A practice piece that got way out of hand, this one.
I’ve been intending on tackling either this or 3d Lunattack for a bit and kinda put it off for a while because eurgh, effort. Today was pissing me off and I needed a distraction and I clearly hadn’t realised how much of a distraction.
The Seiddab games are pretty formative experiences for me. Sure, not the first or the best of their kind but still impressive stuff for the time and I still keep a little flame alive for them all these years later.
I was never the greatest fan of Elite (read: I never liked it in the slightest) but I did enjoy the more arcade end of the 3d spaceships spectrum, whether it was Star Wars or Darkstar, Starion or 3d Starstrike, all that sort of thing was very much my bag.
Starion is a bit of an odd one because it sits somewhere in the middle. It’s neither all out arcade nor quite close enough to pass itself off as a space simulator, which made it all the more interesting to me because it’s, frankly, a bit weird like that. It also has ginormous floating space letters and everyone knows floating space letters are great. I think? Look, just don’t quote me on that.
After doodling Elite last week, I figured I owed it to myself to draw a space game I actually liked and as Starion was the first one I mentioned in jest, that was what I settled upon.
Chris has been chipping away at Oidanoid for a while now and quite a few folk have had a play around with it before me. I’ll admit that it wasn’t for want of opportunity, it was just I kept forgetting because I’m completely rubbish.
Fortunately for me, I got thrown a link to the latest version yesterday, downloaded the thing, popped it onto the Steam deck and … yeah, go on then!
It’s a neat twin sticker very, very much more in the Minter vein than what I do and obviously, everyone knows that’s the correct approach to anything whatsoever. There’s a lot of Yak DNA to the game with its biscuits, flying text, and more chill Llamatrom vibes and that’s probably the first thing anyone will notice.
A bit of a play and that rather slips away as it reveals itself to be, and I piss you not about this, more Blue Jam than you’d expect any game to be. There’s a constant, calm but unsettling ambience to everything and sure, as far as I could tell nobody has put any lizards in my Steam deck, it still made for a pretty weird (in a very good way) experience.
And, you know, I do love a game that feels extra personal. Aside from some social media chats over the years I don’t really know Chris as a person but this is one of those videogame recipes where it feels like there’s only one person in the world who could make this the way it’s made and that’s my favourite thing in anything, ever.
So of course I had to give it a doodle. I love that stuff. Plus, you know, neon grids. I can’t help myself.
You can follow what Chris is up to over on the Blueskys. Go on.
Mucking around with some bits and pieces and this is where it ended up. Quite like it! It should be the law that you have to put a neon grid in everything.
To be honest, I just wanted to see if I could doodle a decent enough space tube and needed something to pop on top of that to see whether it worked. I don’t really care for Elite all that much! Each to their own and all that, it just isn’t my bag of space videogame.
Still! It gave me a nice break from drawing mascots and I think I’ve sort of got a way of doing tubes how I want to. Wahey, etc…
I weirdly enjoy people finding out that no, I’m not making them up, Alcatraz Harry was a legit, two game, videogame mascot character.
Whilst everyone else was off with Ramsey The Racist Raccoon or something, here was Barry Jones making a game about a dude in Alcatraz, called Harry. Amazing. Probably dodge too but here he is.
Pity poor I, Ball, not only a largely forgotten character in the annals of videogame but who, for their second outing, became a being of purest chrome. Still, they looked pretty chonky and far from an executive toy so it could have been worse.
I have a fondness for Steinar Lund’s take on the character more, though both are pretty fine really. So that’s the one I went with when it came to doodling them, army fatigues, laser guns and helmet and all.
I’ve always, always, found myself drawn to the small, the janky and in some cases, downright tatty when it comes to my tastes. Whether it’s watching (and enjoying!) cheap films, games or whatever, I’m much more at home with rough edges and jank than I am with super polished, super slick stuff.
Obviously, the dawning of home computer games and the wild spread of stuff being made, listed, or sold meant I would rarely be short of stuff to tinker with and the notorious Don’t Buy This – five pointedly crap games for a couple of quid and a bit – didn’t exactly help either.
And sure, most of the games on the compilation were games I was in no rush to play. Fido, however, was an exception. A simple and juuuuust about responsive enough to play whack a mole videogame with a cute doggo, Fido got a lot of play. More than a whole bunch of higher rated, better remembered videogames.
I could rarely be arsed with Fido 2, solely by virtue of having to put effort into forwarding the tape on far enough to get to it rather than having any particular beef with it but the first one? I still like it and still reckon I got more than my two pounds and fifty UK pence worth of videogame from it.
I can’t recommend anybody else play it! Well, unless you’re like me and thrive on tat, then definitely, definitely, definitely grab Don’t Buy This and give it a play.
Despite being perfectly fine mascots (and certainly cuter than that egg) Olli And Lissa got short shrift in the cover art stakes. A screaming dude for the first, their names reduced to a barely noticeable size for the second as a spooky witch takes centre stage in their place and in the third, inexplicably becoming dogs.
A bit silly because whilst slight, they were a perfectly fine bunch of games and really quite pretty to boot.
I guess this is just my way of making it up to them somewhat. Better late than never and all that.
I’ve got no excuse for this one really. Yes, I was watching a Vincent Price film whilst sketching it out but that was House Of Wax, not Witchfinder General.
At least I can honestly say the pun isn’t mine. Everything else though? Yeah, sorry. Sorry about your egg.
