This tutorial will guide you from start to finish on how to set up your PS1 RetroPie Emulator on your Raspberry Pi 2. Please make sure you watch the previous video in this series if you are having any trouble: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ySoTQ…
With these settings I have yet to encounter a game that does not run great. All controls work as they should and this is an amazing PS1 emulator.
This is a beginners tutorial, and is for those who want an easy step by step guide to setting up PSX Emulation with RetroPie on their Raspberry Pi.
Each Friday is PiDay here at Adafruit! Be sure to check out our posts, tutorials and new Raspberry Pi related products. Adafruit has the largest and best selection of Raspberry Pi accessories and all the code & tutorials to get you up and running in no time!
For the past six years, my wife and I have restrained ourselves from adopting a dog. It hasn't been easy. For a dog lover, New York City's streets are a constant reminder that everyone else is receiving kisses from affectionate, warm, oh-so-cute-I-just-want-to-bite-their-little-noses-off dogs. When I pass a pup — any pup! — it takes everything in my being not to scoop that woofer into my pocket and run. So naturally I have fallen in love with Butt Sniffin' Pugs, one of many charming games at ALT.CTRL.GDC, a showcase at the Game Developers Conference that focuses on unusual control schemes.
Space Beagles' Gabe Telepak explained the game's set-up on the show floor: each player controls their own pug with an oversized tennis ball that serves as a mouse. Two green buttons control two unique dog actions, like bark or bite. Additional actions, like poo and pee, can be switched-in by sniffing another dog's butt, itself triggered by bopping the rear end of a toy puppy.
The game doesn't feature levels or predetermined goals. Butt Sniffin' Pugs is just a chance to have some fun with cute pups. I wish I could bring it home for my wife.
Formerly known as Bradley Manning, the private was court-martialed last year and sentenced to 35 years for forwarding a cache of classified documents to WikiLeaks.
After the August 2013 espionage conviction for leaking more than 700,000 documents and video, Manning announced that she would live as a woman with the name Chelsea going forward. She also appealed the conviction. A non-military judge approved the name change last year. Hormone therapy, which she is now getting, is assisting her transition. Manning has been diagnosed with gender dysphoria.
If there’s one thing that can take your mind off the horrific results of our failed drug war—a policy that has brought about the highest incarceration rates of any country in the world, wrought economic disaster, and promoted racist criminal statutes—it’s that soon you’ll be able to see a show depicting all that devastation in super-awesome HD! Collider reports that The Wire, HBO’s Baltimore crime drama and show that the Internet will murder you for not appending with the tag “best show ever,” is being released on Blu-ray on June 2.
This HD remastering for the Blu-ray release is a mixed bag, however, as befitting a show where nothing that ever happened was either simply good or bad, but rather a complex mélangeof ambiguous consequences. So while it’s good that deeply shaded colors and images will now illuminate those deeply shaded narrative ...
"When I called the officer he said that he had gotten out on the highway and gotten hit by a car and broke both of his back legs,” she said.
Clackamas County Sheriff Office spokesman Sgt. Nathan Thompson tells KATU News the officer did believe the horse had broken legs from being hit by a car.
Thompson also said he believes the deputy called the Oregon Humane Society to ask about euthanizing the horse before he shot it. A spokeswoman for OHS tells KATU News the deputy never called them.
Thompson also said the deputy called a local veterinarian to ask about euthanizing the horse. KATU News reporter Hillary Lake contacted the vet about that call. He confirmed he did talk to the deputy, that his office offered assistance in euthanizing the horse, but that the officer said he would “take care of the problem on his own” and call a rendering service himself.
Thompson said the deputy made the decision to shoot the horse after also consulting his supervisor.
What do women want in their women characters? Art director and Muddy Colors columnist Lauren Panepinto addresses sexism in art and what she wants creators to think about when developing female characters. Even better, she shares redesigns of popular female characters done by female science fiction and fantasy artists.
It must noted that the rhetoric "personal responsibility" enjoys, not just currency among the white officials of Ferguson, but among many black people ("black on black crime!") who believe that white supremacy is a force with which one can negotiate. But white supremacy—as evidence in Ferguson—is not ultimately interested in how responsible you are, nor how respectable you look. White supremacy is neither misunderstanding nor a failure of manners. White supremacy is the machinery of Galactus which allows for the potential devouring of everything you own. White supremacy is the technology, patented in this enlightened era, to ensure that what is yours inevitably becomes mine.
