Ep.261 – Horror in Full Motion – Exploring the Nightmare World of Phantasmagoria

The mid-1990s were a time of bold experiments in gaming. With the rise of CD ROMs, developers suddenly had the space to create experiences that looked and felt like movies, fusing live action performances with interactive gameplay. Few studios leaned into that potential harder than Sierra Online. And few designers made the leap with more ambition than Roberta Williams. Best known for the whimsical fairy tales of King's Quest, Williams shocked the industry in 1995 with Phantasmagoria, a slow motion video horror adventure that traded enchanted castles for haunted mansions and heavily ever afters for blood, betrayal and terror. Packed across seven discs, it promised an immersive cinematic nightmare. And it delivered, complete with controversy over its graphic violence and infamous mature themes. It wasn't just a game, it was a statement about how far the medium could go, for better or for worse. Today we're stepping into the chilling world of Phantasmagoria to explore its daring design, the uproar it caused, and the legacy left in horror and interactive storytelling. So dim your lights, steal your nerves and join us for today's unsettling trip down memory card. LA.

Foreign.

Good morning, good afternoon, and good evening. I hope these words find you well. Hello and welcome to the 261st episode of our video game history podcast, a trip down memory card lane. Each week we'll tell you a story relevant to the current week in gaming history. It it can be about a game or the people who have created it. It can be about a console or the technology that brought it to life. We often talk about the companies that bring it all together, making our hobby video games a reality. While telling you each story, we hope to teach you something new about the topic. What it took from the world as its inspiration, or what it gave back to the world in its legacy. Today we are stepping into the unsettling world of Phantasmagoria, the 1995 interactive horror game that pushed boundaries with its live action cinematics and mature themes. A controversial yet iconic title, it redefined the limits of storytelling in gaming. I'm David Kassin, and as always, I'm joined by my co host, who'd probably try to reason with the ghosts instead of running for his life. He's my brother, Rob Kassin. Rob, do you think that you could uncover the mansion's dark secrets or would you just kind of get stuck trying to figure out how to open a spooky door?

We're gonna go at the door, Dave.

Yeah, I get stuck at the door too. I did get stuck at the door, to be fair. I was probably a little too young for Phantasmagoria and you were definitely too young for Phantasmagoria when it came out. When it came out.

Yeah. This is a new one to me, Dave.

You know how it goes. I mean, you know, 1995 you were born born a little too young for spooky doors.

That was one spooky door I was already coming out of. I didn't have time for another.

1995 was our first computer, a Packard Bell. I did not have Phantasmagoria. I was into the seventh Guest, the other spooky live action game back when. So yeah, we have a whole story about Phantasmagoria. But before we get to said story, why don't you share with our listeners what else has happened during the current week in gaming history?

All right, well, kicking it off on August 28, 1987, Konami released Castlevania 2 Simon's Quest for the Famicom game system in Japan. This took the gothic action series in a bold new direction. Instead of strictly linear stages, the sequel blended side scrolling combat with RPG elements like an open world, day, night cycles and cryptic NPC hints. Players guided Simon Belmont on a quest to lift a deadly curse by collecting Dracula's scattered body parts, a setup that, along with its emphasis on exploration for foreshadowed the later Metroidvania style. Though its obtuse clues frustrated many at the time, Simon's Quest has since been recognized as a formative experiment in expanding action adventure design.

Yeah, I still don't like it, eh?

It's not for everyone.

Okay?

On August 24, 1995, Microsoft released Windows 95 in the United States, ushering in a new era of personal computing with innovations like the Start Menu Taskbar and Plug and Play hardware support. Bundled with easy to learn games such as Minesweeper and Hover, the operating System helped make PCs approachable for everyday users while pushing graphical user interfaces into the mainstream. Backed by an unprecedented marketing blitz from the Rolling Stones Start Me up campaign to midnight launch events, it quickly became one of the most influential software releases in tech history, shaping how millions would interact with their computers for years to come.

It was revolutionary. And we all got to play Solitaire and Minesweeper.

Absolutely. And hover.

And hover.

Next up on August 29, 2000, Ubisoft acquired Red Storm Entertainment in the U.S. a studio we just talked about in last Week's episode on Rainbow Six. Founded in 1996 by Tom Clancy and Doug Littlejohns, Red Storm quickly made a name for itself. With realistic squad based tactical shooters that stood apart from the run and gun action dominating the late 90s. The Ubisoft acquisition was a pivotal turning point, giving Red Storm the resources and global publishing muscles to expand Tom Clancy's universe beyond Rainbow six into major franchises like Ghost Recon and later the division for Ubisoft. It was more than just a purchase. It was the beginning of a long running partnership between Tom Clancy's brand and and one of gaming's biggest publishers, ultimately shaping Ubisoft's identity as a powerhouse in the tactical, shooter and style genres for decades to come.

Look at that relevance to a recent episode.

I know it's crazy when it works out like that.

I know. I'm so proud of me.

