Dialogue about Dialogue - Episode 1 (Patreon)

Howdy, folks! Pistol Shrimp is pleased to release something special and exclusive as thanks to our generous supporters on Patreon. We will be making this publicly available in the future but want to give our supporters early access to the very thing they asked for: relics, stories, and insights about the making of our games.

This is the first in what we hope will be a series of dialogues with Pistol Shrimp about the making of The Ur-Quan Masters 2. In this opening installment, UQM2 contributor Lee Hutchinson sits down with series co-creator Paul Reiche and digs in on the role character dialogue plays in storytelling. Come for the behind-the-scenes details, stay for Paul’s anecdotes about the early days of the games industry and the role Pogo the Possum played in UQM’s conversation engine!

Included are some links and visuals referencing some of the topics covered.

Note: This post is now public, and a text transcript has been attached. Happy days and jubilation!

High School Creations

One of the books Erol, Mat, and Paul made in high school.

Past Games

Paul Reiche wrote and Erol Otus illustrated on Gamma World.

Keys of Acheron manual with one of Paul's paper and ink illustrations.

Keys of Acheron gameplay.

Paragraphs of text!

Paul met Robert Leyland who was working on "Dragon's Eye", a different fantasy game. You can even go play it.

Scott Adams' "Pirate Adventure".

Font Examples

Font on a Larry Niven book from the early 1970s.

Using a font that's one step too arcane.

Lettering from the Starfleet Technical manual.

1977 Letraset Catalog.

1977 Letraset sheets of rub-off letters.

Fonts expressing emphasis from Pogo the Possum.

More Pogo the Possum fonts (even the framing is character-specific!).

Star Control 1 Code Wheel

Alien name tool extraordinaire!