Yesterday the Justice Department released the results of a long and thorough investigation into the killing of Michael Brown by officer Darren Wilson. The investigation concluded that there was not enough evidence to prove a violation of federal law by officer Wilson. The investigation concluded much more. The investigation concluded that physical evidence and witness statements corroborated Wilson's claim that Michael Brown reached into the car and struck the officer. It concluded that claims that Wilson reached out and grabbed Brown first "were inconsistent with physical and forensic evidence."
The investigation concluded that there was no evidence to contradict Wilson's claim that Brown reached for his gun. The investigation concluded that Wilson did not shoot Brown in the back. That he did not shoot Brown as he was running away. That Brown did stop and turn toward Wilson. That in those next moments "several witnesses stated that Brown appeared to pose a physical threat to Wilson." That claims that Brown had his hands up "in an unambiguous sign of surrender" are not supported by the "physical and forensic evidence," and are sometimes, "materially inconsistent with that witness’s own prior statements with no explanation, credible for otherwise, as to why those accounts changed over time."
Unlike the local investigators, the Justice Department did not merely toss all evidence before a grand jury and say, "you figure it out." The federal investigators did the work themselves and came to the conclusion that Officer Wilson had not committed "prosecutable violations under the applicable federal criminal civil rights statute, 18 U.S.C. § 242."
Our system, ideally, neither catches every single offender, nor lightly imposes prosecution, jailing and fining up its citizens. A high burden of proof should attend any attempt to strip away one's liberties. The Justice Department investigation reflects a department attempting to live up to those ideals and giving Officer Wilson the due process that he, and anyone else falling under our legal system, deserves.
One cannot say the same for Officer Wilson's employers.
The Justice Department conducted two investigation—one looking into the shooting of Michael Brown, and another into the Ferguson Police Department. The first report made clear that there was no prosecutable case against one individual officer. The second report made clear that there was a damning case to be made against the system in which that officer operated:
Ferguson’s law enforcement practices are shaped by the City’s focus on revenue rather than by public safety needs. This emphasis on revenue has compromised the institutional character of Ferguson’s police department, contributing to a pattern of unconstitutional policing, and has also shaped its municipal court, leading to procedures that raise due process concerns and inflict unnecessary harm on members of the Ferguson community. Further, Ferguson’s police and municipal court practices both reflect and exacerbate existing racial bias, including racial stereotypes. Ferguson’s own data establish clear racial disparities that adversely impact African Americans. The evidence shows that discriminatory intent is part of the reason for these disparities...
Partly as a consequence of City and FPD priorities, many officers appear to see some residents, especially those who live in Ferguson’s predominantly African-American neighborhoods, less as constituents to be protected than as potential offenders and sources of revenue...
The "focus on revenue" was almost wholly a focus on black people as revenue. Black people in Ferguson were twice as likely to be searched during a stop, twice as likely to receive a citation when stopped, and twice as likely to be arrested during the stop, and yet were 26% less likely to be found with contraband. Black people were more likely to see a single incident turn into multiple citations. The disparity in outcomes remained "even after regression analysis is used to control for non-race-based variables."
One should understand that the Justice Department did not simply find indirect evidence of unintentionally racist practices which harm black people, but "discriminatory intent”—that is to say willful racism aimed to generate cash. Justice in Ferguson is not a matter of "racism without racists," but racism with racists so secure, so proud, so brazen that they used their government emails to flaunt it.
The emails including "jokes" depicting President Obama as a chimp, mocking how black people talk ("I be so glad that dis be my last child support payment!"), depicting blacks as criminals, welfare recipients, unemployed, lazy, and having "no frigging clue who their Daddies are.” This humor—given the imprimatur of government email—resulted in neither reprimand, nor protest, nor even a polite request to refrain from reoffending. "Instead," according to the report. "The emails were usually forwarded along to others."
