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The final installment of this column prior to Halloween saved the best for last. There’s no denying John Carpenter’s “The Thing” from 1982 is a master class in claustrophobic paranoia. Forget the 2011 prequel and turn your attention to the 2002 sequel, developed with Carpenter’s blessing as a continuation/expansion of the events from the movie on its […]
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Revenge of the License: The X-Files (PS1)
October 23rd, 2016 
Michael Crisman ‘The X-Files’ utterly changed the face of television. It scared us with ghost stories for adults. It boggled our minds with conspiracies within conspiracies. In its early days, before internet access was something everyone took for granted, it gave us a reason to visit the library and research topics ranging from alien abduction and the […]
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Revenge of the License: Alien Trilogy
October 16th, 2016 Michael Crisman One of iD Software’s initial ideas for Doom was to make a first-person shooter set in the world of James Cameron’s ‘Aliens’. When a licensing deal couldn’t be worked out between iD and 20th Century Fox, Carmack and Romero’s team fell back on a more generic ‘space marine kills everything’ setting, and an FPS classic […]
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Revenge of the License: Nobunaga’s Ambition (NES)
September 18th, 2016 Michael Crisman When other developers were looking at ways to maximize profits by way of comic books or television shows, Koei said, “Holy cow, it’s expensive to buy the rights to something current. Screw that! Japanese history is ripe for plunder and we don’t have to pay anybody a single yen to use their likeness because they’ve […]
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Revenge of the License: The Godfather (Amiga)
August 14th, 2016 Michael Crisman Let’s say you hit the jackpot. You just chased down one of the biggest licenses you could hope to land. A legendary bulwark of American cinema based on a best-selling novel by Mario Puzo, “The Godfather” is a guaranteed slam-dunk in the gaming world no matter what you deliver. So how do you pay homage […]
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Revenge of the License: Dragon Magazine Archive
August 7th, 2016 Michael Crisman No, the Dragon Magazine Archive is not a game, it’s something better–it’s knowledge. Following up on last week’s absurdly difficult adventures article, we’re keeping with the D&D theme and presenting this look at how a concern over copyright led one of the most awesome pieces of software ever to arrive on store shelves to vanish just as quickly […]
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Revenge of the License: Five NES Games That Missed the Point
July 24th, 2016 Michael Crisman I love licensed NES games. I love the sound they make as I yank them out of my system and hurl them against the wall. The relentless plundering through the morass in search of something worth playing and finding the occasional surprise is always delightful, and why I keep coming back to this column over […]
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Revenge of the License: Board Games
May 15th, 2016 Michael Crisman The most obvious shortcut you can take as a game developer is to make a game out of something that is already a game. Chess programs have been used to sell people on the idea of home computers since the 1970s, every version of Windows has shipped with Solitaire built right in, and casino games […]
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Revenge of the License: Dark Seed
April 17th, 2016 Michael Crisman Over the lifespan of this column, we’ve looked at games licensed from every conceivable medium: blockbuster films, television shows, comic books, sporting events, fashion dolls, a casino, a restaurant, table top role-playing games, and even real life. Just when you sit back and think you’ve covered every conceivable thing a game company could pay money […]
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Revenge of the License: Trump Castle II (PC)
April 3rd, 2016 Michael Crisman “Michael,” said my editor with a cruel, evil twinkle in his eye, “have I got a dream assignment for you.” I steeled my nerves and through sheer force of will managed to avoid the loud, noisy gulp which I have learned only fuels Carl’s sadistic side. He wrapped his arm around my shoulder, buddy-like.
