View Full Version : Ken and Roberta Williams Have Received 'The Game Awards' 2014 Award for Lifetime Achievement
Ken and Roberta Williams have won The Game Awards 2014 award for Lifetime Achievement. Though I didn't watch the show live, I was very happy to read this. I hope nobody minds a video of the event, as there is not much information on the official site (http://thegameawards.com/nominees/) about the results of the show.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-JQkRp-VFXQ
Couldn't have happened to better down-to-earth folk.
kai123
12-09-2014, 06:34 PM
Ken and Roberta Williams have won The Game Awards 2014 award for Lifetime Achievement. Though I didn't watch the show live, I was very happy to read this. I hope nobody minds a video of the event, as there is not much information on the official site (http://thegameawards.com/nominees/) about the results of the show.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-JQkRp-VFXQ
Couldn't have happened to better down-to-earth folk.
She is a legend and pioneer. I hope they are still reaping the rewards for all the games they have made. I think I may fire up dosbox and play some King's Quest.
edited because I are dumb.
Jorpho
12-10-2014, 01:04 AM
More like "The Game Awards" have found a way to make a play for fame and respectability, amirite?
(Seriously, who are these awards folks and why should we care?)
JSoup
12-10-2014, 01:41 AM
More like "The Game Awards" have found a way to make a play for fame and respectability, amirite?
(Seriously, who are these awards folks and why should we care?)
It's a show thrown together on a budget by Geoff Keighley to replace the yearly PSN awards (supposedly). Grew into other stuff from there, but the budget didn't change. Seriously, the show was amature night with the camera work and pacing.
bb_hood
12-10-2014, 02:43 AM
I played sooo much KQ4, 5, 6 as a kid. KQ4 was one of the first games i ever got obsessed with. When I was in grade school I mail ordered the hint book from Sierra, it was like 25-30$ which was alot back then. KQ5 and KQ6 me and my brother beat without any hints, but it took alot of playing.
It's a show thrown together on a budget by Geoff Keighley to replace the yearly PSN awards (supposedly). Grew into other stuff from there, but the budget didn't change. Seriously, the show was amature night with the camera work and pacing.
PSN Awards? Did you mean the Spike Video Game Awards (VGAs) (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spike_Video_Game_Awards)?
JSoup
12-11-2014, 02:59 AM
PSN Awards? Did you mean the Spike Video Game Awards (VGAs) (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spike_Video_Game_Awards)?
Doesn't look like it. For the last few years, the PSN would have a yearly awards thing where they'd make PS3 XMB themes of the contestants and then the winners would be on sale for a week.
Edmond Dantes
12-11-2014, 03:24 AM
Whatever the case, nobody deserves this award more. Sure, you could argue that Quest for Glory (Lori and Cory Cole) or Space Quest (Scott Murphy and Mark Crowe) were better games, but they wouldn't have existed without the Williamses and the King's Quest line, so the award must go to the progenitors.
Besides, Mystery House still effin' rocks ;)
calthaer
03-10-2015, 09:28 PM
While I do think that these two were true pioneers of the computer game industry, I wish that they had continued to change along with it. I always viewed this interview with Roberta as something I didn't quite like:
http://web.archive.org/web/19991127225719/http://www.gamersdepot.com/interview_roberta_a.htm
This sounds an awful lot like she attributes the lack of popularity in adventure games as a commercial enterprise to the "dumbing-down" of the gaming populace, rather than the fact that new technology made new types of gameplay (and thinking) possible, and those types of gameplay which were her stock-in-trade obsolete or archaic. I wish that Sierra had been able to adapt to these changes, and it almost seems like it could have - the fact that they took a risk on Half Life was an auspicious omen. If only they had followed through with that - they could have reinvented the narrative video game all over again...not as it had been, but as it could be. I think the industry is poorer for the fact that they (or at least Sierra) didn't shift priorities and move away from the old style of adventure games.
Edmond Dantes
03-10-2015, 09:52 PM
It seems to me like Sierra did try to shift priorities. I remember reading InterAction (god I wish I had copies of that mag!) in the mid-90s and adventure games honestly made up the minority. There's plenty of strategy, simulation, arcade etc. games under their belt. Don't forget that Sierra also owned Papyrus, who made some highly-regarded racing games.
I honestly think it wasn't Ken and Roberta that led to Sierra's downfall. It was, rather, two things.
First of all was Sierra's consumers. Sierra themselves tried to branch out, but consistently it seemed like all people wanted from them was adventure games. Remember the Imagination Network and all the multi-player RPGs (not really MMOs, just RPGs with online functions) made for it? Yeah, neither do I. And of course, everyone hated Outpost.. for reasons I still don't understand. Outpost 2 even more so, since at least Outpost 1 did have some harmful bugs (which later got patched) but Outpost 2 was perfect right out of the box. Point is, it seems like their non-adventure game output either got no press or BAD press, and still does to this day.
Second problem (and the one which I think killed them) was when they got bought out.
I remember reading an interview with... Scott Mandel I think? One of the guys who was involved with Space Quest 6. Around that time Sierra got bought out (by Vivendi?) and he claimed that the atmosphere changed, and these suits came in and all started making demands. I remember particularly he said "There was an attitude about them, a feeling of 'we're gonna show these yokels how to really run a game company!'" that rubbed him the wrong way and was one of the factors in him leaving the company. These business people made all sorts of demands to force Sierra to cater to "market trends." For example, they wanted to make Space Quest 7 a multiplayer game because multiplayer gaming was popular. They made King's Quest 8 a pseudo-RPG because Baldur's Gate was popular. So on and so forth. These decisions failed left and right and eventually all the people who meant anything to the company left, leaving Sierra itself just a meaningless label.
It gladdens my heart a little that people in the company remember the good old days. I smiled a bit when SWAT 4 had a mission that took place on "Blakestone Ave" and that the snipers are always called "Sierra." But the truth is, Vivendi ruined it, just like how Electronic Arts ruined Origin.
I swear, if I could somehow go back in time and destroy these big companies...
Yeah, but you need to remember two things: the company Ken initially sold Sierra to (which wasn't Vivendi - it was called something like CIS or a similar three letter acronym) assuaged his fears about selling the company, convincing him to sell. Mr. Williams's greatest fear was what would happen to the people at the company if it were sold as he viewed them as friends and family. His second fear is what would happen to all they worked to develop, nurture, and foster there, and he wanted to make sure the people and series were well taken care of. CIS hit all the right notes in what they told him, and he and Roberta felt assured that things were in good hands. They weren't. CIS was just buying up the company to trump up its perceived market value so they could turn around and "flip" the property in a few months to make a huge profit. It went exactly according to CIS's plan. And then the company after that did basically the same thing. During this time, series and everything else about the company were getting neglected and ruined, and without the support they needed, the creatives fled. Eventually Vivendi Universal acquired Sierra, and after that things stabilized, but the irreparable damage had been done.
But on the plus side, none of the creatives from the old Sierra days hold the Williams's accountable for what happened. They know Ken and Roberta got hornswoggled by that awful company which initially bought Sierra. And hey, the Williams sold Sierra for OVER 1 BILLION DOLLARS, and that's pretty good money for a married couple to retire on.
Greg2600
03-11-2015, 06:48 PM
They made fantastic games, that's all that matters. I see little need for game awards shows, but glad the Williams were given accolades.