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Post by Discoalucard on Mar 14, 2010 21:47:58 GMT -5
www.hardcoregaming101.net/inherittheearth/inherittheearth.htmI know it's easy to write this game off as LOL FURRY but it's actually quite good! It would be better if they'd excised all of the random meandering and maze wandering, but then it would also be like a third of the size. I'm really impressed by the fact that there's an ongoing webcomic for this though. It shows a lot of passion on the part of the artist to continue something from a vaguely obscure game from ten years prior.
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Post by ryochan on Mar 15, 2010 3:13:39 GMT -5
The art looks a lot like the old Furcadia chat program a friend once had me try, which is interesting and makes me wonder a bit. Still, this game itself does look very nice, at least in the backgrounds. If I ever get back into a point-and-click adventure game groove, I'll be trying several of the suggested ones on this site.
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Post by derboo on Mar 15, 2010 3:57:01 GMT -5
I played this back when it was almost-but-not-quite new and was actually waiting for the sequel a few years. Looking back, the game itself is just so-so, but I still think the scenario and the world are awesome. Furry is quite the wrong word for this, as it is more inspired by classical antropomorphic animal roles in old fables. See Reynard the Fox. I didn't know about the webcomic. Don't like the art in that, sadly
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Post by syntheticgerbil on Mar 15, 2010 14:04:37 GMT -5
I didn't know a thing about furries until much later after getting into the internet, but when I played this when I was really young after asking my dad to get it for me, so it was before that. I wanted so bad to enjoy this game the whole way through, but the design was just so weird and pitiful with the mazes galore that it was a real put off. It's not that any of the inventory puzzles were hard either, it was just really difficult to just find the items you needed to get on to the next part of the game inside of the huge maps.
I still managed to finish the game, and was overly weirded out in a good way about the story. The abandoned airport part was very creepy as well even though nothing creepy happened.
I guess it's forever ruined for me either way because I found out a lot of the artists on the original team for this game turned out to have drawn some perverted anthropomorphic stuff (I got curious and did some research after seeing that dreadful webcomic). So while I want to say the characters were based on fairytale renditions like Derboo is saying here, after finding out about the weird underground black and white furry comics from the 80s and knowing what some of the people who made Inherit the Earth were into, I don't think it is that pure or unintentional like the furry-like characters in Quest for Glory for instance.
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Post by Discoalucard on Mar 15, 2010 16:31:32 GMT -5
The art in the webcomic is....not good. Very amateurish, which is surprising, because I THINK the illustrator who does it also did the actual cover illustration, so she's obviously talented. I guess that doesn't shine through when you're doing comics.
The furry stuff only bothers me when it's overtly sexualized. Other than one spot where you end up accidentally walking into a wolf warrior taking a shower in a waterfall (still not sure how animals can be "naked" regardless of how anthromorphized they are), it's all pretty innocuous, around the level of the old Disney Robin Hood film.
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Post by ryochan on Mar 15, 2010 18:07:28 GMT -5
Technically a person can be just as good in comic panels as in covers, but a lot of times what happens is more time is spent on the cover of things than the inside due to deadlines, and due to the intention to make things look as good as possible in order to sell.
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Post by wyrdwad on Mar 15, 2010 18:15:08 GMT -5
I'm probably opening a bag of worms here, but I honestly don't get furry hate. So what if people draw sexualized images of anthropomorphic animals? They're not hurting anyone. If you don't like it, just don't look! And certainly don't hold it against anyone who likes that kinda stuff - it's no weirder than people who are into S&M, or spanking, or foot fetishes, or basically ANY form of fetish or unusual sexual behavior whatsoever. If people get turned on by cartoon animals, I say let 'em!
As for the game... I don't even really like the art in-game that much, to be honest. Still, it was an interesting article to read. Good job, man. (:
-Tom
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Post by ryochan on Mar 15, 2010 20:04:08 GMT -5
I think most the problems come from that select group of Furry fans who shove it in your face. I've met a few. But most are pleasant people who understand not everyone is going to like what they do. Also, a lot of media only refers to Furries as people who get plastered and have mass orgies in their costumes, where this is not true. But it certainly doesn't leave a very good impression about them.
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Post by Discoalucard on Mar 15, 2010 20:30:54 GMT -5
It's just the kids that got picked on in high school coming up with an imaginary nerd hierarchy so they can hypocritically mock other people.
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Post by wyrdwad on Mar 15, 2010 21:53:07 GMT -5
I think most the problems come from that select group of Furry fans who shove it in your face. I've met a few. But most are pleasant people who understand not everyone is going to like what they do. Also, a lot of media only refers to Furries as people who get plastered and have mass orgies in their costumes, where this is not true. But it certainly doesn't leave a very good impression about them. Yeah, but that can be said about any fetish. People who walk around in bondage gear, or crawl through hotel lobbies sniffing peoples' feet, would be regarded with similar disgust. (: Maybe it's just because I know so many "casual furries" who are into it, but as you say, don't shove it in anyone's face, that I find the whole idea of stereotyping all furries to be preposterous. Heck, I've even heard from my friends that Anthrocon, and other furry conventions, are actually pretty fun, and not at all the dens of sin they're made out to be - they're no worse than anime or gaming conventions, just a bit more focused. -Tom
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Post by Smithee of Zur-En-Arrh on Mar 15, 2010 23:39:12 GMT -5
I'm with y'all. Like, yeah, the art disgusts me, but it doesn't stop the people from being cool dudes. Just don't talk sex with them.