One should resist the urge to clutch pearls and carp about the "mean people" of Ferguson. Bigoted jokes are never really jokes at all, so much as a tool by which one sanctifies plunder. If black people in Ferguson are the 47 percent—a class of takers, of immoral reprobates, driving up crime, while driving down quality of life—then why should they not be "the sources of revenue?" In this way a racist "joke" transfigures raw pillage into legal taxation. The "joke" is in fact an entire worldview that reveals that the agents of plunder, the police, are in fact not plundering anyone at all. They are just making sure the reprobates pay their fair share.
That is precisely what Ferguson's officials told federal investigators:
Several Ferguson officials told us during our investigation that it is a lack of “personal responsibility” among African-American members of the Ferguson community that causes African Americans to experience disproportionate harm under Ferguson’s approach to law enforcement. Our investigation suggests that this explanation is at odd with the facts.
On the contrary the investigation "revealed African Americans making extraordinary efforts to pay off expensive tickets for minor, often unfairly charged, violations, despite systemic obstacles to resolving those tickets." And while the investigation found no lack of "personal responsibility" among black residents of Ferguson, it did find that the very same people making the charge were often busy expunging fines for their friends:
In August 2013, an FPD patrol supervisor wrote an email entitled “Oops” to the Prosecuting Attorney regarding a ticket his relative received in another municipality for traveling 59 miles per hour in a 40 miles-per-hour zone, noting “[h]aving it dismissed would be a blessing.” The Prosecuting Attorney responded that the prosecutor of that other municipality promised to nolle pros the ticket. The supervisor responded with appreciation, noting that the dismissal “[c]ouldn’t have come at a better time.”
Also in August 2013, Ferguson’s Mayor emailed the Prosecuting Attorney about a parking ticket received by an employee of a non-profit day camp for which the Mayor sometimes volunteers. The Mayor wrote that the person “shouldn’t have left his car unattended there, but it was an honest mistake” and stated, “I would hate for him to have to pay for this, can you help?” The Prosecuting Attorney forwarded the email to the Court Clerk, instructing her to “NP [nolle prosequi, or not prosecute] this parking ticket.”
In November 2011, a court clerk received a request from a friend to “fix a parking ticket” received by the friend’s coworker’s wife. After the ticket was faxed to the clerk, she replied: “It’s gone baby!”
In March 2014, a friend of the Court Clerk’s relative emailed the Court Clerk with a scanned copy of a ticket asking if there was anything she could do to help. She responded: “Your ticket of $200 has magically disappeared!” Later, in June 2014, the same person emailed the Court Clerk regarding two tickets and asked: “Can you work your magic again? It would be deeply appreciated.” The Clerk later informed him one ticket had been dismissed and she was waiting to hear back about the second ticket.
It must noted that the rhetoric "personal responsibility" enjoys, not just currency among the white officials of Ferguson, but among many black people ("black on black crime!") who believe that white supremacy is a force with which one can negotiate. But white supremacy—as evidence in Ferguson—is not ultimately interested in how responsible you are, nor how respectable you look. White supremacy is neither misunderstanding nor a failure of manners. White supremacy is the machinery of Galactus which allows for the potential devouring of everything you own. White supremacy is the technology, patented in this enlightened era, to ensure that what is yours inevitably becomes mine.
This technology has proven highly effective throughout American history. In 1860 it meant the transformation of black bodies into more wealth than all the productive capacity of this country combined. In the 1930s it meant the erection of our modern middle class. In Ferguson, it meant funding nearly a quarter of the municipal budget:
The City has not yet made public the actual revenue collected that year, although budget documents forecasted lower revenue than 10 was budgeted. Nonetheless, for fiscal year 2015, the City’s budget anticipates fine and fee revenues to account for $3.09 million of a projected $13.26 million in general fund revenues...
In a February 2011 report requested by the City Council at a Financial Planning Session and drafted by Ferguson’s Finance Director with contributions from Chief Jackson, the Finance Director reported on “efforts to increase efficiencies and maximize collection” by the municipal court. The report included an extensive comparison of Ferguson’s fines to those of surrounding municipalities and noted with approval that Ferguson’s fines are “at or near the top of the list....” While the report stated that this recommendation was because of a “large volume of non-compliance,” the recommendation was in fact emphasized as one of several ways that the code enforcement system had been honed to produce more revenue.