And in a not related fashion, on August 25, 2009, Rocksteady Studios released Arkham Asylum for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 in the US and Canada. This game redefined the superhero genre in video games. Drawing inspiration from the animated series and featuring voice talents like Kevin Conroy and Mark Hamill, this game immersed players in a single sprawling night on Arkham Island. Its free flow mechanic combat system combined fluid melee attacks with counter mechanics, while stealth sequences let players stalk enemies from the shadows as the Dark Knight. Critical and commercial success turned Arkham Asylum into a blueprint for modern superhero games and spawned an acclaimed franchise.

Very good game.

It was.

Yes. Go play it.

And last up for this week in gaming history. On August 27, 2019, Remedy Entertainment released Control for multiple platforms. Blending supernatural action with a shifting, brutalist inspired setting, players stepped inside the role of Jesse Faden, the new director of the mysterious Federal Bureau of Control. Navigating a constantly transforming skyscraper known as the Oldest House, the game combines telekinetic combat, surreal environmental design and cryptic storytelling into a hauntingly atmospheric experience. Widely acclaimed by critics, Control won numerous Game of the Year awards and cemented Remedy's reputation for marrying innovative gameplay with narrative ambition.

What more can I say? I played it. I loved it. That's why it won a lot of awards. Well, not because I played it, but you know, because they made a great game.

No, no. Just because of you, Dave.

Yeah.

You had so much control.

I do. I have all the sway over the Game of the Year awards. So any video game developers if you're listening to this, send me your games or don't.

Because David let the joke slide right over his head.

Damn.

The joke is you had control.

Ah, there was a joke in there I missed. You did slide it right over my head. Very nice, very nice.

Actually, but I think people aren't here to hear about that, Dave. So why don't you tell.

No, I think they definitely are.

No, I think they're here to learn about Sierra Online.

What? I mean, Sierra Online is only part of the story. We're here to learn about Phantasmagoria.

Yeah. And how it got started from Sierra Online. But people won't know that unless you tell them now, will they?

I mean, they know it now.

Oh, well, guess there's more to the story, though, isn't there, Dave? Better tell them.

Well, fine, you're right. By the mid-1990s, Sierra Online was one of the titans of PC gaming. They were known at the time for pushing boundaries in the adventure genre. At the center of much of that success was Roberta Williams. She and her husband Ken founded Sierra back in the early 1980s. And Roberta quickly made a name for herself with mystery house in 1980, which was the very first graphical adventure game. And that early experiment not only set the stage for her career, but it also pushed the entire industry towards storytelling and games. And she followed up with some great stuff. The Laura Bo detective series and of course, the iconic. The iconic King's Quest franchise. And this cemented her reputation as one of the more important designers of that era. Now, we've covered much of King's Quest story. We learned all about the Williams, both Kenan, Roberta and Cira Online when we explored the origins of King's Quest back in episode 89. But what often gets overlooked when people talk about Roberta Williams during this time period is that while she was writing King's Quest and its fairy tale, so to speak, she was also harboring darker ideas. She has admitted in interviews that while she enjoys whimsical stories, she never wanted to be typecast as a fairy tale designer. She was interested in telling stories with more weight, more substance and deeper emotions. And horror. She loved horror films. That was a genre that she rediscovered as a teenager, and she felt that it kept calling to her. So Roberta often pointed to her influences in this realm. There was the Halloween series, Stephen King's Carrie the Shining, and the gothic tales of Edgar Allan Poe. And so these works lingered in the back of her mind, even if she was designing her talking frogs and magical kingdoms for King's Quest. And the truth of the matter is, is that she had wanted to make a horror game for nearly a decade before she managed to start working and develop our topic today, which is Phantasmagoria. Over the years, she sketched out multiple concepts. There was one about a Young woman who answers a magician's ad for an assistant only to find that the magician is insane. That sounds like the Prestige, doesn't it? A little bit prestigious, you know. Okay, yeah. There was another set in the past where a heroine becomes entangled with illusionists who are dabbling in the supernatural. And we don't have any games based on these. So we know that these prototypes didn't go anywhere, but they kept. The seeds were planted.

Right.

She, she kept hearkening back to stories that were darker, that were more twisted. And the reality of the situation is, as she talks about it, that the hold up up until that point wasn't so much the ambition, wasn't so much the storytelling, wasn't. Wasn't so much anything but the technology. Roberta truly believed that a horror game could only work if players were able to genuinely empathize with the characters. And that meant using real actors. And in the 1980s, we had floppy disks and these slow drives just couldn't handle her vision. But by the early 90s, CD ROMs were being put into computers. And CD ROMs offered both the storage and the speed to pull it off. You know, we've talked about that time period before in our episodes on myst and the seventh guest, which are the two titles that pretty much like mainstream CD ROMs. They were the reason why many, many people bought computers with CD ROMs and full motion video. Lesser. Missed more seventh guest. But the concept is, plays a role. Motion video is kind of where, like where they took that technology right from the beginning. So. So again, early 90s CD ROMs are here and the technology is finally in front of us. So the tech is in place and Sierra is riding high. They're on top of their game in the early 90s. So the timing was absolutely perfect. And so Roberta Williams is finally given the green light to work on this concept again. And she just dives in head first.

