I started playing the 7th Link last night to get a feel for it, to see if this is the game I'd like to blog next.

It feels big, and from some of the meager info I can find online, I don't really know if I want to spend the '200 hours'! required to play the game. Thats a lot of hours and I'm sporadic at best to playing.

Want to make a good single player CRPG?Probably the hardest part of my new book to write was the conclusion, where I tried to think about the future of our favorite genre: the standalone, single-player CRPG. That genre includes all the classic Ultimas, Bard's Tale, Gold Box games, and so on. It's all the genre that has suffered the most attrition from game developers and publishers, though the better ones still attract mainstream attention (Oblivion, Mass Effect). What I want to do here is focus on a few subgenres, if you will, that to my mind have the best chance of thriving in the current market. I will naturally focus on PC games, though where possible these concepts could be applied to any of the new consoles.

(See the prior entries in this ongoing feature)

NOTE: The format of these for now are going to be the REVIEW (semi-walkthrough) portion first, followed by the STORY (fictionalization) portion. Each portion is stand alone and I'll separate them with headers.

REVIEW

I see that Free Software Magazine has finally put up Computer Role-Playing Games for GNU/Linux, an article I wrote that peeks into the surprisingly active world of free CRPGs.

(See The premise at the end of this posting for details on this ongoing feature)
OK, I'm sure you're getting tired of "setup" at this point, but this is finally it. Frankly, it was bothering me that I'd have to type on the same system I was using as a display that I was also capturing direct images and videos on, so I decided to be a bit technically poor and split the composite video/mono audio signals coming from the C-128D into two outputs. There appears to be little-to-no noticeable degradation, so there you go. This will now allow me to be as "authentic" as I prefer to be, meaning I'll be playing "Wizard's Crown" on a real Commodore 8-bit system with a vintage monitor, while still having full capture capability on my laptop.

So, once and for all, here are the specs for the review and chronicle:

BL: Welcome to yakumo9275's (Stu) ongoing "Gates of Delirium Live" recounting of his play through this obscure Computer Role Playing Game for the Radio Shack TRS-80 Color Computer, released in 1987 from Diecom. Post 1:

(See The premise at the end of this posting for details on this ongoing feature)
With most of the setup behind us, with the two prior features, (00) and the unnumbered preparation, it's time to provide the last of the build-up before the actual feature starts to unfold. I have scanned the complete box and complete manual. Go to the set, here. First the box is presented (all sides), then the rather long manual, then the rest of the photos as the chronicles continue. You can view this as a slideshow or click on the individual photos to get high resolution imaging options. Enjoy!