Time Gate: Knight's Chase I Retro Reviews

[@kairos468]

These are some of the most in-depth and well-written game reviews I've seen on KZbin. I feel certain your channel will go far.

[@MrEdders123]

I doubt that many people are interested in obscure boomercore adventures, thanks though :P

[@firebat36]

@@MrEdders123 These are absolutely top tier videos.

[@oskarniepowiem1776]

@@MrEdders123 please do this kind of video on evil island ciurse of the lost soul. I am starting making marathon on your channel btw you are really good content creator. Congrats

[@Jandau85]

I was halfway through this video about an old adventure game I've never heard of, when I saw the scene of the main character piloting a remote controlled catapult through security lasers at a museum, when I realized I DID in fact play this at some point, but managed to blank entirely on the game...

[@TheFrozenWasteland]

I can spend an entire day binge watching your videos. It doesn't matter if I'm familiar or not with the game, nor does it matter if it's a genre I'm interested in. The quality is extremely high and so is the entertainment value. Thank you for these great videos.

[@inrit]

I find the art of this game so charming, I think it really stands up to the test of time.

[@arnaud33200]

love it! this is great you spend time diving into this game. I'm glad I was able to help you :)

[@MrEdders123]

Thank you! I'd be missing a huge amount of the background context to the game without your help.

[@mojebi3804]

It's cool to see you putting the real effort in to these videos, even if the audience is not "huge." It is appreciated.

[@judgeprime3730]

Im closing in on 50 and at some point all the games we player kind of blur into one another, especially the 486 and Pentium 1 era when i was a kid. I know i never played this one but in some of your other vids i say the same thing but you show a scene ir puzzle and it hits me immediately “omg i played this!!” So thanks for the nostalgic memories of such a fun and innocent time in my life. 👍 Oh and i found this channel because of Hfric Gaming Backlog post so i owe him a coffee. Lol

[@MrEdders123]

When I played some of these games back as a kid I had no idea of the context or interesting development stories behind them. It's nice to see them in a new light.

[@IAM_UDON]

I know youve said before you just want this to be a hobby but i still think at some point this channel will suddenly get some serious traction. Excellent quality overall 👌

[@MrEdders123]

Thanks! Probably better if that never happens though - all the channels I followed got worse once they had enough popularity to make a living out of it. :D If I ever get to a point where my most obscure vids are still getting 1K+ views on average, I'll be very happy!

[@camerongrant6765]

Recently found you via this video when looking up information on an odd-looking game I'd seen on GoG. I was really impressed with this video and I've really enjoyed going through the rest of your well-researched videos since. Really looking forward to looking through the rest of them and seeing more when you get back. Best of luck!

[@GreySectoid]

I never knew there existed a fourth "alone", I was obsessed with the first one as a kid, a house of mystery and horrors got me into Lovecraft's books.

[@DosboxLetsPlay]

Thanks for the great review of a game from my childhood. I sucked terribly at it but I really-really loved the setting, the visuals and the music + although it may have not been as scary as AITD, it was still super scary and spooky for a younger person and made it all the more nostalgic for me.

[@bligc8672]

Great video. This is officially my new favorite channel.

[@MrEdders123]

Cheers!

[@misterkefir]

Another vid, another banger. Thanks man. Keep up the good work. Cheers!

[@MrEdders123]

Thanks m&

[@DouglasCarter]

Hello, thanks so much for making this video! This was one of the most influential games of my childhood and I still love it today, despite its many shortcomings. I note that you mentioned the SVGA version was possibly part of the 1996 North American version. That isn't actually the case; the version I bought in the UK (the original 1995 version), which contains the older artwork and dialogue, had both an SVGA mode that ran in Windows, as well as the VGA version which ran in DOS. I played both at the time, but stuck with SVGA mode as I preferred the crisper graphics. But, I have a distinct memory that the SGVA mode had a game-breaking bug right at the end (the game would crash to Windows every single time at a certain spot), which prevented me from ever finishing the game, until I tried it in the VGA mode many years later (and only thanks to DOSbox).

[@MrEdders123]

Thanks for the comment! I was wondering about that. Interesting that it still used the British English dialogue and such. I wonder why many different versions there are. I know the speedrunner who shared his interview transcripts with me (Arnoud) was still looking into TimeGate when I uploaded the video, so there might be a more in-depth retrospective of the game one day :D

[@DouglasCarter]

@@MrEdders123 I don't suppose you could share those interview transcripts with me? I am very curious about the game and would like to learn as much as possible about it.

