Monday 26 February 2018

What's Your Story - Smartgenes

Answers: Smartgenes
Introduction and Captions: Ilmari

It's always a pleasure to find people who appreciate retrogaming and especially people who like to blog about their gaming experiences. Our next guest, known only by the alias Smartgenes, is a real professional in this matter, because he has been writing not just one, but two blogs on retrogaming. He is a special fan of the adventure game genre, so let's all give a warm welcome to him!


This is the best image I found of Smartgenes on the Internet. He resembles George Washington
My home country is...

England, but I presently live in Slovakia.

My age is... 

40 (41 in March)

The first adventure game I played was... 

"L" I believe on the BBC in school. (I could be mistaken) Also Secret Mission was one of the early ones.


Secret Mission (by Scott Adams) I know, but what game was "L"?

My favourite adventure game is... 

KGB by Cryo.


Who wouldn't love this game?

When I’m not playing games I like to...

Read, read.

I like my games in (a box, digital format)… 

On Steam.

The thing I miss about old games is… 

The fact in most cases you could not look through walkthroughs, so there was that communal aspect - reading adventure columns like Mike Gerrard, Brewster or Keith Campbell, asking other players for advice - KGB in 1995 was a great case in point, when in school, asking my schoolmates how they got past a certain point.

The best thing about modern games is...

The sound. Soundtrack music, plus, voiceovers give them an elegance that makes them more socially acceptable, though I do miss the days of reading point & click text. (The first time p&c went voiceover I didn't really like it - also Broken Sword Gabriel(?)'s sarcastic tone is annoying and just not heroic for me). But when good voice actors are used it is great. Text adventure parsers are generally a lot friendlier now. I also like the games which make use of real life visual footage, like Curse of Rhiannon, and especially the room escape games that do that.

The one TV show I never miss is...

Game of Thrones.

If I could see any band live it would be...

Nirvana, but I never will, so in that case, Sepultura.

My favourite movie is... 

Empire Strikes Back, with Aliens close behind it. But Superman III is so underrated.. Also the Karate Kid trilogy and for self-help reasons, The Secret.


I love this film! I mean, it has Superman becoming drunk, straightening Tower of Pisa and fighting with Clark Kent. Who on their right mind could not appreciate it?

One interesting thing about me is... 

I practise aikido.

3 comments:

  1. In case you thought Elves '87 (that I reviewed at Christmas) was fictional, take a look:

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/capital-weather-gang/wp/2018/02/26/north-pole-surges-above-freezing-in-the-dead-of-winter-stunning-scientists/

    It's all real! Just a couple of years too early.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Yay, KGB! Feeling better about my score :-)

    ReplyDelete
  3. Love the inclusion :-) My dream is for someone to hack KGB and make it possible to create adventure games in the Cryo style..

    ReplyDelete