A Visit to the Museum of Underappreciated Games

You’ve heard of “Myst,” “Quake” and “Tomb Raider,” but how many people remember “Obsidian,” “Grim Fandango” and “Under A Killing Moon?” —Gene EmeryA Visit to the Museum of Underappreciated Games (Yahoo|Reuters (will expire))

One presumes this museum is somewhere near The Island of Misfit Toys. Of course, there is also The Underdogs, a site devoted to games that have disappeared from commercial shelves (or games that never were released commercially… there’s a healthy section on interactive fiction, including recent releases from the present, post-commercial era.).

Grim Fandango is on my list of “games I’ve read about and really should take a look at,” because I’ve seen it mentioned in games scholarship.

I’ve got “Obsidian” in a small stack of retro CDs in my office. “Under a Killing Moon” must be in a box somewhere.

Just hearing the name of the latter two titles makes me think of the taste of the Keebler wafer cookies that my sister and I would load up on when I spent a weekend away from graduate school, at her apartment, catching up with her and playing games.

5 thoughts on “A Visit to the Museum of Underappreciated Games

  1. You’ll want to get the SCUMMVM virtual machine to run these under XP. The sound compatibility with older software in XP is awful. SCUMMVM allows you to run most of the older Lucasarts games on XP with few or no problems.

    http://www.scummvm.org/

  2. Grim Fandango is one of the Lucasarts classics that should be required playing for anyone who styles themselves as a “gamer”. Other titles from the Lucasarts era include Monkey Island, Manic Mansion, and Sam and Max.

    For me, Grim Fandango’s biggest appeal was the “film noir” storyline and characters. What made it funny was the way it seamlessly blended Mexican folklore and myths about death and the afterlife into the storyline.

  3. “Just hearing the name of the latter two titles makes me think of the taste of the Keebler wafer cookies that my sister and I would load up on when I spent a weekend away from graduate school, at her apartment, catching up with her and playing games.” —

    It was a kick to read this last paragraph especially now, since my final paper in my own New Media class related to the possibility of using the mind, and memory–or hyperlinks such as this (name of titles –> taste of cookies) to communicate beyond both the usual verbal and physical methods. Storage of data in the mind to storage of data into a computer.

  4. Thanks for that feedback, Anonymous.

    I liked “The Dig,” too, though the more realistic first part of the game actually interested me more than the main part. Still, it did a good job putting character interaction into the classic “explore a strange landscape and solve puzzles” plot.

    I’ve got my copy of “Full Throttle” within reach, though I haven’t played it in years.

    Hey, wait a minute… I see a copy of The Grim Fandango on my shelf. How did that get there?

    Hmm… suddenly I have a new item on my “to do” list.

    Grades first… grades first… grades first…

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