The men and women behind this policy did not approach their effort to "produce more revenue" somberly, but lustily. As the fruits of plunder increased, Ferguson officials congratulated and backslapped each other:
In one March 2012 email, the Captain of the Patrol Division reported directly to the City Manager that court collections in February 2012 reached $235,000, and that this was the first month collections ever exceeded $200,000. The Captain noted that “[t]he [court clerk] girls have been swamped all day with a line of people paying off fines today. Since 9:30 this morning there hasn’t been less than 5 people waiting in line and for the last three hours 10 to 15 people at all times.” The City Manager enthusiastically reported the Captain’s email to the City Council and congratulated both police department and court staff on their “great work.”
It is a wonder they did not hand out bonuses. Perhaps they did. The bonus of being white in Ferguson meant nigh-immunity from plunder. The bane of being black in Ferguson meant nigh-inevitable subjugation under plunder. Plunder is neither abstract nor theoretical. Plunder injures, maims, and destroys. Indeed the very same people who were calling on protestors to remain nonviolent were, every hour, partner to brutality committed under the color of law:
We spoke with one African-American man who, in August 2014, had an argument in his apartment to which FPD officers responded, and was immediately pulled out of the apartment by force. After telling the officer, “you don’t have a reason to lock me up,” he claims the officer responded: “N*****, I can find something to lock you up on.” When the man responded, “good luck with that,” the officer slammed his face into the wall, and after the man fell to the floor, the officer said, “don’t pass out motherf****r because I’m not carrying you to my car.”
The residents of Ferguson do not have a police problem. They have a gang problem. That the gang operates under legal sanction makes no difference. It is a gang nonetheless, and there is no other word to describe an armed band of collection agents.
John Locke knew:
The injury and the crime is equal, whether committed by the wearer of a crown, or some petty villain. The title of the offender, and the number of his followers, make no difference in the offence, unless it be to aggravate it. The only difference is, great robbers punish little ones, to keep them in their obedience; but the great ones are rewarded with laurels and triumphs, because they are too big for the weak hands of justice in this world, and have the power in their own possession, which should punish offenders. What is my remedy against a robber, that so broke into my house?
What are the tools in Ferguson to address the robber that so regularly breaks into my house? One necessary tool is suspicion and skepticism—the denial of the sort of the credit one generally grants officers of the state. When Darren Wilson shot Michael Brown there was little reason to credit his account, and several reason to disbelieve it. The reason is not related to whether Michael Brown was "an angel" or not. The reasons are contained in a report rendered by the highest offices of the American government. Crediting the accounts of Ferguson's officers is a good way to enroll yourself in your own plunder and destruction.
Government, if its name means anything, must rise above those suspicions and that skepticism and seek out justice. And if it seeks to improve its name it must do much more—it must seek out the roots of the skepticism. The lack of faith among black people in Ferguson's governance, or in America's governance, is not something that should be bragged about. One cannot feel good about living under gangsters, and that is the reality of Ferguson right now.
The innocence of Darren Wilson does not change this fundamental fact. Indeed the focus on the deeds of alleged individual perpetrators, on perceived bad actors, obscures the broad systemic corruption which is really at the root. Darren Wilson is not the first gang member to be publicly accused of a crime he did not commit. But Darren Wilson was given the kind of due process that those of us who are often presumed to be gang members rarely enjoy. I do not favor lowering the standard of justice offered Officer Wilson. I favor raising the standard of justice offered to the rest of us.
As reported by Deadline, Raising Hope‘s Martha Plimpton has signed on to play another mom. This time it’s for Family Of The Year, ABC’s comedy pilot that’s loosely based on the life of writer/gay rights activist Dan Savage—he’s that guy in the red (or white) shirt who shows up on The A.V. Club every Wednesday. The pilot’s storyline is about the O’Neals, “a seemingly perfect All-American family” that has to face a bunch of family secrets when the youngest son, played by Noah Galvin, comes out of the closet. Mad Men‘s Jay R. Ferguson will play the father, a cop who works for the Chicago Police Department. As we said earlier, Plimpton will play the mom, a woman who is “very proud of her family,” but, secretly, “her marriage is on the rocks and her life hasn’t been ...