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Post by syntheticgerbil on Mar 16, 2010 12:48:54 GMT -5
Yeah, but that can be said about any fetish. People who walk around in bondage gear, or crawl through hotel lobbies sniffing peoples' feet, would be regarded with similar disgust. (: I wouldn't necessarily like those things as a main theme in an adventure game either, even if majorly toned down. I was grossed out for instance by the cow bondage scene in Toonstruck for instance. I had no idea what the artists, designers, and animators were going for on that part, but it was really uncomfortable to play and not funny. I guess on a deeper level, I'm just disturbed with people humanizing animals in order to sexualize them, not with the concept of anthropomorphic animals themselves. The thing is, I mean I know I looked up the artists of Inherit the Earth with my own prying, I'm not comfortable with people who draw perverted humanoid animals conceptualizing a video game meant for kids (or all ages). It adds a disturbing level for me to the game. Now to be fair, the link from the HG101 article to an interview with the director Talin (who is not a furry) explains he is also put off by a lot of the furry stuff, and says he did not have the intention of pandering to that crowd when designing the game. It's artists on the crew like Lisa Jennings and Eric Blumrich who were major roles in designing the game's characters I find off-putting when I discover through a very light Google serach that they have galleries of furry porn that they drew. But to further try to balance this out, I would say judging by the concept art by a few of the other artists on the game, a lot seemed to be pushing for more literal fairytale depictions of humanistic animals that look more like something you would find out of a Little Golden Book than the more lteral human-anatomical style. So with that in mind along with Talin's comments, it helps me rest easier with Inherit the Earth. I might even really enjoy it if it had been designed well, since the post apocalyptic themes and tone of the story along with the creepy atmosphere from abandoned human structures are great. I hope you aren't offended, I'm just telling you how I honestly feel about the game. I played and finished Inherit the Earth in elementary school and again later around when I started high school. The second time I had tracked down the CD version only to play a game that I felt was much worse than I haf remembered. I still see it's merits though. I guess also I should say a creator's persona is important to me to an extent in any kind of entertainment or art. I know not everyone is like that or agrees with that, instead thinking the end product matters more than what's going on personally with the creator. Either or, I suppose. But to me, I mean, if Al Lowe's personal webpage were stories about his sexploits, fetishes, and him acting constantly dirty, the older Leisure Suit Larry games would be put in a new light for me. One of the compelling things I find about Leisure Suit Larry is how squeaky clean Al Lowe comes off sometimes on his website or in interviews, even to the point of hilarity in the Official Leisure Suit Larry book. Even then, that persona of Al Lowe is what separated the overall teasing nature of the old games compared to the more raunchy games made sense.
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Post by wyrdwad on Mar 16, 2010 14:13:32 GMT -5
I dunno, unless Inherit the Earth actually has sexualized elements in it (which it apparently doesn't), then why does it matter if the artists who drew the characters were into that? If they didn't draw the characters in a sexually suggestive fashion, then they weren't meant to be taken that way.
As a comparison, imagine a parent refusing to let his/her child watch Full House because it has Bob Saget in it, and Bob Saget is a filthy comedian. Sure, Saget may be filthy in his comedy acts, but he played a completely wholesome and pure character in Full House, and the show was about as family-friendly as it got. Yes, the show sucked, which would be a much BETTER reason not to watch it (heh)... but my point is, you have to judge someone's work based on the work, not the person. Bob Saget's acting in Full House is like the furry fetishists' art in Inherit the Earth: the person may typically be "filthy," but his "art" in this context is not.
-Tom
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Post by ryochan on Mar 16, 2010 15:52:24 GMT -5
Hey I think Full House was awesome! But wyrd is right in a lot of ways. Another example, related to games, is Satoshi Urashihara. He did the Langrisser series and several others I believe, but if you judge people's works in the broad sense, you'd better stay away as a lot of his work has been featured in full-blown hentai.
I understand disliking furry porn, it has never interested me either, but the game doesn't sound like it's meant to be that. Just avoid the artist's other works when you can.
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Post by derboo on Mar 16, 2010 16:27:45 GMT -5
As a comparison, imagine a parent refusing to let his/her child watch Full House because it has Bob Saget in it, and Bob Saget is a filthy comedian. Sure, Saget may be filthy in his comedy acts, but he played a completely wholesome and pure character in Full House, and the show was about as family-friendly as it got. Yes, the show sucked, which would be a much BETTER reason not to watch it (heh)... but my point is, you have to judge someone's work based on the work, not the person. Bob Saget's acting in Full House is like the furry fetishists' art in Inherit the Earth: the person may typically be "filthy," but his "art" in this context is not. Don't know Bob Saget's comedy, but that reminds me a lot of Robin Williams and his stand up vs movies.
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