[@MrEdders123]

@@DouglasCarter I'll fire off an email to Arnoud tomorrow to double-check it's OK to pass them on. The original interview was conducted in French, followed by Arnoud writing some notes for me in English and some back-and-forth on Discord. I'll also ask if it's OK to put you in touch with him since he could tell you more than me.

[@MrEdders123]

@@DouglasCarter Hey, he said it's no problem, in fact he has a couple of updates from the interviews I don't think I saw. Send a DM to me on twitter (marquisdecodex) and I'll put you in touch :)

[@DouglasCarter]

@@MrEdders123 Thanks! I can't get in touch via Twitter as Twitter won't let me DM you (I haven't Tweeted anything so they don't consider me "human".

[@ReviersDigitalReels]

Very good and comprehensive review! I'll add that you made me come up with an interesting observation about the Alone in the Dark titles: all of them, including this, feature very little verbal interaction with people. This made perfect sense in the first game, and still could be reasonably applied to the second one, but got weirder and weirder afterwards. You really do have to wonder why Bruno Bonnell didn't try adding more dialogue and more interactions, as that would help both the storytelling and the gameplay quite a bit. William is not a lone wolf, there's no good reason he can't talk more with others. I suppose you could make up the excuse that he's Splinter Celling his way out of a hostile monastery, but still, it's obvious that they missed opportunities with him, especially since the Splinter Celling doesn't work out and he disguises as a monk working in the very same monastery anyway.

[@BlacEyedPriest765]

Looks good 😊 thanks for the Post

[@goldengolem3341]

Once again a brilliantly crafted video! Thanks so much!

[@AceKuper]

As soon as i saw the Hawk of Light being a thing, something clicked. So a chain of associations formed based on real world and another obscure game aka The Realms of the Haunting. In The Realms of the Haunting a dude named Hawk describes himself as a vessel born of time to become a Host for the Power of Light. Now his name makes a lot more sense to me. I realized that it 's an association with Egyptian mythology aka Ra being a sun god with a Falcon\Hawk head. Sometimes pretty obvious revelations come from completely unexpected places.

[@MrEdders123]

Maybe I should do RoH some day. I think Grim Beard did a video on it already though, not sure how much I can add.

[@AceKuper]

@@MrEdders123 Yes, he did. On top of that i learned about Realms of Haunting in the first place from watching Ross's Game Dungeon on it from Ross Scott of Freeman's Mind fame. But i also watched so many different videos about the same games, yet they all were pretty different. So in the end it all depends on what you want to do. I very much enjoy your videos, so i just hope they will blow up, so you could do this more comfortably. Plus, i think if more people discovered them it means more people would enjoy them.

[@thegblob]

Amazing content

[@HighwayMule]

This made me realise how much of French games industry produced these action-adventures with polygonal characters on pre-drawn or pre-rendered background. In addition to the ones mentioned in the vid, I'd recommend Dark Earth by Kallisto.

[@MrEdders123]

I actually avoided Dark Earth because there's a really in-depth video by uh...Indigo Gaming, I think? He also has an interview with the creative lead. Interesting game all the same (for the female models alone hehe).

[@HighwayMule]

​@@MrEdders123 Indigo's interview with DE's director is pure gold, but his actual review is in fact quite brief (kzbin.info/www/bejne/ZqPdfZZ6hrN6ack). I'd love to see a another take, given how the game is close to being lost.

[@MrEdders123]

@@HighwayMule Ah I think the interview and the review merged together in my mind. I could've sworn I'd watched a 2hr review of it or something...

[@Rufert]

I'd recommend "Azrael's Tear" if you want to cover a truly unique game with an extremely interesting history. I streamed it a few years ago, finally getting it working. There's an article titled "How to Disappear Completely: The Tale of Azrael’s Tear" that outlines some of it. You'll have to web archive it if you want to read it. Personally I'd recommend playing the game first since there's really nothing quite like it and you only have one first.

[@MrEdders123]

I've been considering covering it. It's terribly brown though :P

[@Rufert]

@@MrEdders123 If that is enough to put you off then it is probably for the best you avoid it.