'Ginger Maseda, Director of Global Talent Acquisition at EA, noted that more and more, she hears interest in hiring people from outside of the dominant pool. "I love that they're asking," she said. "I think it demonstrates interest and passion." Maseda noted that it needs to be backed up by a company culture that values diversity. "It [can't be] just one person, it has to be every person," she said, of a studio that wants to diversify its workforce. "It's important that HR directors are deliberate and championing."
Susan Bollinger, Director of Talent & Culture at Certain Affinity, had some very practical advice for building such a culture.
"I call it a 'no jerks rule,'" she said, and noted that the interview process is specifically designed to weed out folks who would make company culture toxic. She also had practical advice on how to deal with the "locker room" mentality that can come up in male-dominated spaces. Bollinger asserts that hiring folks who care about their environment and empowering everyone to speak up goes a long way.
"It's really important in my view to not always leave that to the 'HR' police," she said, speaking about inappropriate jokes. "It's not about being the 'fun police' it's about having the work environment that we want."
Bollinger also had advice with regards to current employees that want to bring up diversity to their team leads. When asked by an audience member how to start a conversation with a team lead that "didn't know where to begin" hiring more women, she advised having stats and articles ready to get the conversation started. Breaking through stereotypes is the first goal.'
Today's Turning the Tide: Hiring and Retaining Women in the Games Industry GDC panel was stocked with advice on helping to create and maintain a workforce that values women workers.
Ginger Maseda, Director of Global Talent Acquisition at EA, noted that more and more, she hears interest in hiring people from outside of the dominant pool. "I love that they're asking," she said. "I think it demonstrates interest and passion." Maseda noted that it needs to be backed up by a company culture that values diversity. "It [can't be] just one person, it has to be every person," she said, of a studio that wants to diversify its workforce. "It's important that HR directors are deliberate and championing."
Susan Bollinger, Director of Talent & Culture at Certain Affinity, had some very practical advice for building such a culture.
"I call it a 'no jerks rule,'" she said, and noted that the interview process is specifically designed to weed out folks who would make company culture toxic. She also had practical advice on how to deal with the "locker room" mentality that can come up in male-dominated spaces. Bollinger asserts that hiring folks who care about their environment and empowering everyone to speak up goes a long way.
"It's really important in my view to not always leave that to the 'HR' police," she said, speaking about inappropriate jokes. "It's not about being the 'fun police' it's about having the work environment that we want."
Bollinger also had advice with regards to current employees that want to bring up diversity to their team leads. When asked by an audience member how to start a conversation with a team lead that "didn't know where to begin" hiring more women, she advised having stats and articles ready to get the conversation started. Breaking through stereotypes is the first goal.
"The first way to get [workers] is to not make assumptions about what kind of people want to work on games."
So listen, I picked Monica for Secret Santa…
…but I’m getting her something for Hanukkah.
You wanna switch?
Oh, you know what? I was trying to trade for, uh, ahem, well, you.
As Sports Illustrated details, the coach's aggressive play-calling and decision to go for a touchdown instead of running out the clock was the difference between a successful halftime show and one that would have been ruined by a sun that hadn't quite set.
Perry's production was designed to be displayed against a dark sky. But the first half of Super Bowl XLIX was played at such a fast pace that the organizers realized they were on pace to perform while it was still bright out.
In fact, it seemed at one point that the show would most certainly be performed in the light. It took three scoring drives to stretch out the first half. The last critical drive -- started with 31 seconds left before halftime, and when the Seahawks could have easily kneeled down and gone to the locker room -- involved three timeouts and one stoppage in play.
Even then, the halftime crew barely made it.
"We made darkness by something like 25 seconds,” said Katy Perry's creative partner, Baz Halpin, to SI. "For months and months, I never panicked. Then the game was so fast -- how did we not think about the sun? It was a miracle."
(I am in Germany on a school trip. I have never been before, nor do I speak German. I am currently with two of my friends talking about going out to dinner on the train platform.)
(A middle-aged man hurries up to me.)
Man: “Guten tag!”
Me: “…guten tag.”
Man:*over enunciating* “Do. You. Speak. English?”
Me: “…yeah?”
