May 10, 2011

Eye^Game^Candy: The Dig

The Dig was released -after many a delay- in 1995 by Lucasarts and, despite failing to be a spectacular critical and commercial hit, should be considered one of the company's most impressive offerings. Actually, I'd easily classify it as one of my all time favourite adventures and one of the few truly successful attempts at proper video game science fiction. What's more, it still looks stunning and even has a whole museum (which, among other things, details The Dig's incredible development history) dedicated to its glorious, digital self.

17 comments:

  1. I had the opportunity to buy the original recently, but I passed on the offer. Silly me.

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  2. How could you Barts? How could you? Surely a kitten is in great pain somewhere...

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  3. Ooh, I played and wrote about The Dig ages ago. It's a lovely game. I've got most of the Lucasarts adventures here... I'm planning to play them all over time (especially Grim Fandango, which I completed years ago).

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  4. I just wish I had the time to replay and get to finish all those classic adventures. And yes, Grim Fandango too. Haven't touched it in ages. Then again, I do believe Day of the Tentacle must feel lonelier...

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  5. Completely agree with you, a truly fantastic game.

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  6. Absolutely so dear Jonathon. And excellently paced too. Also, quite reminded me of Rama.

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  7. Never heard of Rama but it looks likes it got a ton of horrible reviews.

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  8. Oh, but I was actually referring to the Arthur Clark book.

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  9. Wow, this brought back memories. I never actually played it myself, but sat and watched as my friend went through the game.

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  10. Ah, but you should try it for yourself dear Blake. I've recently grabbed the Steam version of it and it plays just fine.

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  11. I don't think that many people know that the dialog was written by Orson Scott Card, of "Ender's Game". This game has some narrative moments in it that are truly unforgettable, and I daresay one of the only truly great "serious" scifi adventures around.

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  12. Well, I didn't know... Thanks a ton Chris. Oh, and I fully agree. The narrative was above what we've come to expect from the average adventure. Could have even made for decent reading material.

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  13. Steven Spielberg was also involved in the writing, not that he is nearly as synonymous with serious scifi as Orson.

    And just btw, Orson also was involved in the 3rd person scifi action adventure Advent Rising.
    Among a few others (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orson_Scott_Card_bibliography#Other_projects).

    And not that it really matters, while I was looking into his artisitc works I found out he is also very religious and as such is anti-gay/evolution/and even global warming.

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  14. I never played either of the Rama video games but I did quite enjoy the book. A classic.

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  15. An absolute classic and one of my all-time favourite books. Then again they are many...

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  16. One of the greatest adventure games ever produced! I'll also give out special props to the epic Wagnerian soundtrack, which really immersed you in the story. Wish more games these days put as much effort into the music as LucasArts did with the dig...

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  17. Ah, my dear Possum. Lovely seeing you around again. And, yes, you are of course right. The soundtrack should have been mentioned.

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