Nate and Ryan go mano-a-mano to discuss MORTAL KOMBAT, the 1992 arcade game from Midway and Acclaim that introduced the world to Fatalities and spearheaded a moral panic about the state of the medium. Nate endures the filmic adaptation, Ryan calls Sub-Zero a "frost wizard," and Kari manages to put the baby to bed long enough to pop in to tell a story about how her mom put the kibosh on her brother's copy of MK for the Sega Genesis. TOASTY!

SHOW NOTES:

1993 New York Times article:

http://www.nytimes.com/1993/09/16/nyregion/video-violence-it-s-hot-it-s-mortal-it-s-kombat-teen-agers-eagerly-await.html?scp=9&sq=mortal%20kombat&st=cse

Mortal Kombat: The Album (YouTube):

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL577E545387C04A3E

Mortal Kombat series Fatalities compilation:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QQ6G2Lau9EE

“Mortal Monday” TV spot:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R8V7TwlYCt0

Nate, Sebastian, and David gather to discuss SUPER MARIO KART. Nate plays the contrarian, David advocates not drinking and driving, and Sebastian marvels at yet another early-'90s TV spot. Nate proposes a new podcast specifically dedicated to kart racers, and Sebastian claims that racing is "boring" and "not fun." David hits him with a red shell.

SHOW NOTES:

Super Mario Kart TV spot:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Fgg1t_pnR4

Nate, Sebastian, and Ryan sit down to discuss WOLFENSTEIN 3D, the grandfather of the first-person shooter. We talk schlock, grindhouse aesthetics, and how deeply ingrained genre-specific controls have become in gaming. Sebastian refers to musical stylings as "tang" for the second consecutive episode, and Ryan watches too much History Channel. Nate gushes about Bj Blazcowicz's soft voice.

SHOW NOTES:

Manual PDF: http://www.abandonia.com/files/extras/23636_game_extra_1.pdf Browser version: http://3d.wolfenstein.com  

Nate, Sebastian, Ryan and new guest Kari tackle 1992's THE LEGEND OF ZELDA: A LINK TO THE PAST, the most delicious(?) game we've yet encountered. We talk about the advent of lore and world-building in games, "canon," and whether the impulse to arrange all the Zelda games into a coherent timeline is reasonable (Nate: no, Ryan & Kari: absolutely). 

SHOW NOTES:

Illicit scans of some Zelda comics:

http://www.zeldacapital.com/comics.php 

Buy Shotaro Ishinomori's manga legitimately:

https://www.amazon.com/Legend-Zelda-Link-Past/dp/1421575418/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1515962715&sr=8-4&keywords=link+to+the+past 

The SNES manual in PDF form:

http://www.gamesdatabase.org/Media/SYSTEM/Nintendo_SNES/Manual/formated/The_Legend_of_Zelda-_A_Link_to_the_Past_-_1992_-_Nintendo.pdf 

The ROM hack that lets you play co-op LttP:

https://kotaku.com/new-link-to-the-past-mod-lets-two-zelda-players-share-i-1797019696 

In our last episode of 2017, Nate, Sebastian, Ryan, and David all gather to discuss ANOTHER WORLD, or OUT OF THIS WORLD as it was titled in the American market. We talk about how games borrow the language of cinema, games made by a single creator, and failed science experiments from our youth (stay for the story about boiled hamster brains). 

SHOW NOTES:

GDC post-mortem talk w/ creator Eric Chahi:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QjnUUIPIMn4

Nate, Sebastian, and Jordan gather to discuss SONIC THE HEDGEHOG, the debut game of Sega's mascot who was custom-built to take down a certain mustachioed plumber. Nate and Sebastian discuss being on the Sega side of the "console wars," Jordan dunks on the battery life of the Game Gear, and Nate gushes about the musical stylings of Masato Nakamura. Also there are some technical difficulties.

Nate, Sebastian, and Jordan sit down to discuss STREET FIGHTER II: THE WORLD WARRIOR, the game that started uncountable arcade brawls and heralded the arrival of a new genre: the fighting game. Hear us try to sort through the nine different iterations of the game, find out who's "the Taylor Swift of Street Fighter," and discover which classic combatant Jordan feels comfortable comparing to Eeyore. Then, after you're done listening, go home and be a family man!

SHOW NOTES:

The inspiration for Dhalsim, from "Master of the Flying Guillotine":

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FGkn8TFaySg

Polygon's excellent oral history of SF2:

https://www.polygon.com/a/street-fighter-2-oral-history

The final dumb tableau of the Street Fighter live action film:

https://youtu.be/VKsGYhb3g7g?t=1m21s

Nate and Ryan sit down this episode in bat and mist form, respectively, to discuss 1990's CASTLEVANIA III: DRACULA'S CURSE, the most fun you can have with a whip without bringing Devo into the picture. Hear discussion of Universal movie monsters, find out which host loves the Netflix Castlevania and which hates it, and discover the secret love that binds two men together (it's manticores). 

SHOW NOTES:

Castlevania III on the Nintendo eShop:

https://www.nintendo.com/games/detail/o1RG7sVLN_8mkQ2I31JCx7ZDVPofx1KG

I couldn't find the picture of the manticore that we referenced, sorry.

:(

Nate, Sebastian, David, and Jordan gather to discuss LEMMINGS, the 1991 puzzle/herding game from DMA Designs. Hear Nate's frustration at trying to play the game with a controller rather than a mouse, David's defense of actual lemmings (the animals), and Sebastian's theory that the Lemmings are Fraggles who have joined a cult. Also, we ponder what "Lemmings: Tactics" might look like.

SHOW NOTES:

Here’s a history of Lemmings in Mike Dailly’s own words: https://web.archive.org/web/20150627001229/http://www.javalemmings.com/DMA/Lem_1.htm

Apple’s 1985 “Lemmings” Ad:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F_9lT7gr8u4

Jordan returns to join Nate and Sebastian in discussing SUPER MARIO WORLD, the flagship title of the Super Nintendo Entertainment System and one of the best side-scrolling platformers ever made. Come for the discussion of SMW's elegant level design, stay for infighting about the console wars and banter about swears. Jordan tells us about nightmarish ROM hacks, Nate tells a story about mushrooms in bubbles, and we make Sebastian watch the Super Mario World cartoon show. 

SHOW NOTES:

An attempted Kaizo Mario run at AGDQ:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zkMuNRjodCQ

Another Mario ROM hack, “Super Panga World”:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nt-unq5i_oU

All 13 episodes of the Super Mario World cartoon:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qCgS64Le_PA&list=PL7F9A88911148633F

“The Mama Luigi Project”:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=liqrfUYsOtA