Star Controller

A video game blog by the name of Games Fascination, recently had an interview with Joeseph Larson, the creator of ASCIIpOrtal. Entar asked Joseph “What are some of your favorite games out there today, independent or otherwise?”, and he replied:

I’ve bugged certain channels with my favorite game of all time a lot. That would be Star Control, and I could go on about it, and would because it’s an obscure title and I feel like everyone needs to know about it. I still play it occasionally today. But on titles that I think everyone would like, one thing I find frustrating right now is how transient our tastes have become. Flash games have trained us to play a game out today, then forget about it because there’s another coming tomorrow. That’s, like, a year’s worth of somebody’s life that we’re dedicating an hour of our time to there. That said, my current “disposable” game is Knightfall 2. I loved the first and the second is just as good. I’m really looking forward to Half‐Life 2: Episode 3 as well, but mostly because I still love Half‐Life 1 and I just kinda want to be done with the series, but my tastes have kinda moved on from that sort of game lately. I’m currently playing Super Mario Galaxy, and while I know it’s all big, flashy, and corporate, I like it because it’s fun and I can play it while my children are awake. In fact they love to watch their Mom and I play it.
‐ Joseph Larson

Before I saw this review, I was already aware of the existance of a text-based version of Portal; it’s been covered by other video game sites such as Offworld and it’s just as intriguing as Flash Portal; if I never saw ASCIIpOrtal, I would continue to believe that it is impossible to turn into a text-based version.  And most of all, the companion cube (or companion block in this case) is still easy to recognize. :D

So, who is Joseph Larson?  In addition to programmer, author and all-around cool person with a good sense of humor, he is also Guesst on the UQM and SCDB forums.

Hey, man. I think I've seen you on the Star Control boards, as well as the Ur-Quan Masters boards. I'm guesst on those boards. But I was the one that made everyone there aware of dragon's remake, tho it doesn't seem to be going anywhere right now.

I'm not as active as I once was on those boards. I think an official sequel to Star Control by FF & PR3 would be the coolest thing in the world. I also think we've got a better chance of getting a cloaking device and finding Groombridge in the DOS version of SC2. (Had to say DOS version becuase some yuker could add it to UQM, you never know.)

But I still can't stop loving the game. Bytejacker has heard way too much from me about Star Control to the point that... well fastforward to 4:32 in http://www.bytejacker.com/episodes/038. Yeah. Also the TIGSource forums I tipped the ballance in a "best games evar" competition by half my available point on Star Control 1 putting it in the top 10, even tho I was the only person who voted for it.

So yeah, I'm obsessed. I know all about Star Control and Toys for Bob and the petitions. I miss the old fan site that had that great artwork. I bought Unholy wars just because they made it. There's probably nothing about Star Control or TFB that you could whip out that I don't already know. - Joseph Larson

I have heard about Dragon’s remake of Star Control 1 and I remember playing a very early build of it where there was a planet, 2 ships and all they could do was fly around.  It looked very sharp and has a lot of potential.  I know there have been much more updates since then and I’ve been so busy with personal stuff that I didn’t have a chance to write about it at the time.

Thank you Joseph for mentioning Star Control in the interview and good luck with ASCIIpOrtal.

Links
Interview with Joseph Larson
Bytejacker Episode 038 (Skip to 4:32)

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