The “Runner” Revisited
- Scribbled on January 4th, 2008 by JBonner71
- Filed in Blu-Ray/HD-DVD, Editorial Content, Humor, Retro
The other day I picked up the super-mega-awesome, four DVD “collector’s edition” of Ridley Scott’s 1982 sci-fi classic, BLADE RUNNER. I must say that it’s been years since I’ve seen the film and I really enjoyed it all over again – I’ve “rediscovered” it, if you will. Everything about the film is spot-fucking-on: the acting, direction, music, writing, special effects (for 1982) and production design all masterfully gel together to make you believe that you are getting a “real” glimpse of a dystopian Los Angeles in the year 2019. And man, is it ever hardcore. Pick up this DVD set if you get a chance; you won’t regret it. It is 117 minutes well spent.
While watching the flick, a couple of video game related notions meandered across my mind…
1. For about three or four minutes of screen time (it’s the scene were Deckard chases the stripper Replicant, Zhora, through the LA streets), a large, purple neon ATARI sign is prominently displayed in the background. Now way back in 1982, Atari ruled the video game roost, so this product placement is understandable. But let’s suppose for moment that Atari continued their dominance into the future, as this film suggests, and is not the two-bit publisher on the verge of bankruptcy that they are today.
Imagine, if you can, that you weren’t playing that shiny, new PS3 right now but the Atari 18200, or the Jaguar 360, or the Lynx DS, or even the Atari Wii. (The last two aren’t all that far-fetched as one might think. In 1983, Nintendo offered Atari the U.S. rights to the original Famicom/NES. The deal fell apart due to arrogance on the part of Atari and some strange dealings between the big N, Atari and Coleco over the console rights to Donkey Kong.)
It literally hurts my brain to think of what could’ve been for Atari if they just played their cards a bit differently. How goddamn far they have fallen in the past 25 years or so is just shameful. If any company in today’s industry needs a Phoenix-like rebirth, it’s Atari.
And I’d like to be around to see that, quite honestly.
2. Secondly, why hasn’t some savvy publisher/developer/studio gobbled up the rights to the BLADE RUNNER IP? A properly designed Blade Runner video game (think GTA IV stumbles into a one-nighter with Bioshock and spawns a child of awesomeness called: Blade Runner – The Video Game Experience) running on today’s hardware would be so completely kick ass I don’t even know where to begin. Just the thought of piloting Deckard’s police Spinner through a virtual, futuristic Los Angeles, while chasing down evil robots that look like a gothed-out Daryl Hannah, gives me a nerdgasm of the highest magnitude.
Believe it or not, there actually were two, previous video game iterations of Blade Runner (not including Hideo Kojima’s excellent Sega CD title Snatcher, which many people feel is the Japanese equivalent of Blade Runner). The first one was a 1985 action game for the Commodore 64 and the other was a 1997 point-and-click adventure game for the PC. Both had one thing in common beyond the “Blade Runner” title: they both sucked worse than my date for the Junior Prom.
I don’t know…is it just me or does a next-gen version of Blade Runner seem like a no-brainer? Does anyone out there in the vastness of the interwebs agree with me? Can BioWare or Rockstar, or 2K Boston, or Starbreeze, or Ubisoft, or even (gasp!) Bungie make this geek fantasy a reality?
January 4th, 2008 at 8:30 pm
At least the cover of the game looks tough. Great article!
January 4th, 2008 at 10:19 pm
I beg your pardon - the Blade Runner adventure game from 1997 was very very good, and earned universal rave reviews. What crack pipe are you smoking?
January 4th, 2008 at 11:19 pm
Nice article!
Agree that Blade Runner was kick-ass and that an update would be cool! The Blade Runner games (so far) did suck…Falcon probably developed the 97 version
On Atari…it would be nice to re-capture some of the magic of 1980 - 82…like they say…you never forget your first time
January 5th, 2008 at 12:08 am
Blade Runner screams out to be a full-on action game, in my opinion, and I’m sure many others would agree with me there. And besides, I’ve never been the biggest fan of the old school point-and-click adventure games. They seem a bit archaic in today’s day and age, don’t you think?
January 5th, 2008 at 1:36 am
Blade Runner:
Moby Ranking: 85 (out of 100)
Computer Games Magazine: 4 stars (out of 5)
Just Adventure: A grade
RPG Fan: 93%
PC Gamer: Nominee for Best Adventure Game of the Year
Game Revolution: A-
http://www.1up.com/do/feature?cId=3165122
So, Scott - you were saying?
Blade Runner also had the ingenious multiple endings, depending on what you did (10 years before Mass Effect) - and some random elements (ie. some games, you discovered you were human. Other games, you were a replicant.)
January 5th, 2008 at 2:35 pm
Man, do you have a hard-on for that game or something?? Do you want a cookie for being able to do a Google search?
You’re harping on one (humorous) comment/opinion and missing the point of the article, which is: wouldn’t a proper, next-gen version of Blade Runner kick ass? Where you actually get to be Rick Deckard and take down Leon, Zhora, Pris and Roy…not some crappy stand-in characters.