[@MrEdders123]

@@Rufert 🥺

[@kloa4219]

38:36 Game devs still create music with midi files today, but they use other samples instead of the game's provided samples.

[@Hummus420]

Incredible, this game was one of my fathers few games, totally forgot about it thank you!

[@JackBz]

Truly fantastic and informative video. I sent you a DM on twitter about the dev interviews, I would love to be able to read those too!

[@NekotTheBrave]

I remember my mom getting this game and we couldn't get past the laser puzzle.

[@MrEdders123]

The first laser puzzle has weird collision detection, the second (with the catapult) also has obstructive camera angles, so quite a few people probably quit there lol

[@absalondebarvac3715]

It is sad that it was poorly received when taking about the graphics, as they look way better than many other western computer games of the era that decided to push into the whole "fully 3D world" thing. I hadn't until now appreciated how good even the Alone in the Dark trilogy looked, and how well chosen the colors were. Makes you think; even with the recent trends that focus on reviving old techniques to achieve a certain look in modern videogames, there hasn't been any interest put into blending 2D illustrations with basic 3D models, in the way these games do.

[@MrEdders123]

Yeah, there was a very powerful impetus towards full 3d stuff in the mid-late 90s. It's understandable in context, I remember reading gaming magazines around that time and being really excited by how fast graphics were moving with the rise of 3d acceleration and and such. There was some great 2d and prerendered art done in the late 90s/early 2000s, right as it was dying out, e.g. the Resident Evil reboot. Some indie games try to do what you described but I think the results have been mixed. A lot of indie artists just aren't quite up to the standards of professional teams from the 90s.

[@kirtknierim3687]

@@MrEdders123 I too remember the excitement I felt as graphics ramped up. You have a wonderful grasp of this knowledge. Thank you for this, these games could easily be lost to time.

[@sozaj]

I can tell you all about the Hawk of Light! His name is Griffith.

[@PenguinDT]

Gouraud shading may be so common these days that devs use it without even knowing the name, but for a brief moment in the mid-90s, it was the the big graphics buzzword. Much like RTX is today. When implemented properly, it really did help 3D models look more round and less like origami. Comparing Time Gate to the original Alone in the Dark is actually pretty effective demonstration of it.

[@MrEdders123]

I had to look it up 😁

[@PenguinDT]

@@MrEdders123 Can't blame you, it is very much like with 'coloured dynamic lighting' or 'the lens flare'. When they became a thing, for about a year they were a big marketing point for graphics, but are now a default. Good luck trying to market your game today with 'we actually shade our polygons'.

[@casanovafunkenstein5090]

I am so gutted that the footage of the AITD1 remake never led to anything. It was such a good interpretation of the style of the original. AITD really would benefit from reinventing the iconic look of the old games, as it would really set the franchise up with a unique and recognisable visual style. The reboot they showed footage of recently went for photorealism and, while the game may end up being excellent, I just didn't feel like it was distinctive enough from other similar games on the market. AITD always feels like it misses its potential whereas Resident Evil and Silent Hill, while they've put out some absolutely awful games in those franchises, do have distinctive styles to their art design that really link all the games together in a way that can't be said for AITD because Carnby has now had multiple redesigns and has been moved between time periods in a way that feels like the developers/publishers really weren't confident in the appeal of the core concept. I just want to play as a fairly average guy in a garish suit getting in over his head with nobody available to save him, not as a brooding secret agent type or a brooding former victim of demonic possession.

[@MrEdders123]

I remember in the artbook for Bioshock 2, they mentioned that they originally wanted the protagonist to be a "schleppy", out-of-shape regular guy 😁 Dad bods are underrepresented in heroes hehe

[@GekiSonic]

49:43 I myself do not mind Time Gate's crossover cosmology approach to its fantastical backstory, as I myself like this idea of folklore and legend from different places and people coexisting and complimenting one another, especially since it has occurred all over the world to varying degrees throughout history; like how different people throughout Europe all have a thunder god who wields some kind of weapon resembling a club or axe, how Hercules became the bodyguard of the Buddha in Central Asia, and of course the various tales of heroes killing dragons or catastrophic floods that ended whole civilizations to start anew, and how Christianity, when you get down to the brass tacks of it, involves a lot of mixing together Middle-Eastern and Greco-Roman spiritual beliefs.