Man: “Oh, thank god. Everyone’s so unhelpful around here! How do I get from [rattles off a number of places in quick succession].”
Me: “I’m sorry…”
Man:*cutting me off angrily* “I thought you said you spoke English!”
Me: “I do. I just don’t know any of those places.”
When Activision's newly resurrected Sierra label announced a revival of the King's Quest series late last year, I was too cautious to be optimistic. As a long-time fan of this classic adventure game series, I've been conditioned to expect the worst.
After all, there hasn't been a new King's Quest game since 1998's terrible King's Quest: Mask of Eternity. At multiple points in the last decade, fresh entries have been rumored or even openly announced, but none have come to fruition.
Most recently, the ever-popular Telltale Games, creators of beloved episodic series like The Walking Dead, were announced to be handling a reboot. That one was confirmed canceled in 2013.
All this is to say that I went into my first appointment seeing indie developer The Odd Gentlemen's take on King's Quest with more than just the regular dose of journalistic skepticism. I was downright cynical; I expected a disaster at worst, a mediocre thing that could never live up to the series I grew up with at best.
I was completely, wildly wrong.
Dragon tales
If there's an immediately obvious note that The Odd Gentlemen got right about King's Quest, it's the general tone of the series. Though they tell unique stories, the King's Quest narratives always felt ephemeral and timeless in some sense. They implemented various bits of fairy tales and mythologies to create something warmly recognizable, even as it was sharply unique.
To match this feeling, The Odd Gentlemen's version of King's Quest is presented as a story literally being told. King Graham, one of the primary characters from throughout the series, has grown into an old man. No longer able to go on adventures, he instead creates fanciful retellings of his past glories for his granddaughter, Gwendolyn.
"We print out 3D models on paper, physically paint them and then scan them back in"
"Each story that he tells, the player gets to shape," says creative director Matt Korba. "They can tell a story of compassion or a story of wisdom or a story of bravery. And that affects Gwendolyn."
The gameplay for each story will actually focus around controlling Graham in his imaginative stories. But along side that, each chapter of the game will feature Gwendolyn encountering her own problems outside of the storytelling. Her reactions to those problems will be influenced by the kind of story you told — a smart idea that goes a step beyond the "[Character] will remember that" branching storytelling that's become so popular from Telltale Games.
In the GDC demo, Korba begins by showing the tutorial story. In this tale, a young, spindly Graham is exploring a dangerous cave in search of a magical mirror. Fans of the series will recognize this as a clear nod to King's Quest 1, although Korba notes that no prior knowledge of the series is required to play this new entry. He also says that post-tutorial stories will be fully original tales, not just tidbits pulled from or inspired by previous games.
The demo is based off a pre-alpha build which has temporary assets in many spots, but what's there already looks wonderful. This is thanks in part to The Odd Gentlemen's distinctive hand-painted art style for the game.
"We're actually physically painting them," says Korba. "We print out 3D models on paper, physically paint them and then scan them back in."
As Korba leads me through the cave, he clues me in on how the team is playing with time via its clever storytelling mechanic. This won't be the only time players (as Graham) enter this creepy cavern.
"We're doing a lot of setup in this first part," he says. "You're going to revisit this cave. We're going to jump back in time and visit this same cave earlier. You'll understand later why certain things in the cave look the way they do."
As he progresses, it's clear to see why players will be left wondering about that stuff. The cave is full of oddities: a skeleton crushed by massive beds, arrows embedded in a long-dead target, strange deathtraps swinging from stalactites.
At one point, Korba encounters King's Quest's first simplistic puzzle. Two switches stand before Graham. One of them is next to one of the aforementioned crushed skeletons. The other is clean. "Which should I pull?" Korba asks me.
I choose the switch that doesn't have a dead body next to it. Korba tells me I made the right choice but hits the other switch anyway just to show me what happens. As soon as Graham pulls the switch, a bed comes flying at him from off-screen, smashing him against the wall.
"I was just checking to see if you were awake"
It wouldn't be a King's Quest game without sudden and surprising deaths, but The Odd Gentlemen opt for silly, cartoon-style endings rather than anything violent. Those deaths will also be a lot less frustrating than the progress-consuming fatalities of yore. After all, Graham is telling a story, and Gwendolyn isn't about to sit through him repeating himself over and over again.