If you don’t want to see that then you can dust off your 10 year old copy of Westwood’s game (which, I’m sure, is tucked safely under your pillow)and stroke it and pet it and tell it that everything is going to be okay…it is still loved.
Beyond a few notable exceptions (Maniac Mansion and Day of the Tentacle), I DO NOT like point-and-click adventure games because of their many limitations (I mean, how many times can you hear/see “I CAN’T USE THAT HERE.” before ripping your hair out in frustration?) and that style of gameplay (along with turn based combat systems in RPG’s) are best left in the past.
January 6th, 2008 at 7:31 pm
The fact is, your blanket statement of “It sucks!” is a minority sentiment. And FYI, many people still play it. The fact you say “I don’t like point-and-click” adventures tells me you’re not in a position to give a review of a point and click adventure.
Furthermore, Blade Runner does not translate well to any genre save advenure games. Most of the film is a detective movie - there’s very little action whatsoever that you’d see in an FPS.
It’s a detective story - and those are adventure games. Do you see gunfights? No. Deckard fires his gun twice - on two unarmed women, one running away from him. He misses Roy twice, and doesn’t even have the use of his gun for most of that chase. Rachel fires once, on an unarmed man. That’s it. Not exactly conducive to an action game, huh?
In fact, the ESPER is as adventure game-ish as it gets, as is Deckard finding a clue and investigating it. Heck, if the movie were a game, you’d be running the mouse over the screen til you get a cursor reaction when you run over the scale in the tub.
January 6th, 2008 at 8:54 pm
Well, there’s obviously a difference of opinion here. “To each, their own,” is a saying I am fond of.
But, I do find it rather amusing that the comment(s) supporting my P.O.V. were mysteriously “moderated” out sometime today…
[They were deleted due to derogatory, personal attacks. There is a lot of flow of information here - insults are not a part of that. - Jonah Falcon]
January 7th, 2008 at 1:26 am
That’s because this is Jonah’s site.
All that matters is her opinion.
January 7th, 2008 at 9:46 am
LOL…yeah, I’m beginning to get that. Pretty sad, really.
All I know is that I was “hired” by Derrick, not Jonah.
And are you using “her” facetiously there, or is “Jonah Falcon” a woman? Not that it matters, really, I just find it interesting.
[I'm male, and the person is being deliberately insulting. - Jonah Falcon]
January 7th, 2008 at 4:42 pm
Let me make one thing perfectly clear: this is not “my” website. This is Derrick Schommer’s.
The posts that were deleted were not due to a disagreement (you may see tons of disagreements with my position in a few editorials) - it was due to the personal attacks. Difference of opinion is fine - insults are not.
January 7th, 2008 at 5:14 pm
Okay. Let’s move on, shall we?
January 8th, 2008 at 8:28 pm
Heh. Another writer having a comment war with Jonah?!!? Blasphemy!
January 9th, 2008 at 10:07 am
:^)
January 12th, 2008 at 2:17 am
Jonah, if you think Point-and-click fans outnumber the haters, you’re an idiot. Seriously. Sorry to say, I don’t know if you know this or not: The genre is DEAD.
Sam and Max is a valiant effort to bring it back, but face it, it’s not well liked.
January 12th, 2008 at 1:03 pm
Glad to see that this is still getting some love…
…and that I’m not alone on my island, which I thought I was for a second.
Thought I was taking “crazy pills” and somehow warped back to the late 80’s.
January 12th, 2008 at 11:10 pm
Considering the links I posted and the reviews, you’re still in the vast minority on thinking that Blade Runner “sucks”. (rolling eyes)
January 14th, 2008 at 11:20 am
Blade Runner sucks. Die, point and click. Die.
[Sam & Max are laughing at you. - ed.]
May 29th, 2008 at 2:47 pm
As someone who was living in Las Vegas during the period when my friends Lou Castle, Brett Sperry and Co. were developing the PC Blade Runner, I got to watch the game through many phases of its development and still have several promotional items from the game. It was, perhaps, the most anticipated game of its time in that, if it worked, it would reinvent the adventure genre.
Blade Runner was a success in many ways. It looked incredible and totally captured Ridley Scott’s visual interpretation of Phillip Dick’s classic novel, “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep.”
And yet I think that even Lou and Brett would acknowledge that the game was a noble, magnificent failure. To give it a simple “it sucks” write-off is to greatly underestimate a visionary work that, in retrospect, has had a massive influence on subsequent game designs.
It was not a financial success and, given the incredible R&D that went into the project, it’s pretty obvious why there was no sequel, nor even an attempt to retool and improve the engine. Also, it had too many gameplay flaws that kept me from coming back (you could meet the same character 15 times in a row and always have the same interaction — and why couldn’t I have and use my gun from the start of the game?
This was a project ahead of its time; it’s as simple as that. Many, many times in subsequent times (until I left Vegas two years ago), I have urged both Brett and Lou to try it again, using the advanced AI available today. And they just never wanted to talk about it. Westwood had such ambitious dreams for the game that its failure to reach their lofty goals make it a bittersweet memory, I suspect.
But no, it does NOT suck and it never did.
Story-wise, its integration of the characters from the film/book into an entirely original adventures