[@ivantumanov1015]

I had this as a kid, could never get past the lazers in the first room, no matter how i tried to crawl.

[@MrEdders123]

I failed it a couple of times too. The on-screen visuals and actual collision detection or triggers or whatever don't seem to really match up.

[@HighPriestFuneral]

I have to say, the description of "sometime a character's said to be a descendant of another character, sometimes a reincarnation of that character, and sometimes literally that same character. Some seem to be all 3 depending on the line, and it's implied some characters are disguised or possessed by another character. " That may as well have described the original Yu-Gi-Oh series, haha! Overall, an interesting concept, to be sure, but after this review... I'll pass.

[@BlacEyedPriest765]

Definitely kinda reminds me of Alone in the Dark 😊😀

[@mostlydead3261]

more priceless EDucation..

[@cjr1382]

May the algorithm Gods bless this video

[@skvan]

I played a demo of this when i was I kid and I though it was really cool. I have to play the full version on GOG.

[@captainufo4587]

I hate when execs demands products to be Americanized to have a broader appeal. Americans are willfully kept inside teir bubble, ignorant of everything outside their borders.

[@MrEdders123]

:(

[@alaksandutheexorkizein7634]

I played this as a kid and think I never beat it 🤔

[@MrEdders123]

catapult puzzle was a pain

[@WarLore]

It's very funny to me that you tried so hard to avoid spoiling a game's storyline when you didn't seem to recommend it, is very old, very confusing, and never got a sequel. 😆 In fact, I'm very curious what the whole story was - Wikipedia doesn't really summarize it - because it looks quite disjointed! I don't think you've quite sold me on playing Time Gate : Knight's Chase to hear the narrative! But I enjoyed the video all the same

[@MrEdders123]

There's not really much point going into more detail on the narrative unless I have specific points to make about it, so I always try to give a general overview of the story rather than a play-by-play. If I thought there was something particularly interesting about a late-game twist or whatever then I'd mention it, but otherwise you can assume the story overview pretty much covers everything you need to know, whilst leaving it open for anyone who might want to actually play it and experience the story themselves.

[@manfromafar5943]

Wonder if anfrogrames made any other games. Real shame can only find infogrames games

[@oskarniepowiem1776]

You tube script get on that channel right now ffs, IT is really good.

[@absalondebarvac3715]

Hoo boy

[@Goldberry2007]

My son contacted me, asking whether we still have this game that we used to play very often in 1998/9! Lo and behold, I still have the original CD or rather the game on a gold games collection. We got it to start via DOSBox and can enter game setup with the mouse (!), sound is good but in the actual game when using the keyboard, William will not move forward, just backwards. We're so close and now what? Is there anyone out there playing this game from CD and can help? >Please?!

[@MrEdders123]

Have you tried the GoG version?

[@Goldberry2007]

Thanks for your support. I don't know what the GoG version is, sorry. Anyway, somehow the moves are good now once I hit the space button William does as told. LOL. Lovely game but needs getting used to again, after so many years.

[@trueneese8080]

Infogrames. The title French software publisher Infogrames Entertainment was most often pronounced as a rhyme of "graham cracker", thus "in-fo-GRAHAMS". Its reps and executives, however, sometimes gave it a strong "A', as in "in-fo-GRAYMES", or other times a soft 'A' for "in-fo-GROMS". Nobody in here is saying it’s pronounced ON-fo-groms like you are doing. 🤦‍♂️ I just don’t get it

[@MrEdders123]

kzbin.info/www/bejne/nGarqWxoodmdpZY kzbin.info/www/bejne/eKbVlpmYnalni9U and so on. I also checked old French TV interviews and the hosts also pronounced it "an-" or "on-" fogrames. 🙂

[@theequitableprose]

Hawk of light? Writers are showing their Berserk influence on their sleeves.

[@MrEdders123]

I don't know what it was in the original French, actually. Arnoud might have brought it up in his interview with the devs.

[@theequitableprose]

@@MrEdders123 this inspired me to check something. The Berserk anime was in 97, which this game preceded by 2 years. Unless they were reading the manga, which is possible (I don't know what the import market was like in Europe in the early to mid 90s), but probably unlikely. I might try to find those interviews or posts myself, but at a glance it seems like it was just a coincidence.