Halcyon Dreams: The Legacy of Dragon's Lair

Rick Dyer's son here (Cory Dyer). This documentary is amazing, Rick loved it! It's reminds me of all the amazing things my father did in his youth that I mostly took for granted growing up.

Former Bluth employee here (I worked on Rock A Doodle through Penguin, 1988 - 93 in the Dublin studio). Loved the video. Poor Rick Dyer - but as you say, most of us are doomed to be forgotten, but cheer up, because in the long run we're ALL doomed to be forgotten ("One by one, we're all becoming shades"). Halt and Catch fire, indeed. I remember one day in the Dublin studio (around 1990), someone swung by my desk and said "come on up to the screening room, they're showing all the footage from Dragon's Lair and Space Ace". "What's that you say? I get to skip work for 30 minutes?" and off I went. The screen was pretty big, about 20ft wide. The footage played (30mm film if memory serves, it really looked beautiful). And in 4 or 5 minutes, it was all over. You wouldn't believe how quickly it went by. Even then, I knew there couldn't be much of a game to either project. So sad, I really wanted to sweat-dodge for 30 minutes, but it was only 5 or 6, and I had to get back to work. Depressing. Don't be too hard on Don for trying to squeeze some life out of DL/SA; they're the only properties he still owns. The rest of the films are property of studios and other entities (I don't think he even has rights to NIMH). Pretty lousy when you think of the amount of work and effort that went into the films, even the ones that weren't so good. You kids will never know how much work went into those things, with your laptops and your render engines and your pixel mashers. Try holding a 19 second 16 field pan scene under your arm when it's done on paper, you dorks. We destroyed forests. Oh, and the animation of 'Thayers' - god almighty, about as ugly as you could hope to get from the TV production pipeline of the period. Probably painted and drawn in some overseas sweatshop. Every naff cost cutting trick in the book, and uncomfortably similar to projects I worked on in the late 90s. Shudder.

So I went to visit my sister this weekend, and she lives just a few miles from the National Videogame Museum in Frisco, TX. They do, in fact, have a Halcyon there, and it's huge! I got pictures.

Rick Dyer's wikipedia page is now more detailed then it was before, I suspect this video might have contributed to that, and that's simply wholesome.

This was a journey.

ONE I am sorry, Steward, i can not allow you to do that.

I looked at his wikipedia page now. And I think it's thanks to you that it is now more fleshed out. You're even cited as a source. (Number 9)

The song playing at 12:42 is "Say, Say, Say" by Paul McCartney and Michael Jackson.

This video is like JonTron, without the...well. You know. I really like the message too, it's awesome to focus on the labourers

“the truth is often very mundane, but maybe that’s ok” - hbomberguy on our philosophy in the 21st century

Went to the Video Game History Museum last year. Can confirm they do have a Halcyon.

Who built the seven gates of Thebes? The history books give a list of kings. Did the kings carry the boulders? And the often destroyed Babylon? Who built it up again every time? In which houses of the golden Lima did the construction workers live? Where - on the night the Great Wall was finished - did the bricklayers go? The great Rome Is full of Triumph Arcs. Who did the Imperators triumph over? In oft-sung Byzantine were there only palaces for it's inhabitants? Even in the mythical Atlantis, in the night it sunk beneath the seas, the drowning were calling for their slaves Young Alexander conquered India. All by himself? Caesar defeated the Gauls. Didn't he bring at least a bring a cook with him? Philipp of Spain did cry when the Armada has sunken. Was no one else crying? Frederic II. triumphed in the Seven-Years-War. Who else triumphed? Every page a victory. Who cooked the meals to celebrate? Every decade a great man. Who payed their expanses? So many reports So many questions - "Questions of a reading Worker" by Bertholt Brecht, German playwright, 1935 from his exile in Denmark; roughly translated.

Thayer's Quest CONTAINS: WHEAT

The ending moral of the story was wonderful. I've always had an inexplicable love for films and documentaries about people who sank their entire life's work into something, only to have nothing to show for it. You've perfectly put the appeal of that kind of story into words here, and have shown me a new and memorable instance of these stories. Thanks bud, you always do great work and this is among your best!

“What do you want Rick?” literally sounds like Hitchhikers Guide dialogue come to life.

33:42 - And the myth of Romulus includes the fact that he had a twin brother, Remus. Romulus killed Remus over a dispute, and then went on to take credit as the Great Founder of Rome, a city that bore his name. Sound familiar?

As I am another one of those Toby-Fox-wannabes, I have to say, this video hit me hard. It made me reconsider how I see my projects and how they fit into my life. It made me less afraid of what I'm doing, and after a break that lasted a couple of months, I came back to working on my game like it wasn't a big deal at all. Now I only want to focus on being happy just doing it at all. Thank you for that video, from the bottom of my heart.

Beautiful essay. As an animator currently working with tv series, I've seen and worked on some amazing pilot episodes that unfortunately, will never see the the light of day by virtue of happening at the wrong time and place. What's worse, I've had to work on series that only succeed by virtue of being financed by a multi-billion dollar franchise. My advice to lovers of animation and new contemporary art-forms ( whether it's indie- games or story telling), please, try something new; and **talk about it**. Find that raw, uncut gem of charm in a mess of under-financed media and remember that, despite its lack of success, it likely provided the ground-work for the next triple A game that copied its formula. The amount of time those pioneers go un-credited and get their material literally pilfered from their still-cooling remains in the animation industry is a trend that major studios like to do.

It's interesting to rewatch this after the Oof video. As someone that is also sentimental about recent tech history, I like that you are telling these kind of stories. If I ever got a chance to talk to you I'd ask if you ever saw any of Jason Scott's documentaries.

"This is the only game you can be killed by wheat" I didn't need a game that hit my gluten free ass that close to home but okay