In this case, the death leads to a fun quip from the much older Graham telling the story: "And that's what would have happened if I pulled the left switch. But since I'm here telling this story, you must know I pulled the other one."
Korba says the team is having a lot of fun with death sequences, both in terms of animating them and coming up with unique lines for Graham for each one. As he progresses through the cave, Graham comes across a massive but sleepy dragon. At one point, Korba makes the choice to walk directly up to the dragon, waking him up. The dragon devours Graham in a single bite.
This time, Gwendolyn interrupts: "You marched right into a ferocious dragon's mouth?!"
"I was just checking to see if you were awake," Graham replies.
The new kid
Dragons and dangerous caverns are all well and good, but King's Quest's heart really shows in its use of other characters. Jumping past the tutorial section, Korba shows me the next story. This one is the tale of how Graham became a knight.
In order to become a knight, Graham is forced to compete in a tournament with four other candidates. And rather than introducing these opponents via lengthy dialogue — or worse, not at all — the game features a series of puzzles that showcase each other potential knight upstaging Graham.
The quandary is this: Graham and the other candidates must find a way to cross a deep ravine. The first would-be knight is a talented archer. He ties a rope to an arrow, shoots it across and shimmies to the other side. Then he tosses the arrow back across to Graham, challenging him to follow.
In a brilliant move, the Odd Gentlemen place control into the hands of the player here. They're able to carefully aim their shot and tap a button to fire the arrow. And then ... the arrow only goes a few feet forward before plummeting into the ravine. Graham's skinny arms were no match for his opponent.
It's so rare to be put into the shoes of a character who can't always win
In another sequence, Graham decides to try chopping down a huge tree using a hilariously tiny axe. After a few moments of hard work, one of the other candidates asks him to step aside. This big, beefy knight has a much larger axe and makes short work of the tree, knocking it over as a makeshift bridge. He hops over to the other side, but naturally the tree collapses afterward, leaving Graham still stranded.
What King's Quest is getting across here is both how Graham is a non-traditional hero and how he (and the player) will need to use smarts rather than strength to succeed. It's so rare to be put into the shoes of a character who can't always win; it's a refreshing twist.
Best of all, these funny scenes are all presented with minimal dialogue. Korba says part of that is due to the voice-over work for the game not being done yet. But as is, the story is told completely through visuals and Disney-style musical cues. I hope the dialogue stays minimal here.
Whatever changes await in the final release, I'm incredibly excited to see more of King's Quest. That's more than I could have said prior to GDC.
King's Quest will be released as an episodic series beginning later this year. No release date for the debut episode has been announced yet, but Korba says news on that as well as some big voice actor announcements will be coming soon.
Book with feet: not possible. It did occur back in the day, I can assure you, although not that often. When medieval binders knew that the object they were processing would be placed on a lectern, for example in a chained library, they often added tiny feet like the ones seen here. They made sure that the lower edge of the binding and the bottom part of the pages would not be damaged by the rough wood of the lectern - notice the shiny bottom of the feet. It was a simple trick to extend the half-life of the book, although it looks kind of funny from our modern perspective.
Pics (my own): Leiden, Universiteitsbibliotheek, BUR Q 1, c. 1100 (pics 1-2) and BPL 67, 9th century (pic 3). More about these feet in this blog I wrote recently.
Each Friday is PiDay here at Adafruit! Be sure to check out our posts, tutorials and new Raspberry Pi related products. Adafruit has the largest and best selection of Raspberry Pi accessories and all the code & tutorials to get you up and running in no time!
![Googling inevitably reveals that my problem is caused by a known bug triggered by doing [the exact combination of things I want to do]. I can fix it, or wait a few years until I don't want that combination of things anymore, using the kitchen timer until then.](http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/hard_reboot.png "Googling inevitably reveals that my problem is caused by a known bug triggered by doing [the exact combination of things I want to do]. I can fix it, or wait a few years until I don't want that combination of things anymore, using the kitchen timer until then.")
Ta-Nehisi Coates : The Atlantic.
Super Opinionated.
![[link]](http://i.imgur.com/VdTTgWb.jpg){kind=link}