As far as DE compilations/documentaries go this is the weakest, but only by a small margin; as always I look forward to their rather unique form of classic game preservation though and genuine appreciate their efforts.
There may not be nearly as much in the way of variety of games here, but it more than makes that up with prototype progression; seeing Deathbounce slowly come to fruition only to be rejected and then reborn under Digital Eclipse's development team is vindicating and serves as the perfect precursor/prologue to the main course, especially as we learn that Mechner was always ahead of the curve with other project ideas but never pulled the trigger, with games like King's Quest beating him to the punch when it came to revolutionising the point and click genre. Similarly you really get to grips with the progression of the Apple II version of Karateka and are ready and able to jump in at any moment of each iteration thanks to a fully explorable interactive demo playthrough, which is a genuinely nice touch.
What there could have been though, is a smorgasboard of available emulation of the many versions of Karateka that are summarised in the last few points of Chapter 4; if I could play the IBM, Atari ST and Amstrad versions I really would consider this the ultimate package. I know for a fact that emulation of at least the Atari ST is stable (and considering the Atari 800 version is included it's safe to say they're on board) but we only get the "holy trinity". I want to see just how bad ports for this game got for history. Ultimately this package this is a much more intimate look at only two games compared to Atari 50 or The Jeff Minter Story, so it would make sense to pack as much of its star attraction as much as fully and legally as possible. I would happily forgo the 16 minute audio podcast oozing over the original soundtrack and the blown out 6-12 minute talking heads segments that can easily be condensed into 4-7 if it meant providing something more of merit like a fully encompassing library across emulatable platforms.
That being said, Digital Eclipse's remaster of Karateka is genuinely quite amazing; they somehow manage to capture a lot of the primitive nature of the original while fixing a lot of the problems caused by its hardware. This is still a very strategic-yet-basic side scroller but its thankfully devoid of a lot of what made it frustrating.
These collections truly are worth these reimaginings of classics. As far as DE compilations/documentaries go this is the weakest, but only by a small margin; as always I look forward to their rather unique form of classic game preservation though and genuine appreciate their efforts.