At the risk of this blog entry being exceptionally niche-y (relying on references only comprehensible by myself, my cousin Matt, and a possible handful of others) I’m writing today about Roger Wilco and Rex Nebular.

This is the beauty of blogs, you see. Thoughts that rabble around in my brain that I otherwise would never mention aloud (even to Mrs. Rengerz), I can just sort of release into the ether here.

Fine. Here’s some quick background. Roger Wilco refers to the lead character in the Space Quest series of Sierra PC games that saw it’s heyday in the 286, 386, and 486 days of the 1980′s. Rex Nebular was the title character in the 1992 Microprose PC game.

It was the era of 256 VGA colors, and I was a young, impressionable sci-fi/fantasy kid.

For those of us that remember, these were a truly enthralling pair of sci-fi games. Rex was a bit of a knockoff of Scott Murphy and Mark Crowe’s character (Those Two Guys from Andromeda, the creators and lead programmers for Sierra’s Space Quest). But Rex (a Han Solo type smuggler/pilot) always felt like he had a marginally heavier amount of brains than Roger (a space janitor).

Needless to say, both these titles were inspired out of the Starwars era (wasn’t everything at that time?). However, neither Roger or Rex could be accused of taking themselves too seriously, both veering hard towards satirical comedy, and an admittedly more mature spin than the strict allegory of good and evil portrayed in Starwars.

In short, these games were built to be fun. And fun they definitely were. Escapism on the highest order of fun.

Roger would routinely die in the most hilarious deathtraps, prompting many gamers to simply save their games and execute Roger at every possible opportunity just to see what snarky and devious manner Scott and Mark had concocted at each juncture.

Roger dissolved in mutant slime from a sewer? Check. Roger consumed by a Labian Terror beast? Check. Roger pummeled by an alien biker gang. Check.

Rex had a really novel plot device in crash landing on a planet patrolled by conflicted militant women that hated Rex for his XY chromosomes, while at the same time, also pining for his faulty manliness. At one point, an Amazonian gal demands Rex prove he’s a man (and not a female impostor masquerading as a male) by grilling him with a series of questions. The clincher is when Rex is asked, “How do you set the silverware?” to which Rex answers, “However it lands when I throw it from the kitchen.” And who could forget the demonized little poodle guarding the garage that Rex pulverizes under a car-lift. Wonderful.

Lastly, I have to add why I think those games far excel anything on the market today. (I know, I’m old and nostalgic, right?). Though the games were simple in all their point-and-click glory, they also had soul.

Today’s games, mass produced monuments to industrial tycoon-ism, are totally soulless. What plagues the multi-billion dollar gaming industry is exactly what plagues the equally profitable movie business (and nowadays a lot of them are developed in the exact same boardroom).

Committees of teams of focus groups “collaborate” ad nauseum to produce what they’re sure will be pleasing to some 15-25 year old male. Period. You’re hailed as a genius developer one day, and then one poor-performing quarter later, you’re out on your ear (Guitar Hero). This manic approach to creativity results in an anxious fifty-five year old CEO having to forecast the fickle whims of a teenager with 100% accuracy (when teenagers themselves have no idea).

Roberta and Ken Williams (founders of Sierra Games) were a husband and wife team of programmers that literally started a gaming company from their own kitchen table (packaging, labeling, and shipping their early software titles by hand).

I guess when you get right down to it, you can’t remove the auteur, the visionary, behind the creative process. Assembling games and movies meant to pass as original and imaginative with a checklist just doesn’t seem to produce results.

You can’t create with an agenda. The muse will inspire the artist, not the artist the muse.