Right.

This was not going to be a tree outline like her earlier Sierra adventures.

Right.

Those are, we kind of call them puzzle trees. You know, she wrote from the get go Phantasmagoria to be a full film screenplay.

Oh.

She immersed herself so deeply in her research on horror that she started having nightmares. Jeez. I know, right? And when she was done, she had a 550 page script that's four times longer than the average Hollywood film, plus another hundred pages of storyboards covering some 800 scenes that she envisioned from the start. Sierra, her team realized that this project was going to be unlike anything they'd ever done before. So to make it work right off the bat, they spent $1.5 million to build a brand new film studio at their Oakhurst headquarters.

Damn.

And they brought in Hollywood veterans right in their mind, they weren't making a video game, they were making a movie. That's where we're starting. So we have ACT brought in special effects crews, directors of photography, Just tons of people that had lots of experience in Hollywood, all who had to train the team at Sierra in like basic filmmaking principles. Blocking, camera angles, right? Just, just the fundamentals of that you wouldn't have to consider when you're programming games, right? And so right off the bat, these two groups, the game developers on one side and the Hollywood film crews on the others, they didn't speak the same language at all. And it took them roughly about a month to find common ground and sort themselves out. Art director Andy Hoyos looked to films like Batman, Alien and Hellraiser to shape the game's style. Right off the bat, his team rendered more than a thousand backgrounds when most games at the time had only 80 to 100. And since this was Sierra's first attempt at blending live actors with computer graphic environments, every bit of it was uncharted territory. Filming itself was intense. They shot for four months, six days a week, often 12 hours in a day. Over 200 people were involved in the filming process, 25 of them professional actors. So we're not, we're not talking a couple like Rob. If you look at motion capture from these days, right, you have a big studio made for motion capture, a few people wearing suits and maybe a few guys sitting in a control booth, a handful at the most. Over to the side. You know, motion capture nowadays is nothing. This was literally uncharted territory. There wasn't a guidebook, there wasn't someone that they could go to to teach them how to do any of this. And their only thought was, we're gonna shoot a movie and try to make it into a video game. And so they literally shot it like a movie. It was, it was more so a Hollywood production than it was a video game production.

You know, I mean, hey, hopefully bodes well for it. Guess we'll find out.

Guess we will find out. Everything was shot on blue screens and they were laser composited into these pre rendered backgrounds. And the special effects were equally ambitious. Sierra hired Hollywood's character shop to create gore and prosthetics. There were pendulum blades that split open heads, gallons of fake blood, a seance ectoplasm gag that required an eight foot hose and scalping effects that had makeup artists gluing morticians, wax to actors, skulls. They didn't have the biggest budget in the world, so most of these effects had to be nailed in one take. That left little room for error. So it was a, it was a big production. That's the only way to put it. It was a production.

Right.

And then once they made it, they had to put it all together. You know, when filming wrapped, Sierra had over 20 beta tapes each roughly about two hours long. So 40 hours of footage, roughly. All of which had to be digitized, had to be edited and had to be like synced.

Right.

There were interactive elements, so they had to code it. So when the actor opened a door, so too, you know, when the player opened a door, the movie went, went to it, or when the player did something wrong, the ceiling would collapse like there were it. You had to put the pieces together.

Right? Right.

More than a hundred scenes of the game required frame by frame compositing a video with digital objects.

Right.

Like we're talking about, we're talking about putting the actors in pre rendered backgrounds. But, but part of that is the actors may not have had some of the props in front of them and that had to be composited in too. Oh, interesting. So you have all this stuff going on, and on top of that you have programmers who have to figure out optimal frame rates and the resolution that computers can handle and even data transfer speeds. You know, if you're, if you. Back when we had CD Rom drives, we had CD Rom drives, they were calculated like this is a 2x drive, this is a 4x drive, this is an 8x drive. And they had to figure out like what data transfer speed because those indicated transfer speeds. What transfer speed did we need to make this work? What's the minimum? Right, because that's when you design a game, you go for minimum requirements. Nothing about the video game industry was standardized at the time. You know, Windows 95 may have brought it closer, which was in the same time period, but for the most part we didn't have standards. You know, you had. Not all CD ROM drives work the same and not all sound cards work the same and not all, I want to say graphics cards, but this is a little bit before 3D graphics cards. But that's like. There was a lot of struggle in making sure that a video game worked together across the board. Even CD management was a nightmare for these programmers, you know, because certain scenes were reused across chapters. Code had to be duplicated across multiple disks. So they didn't have to keep switching disks back and forth. And so that meant that inevitably what was plan to fit on four or five CDs ballooned into seven. Oh, wow. And seven CDs at the time is a lot. It's still a lot in my opinion. Although, I mean.

Oh, it'd be a. It'd be an immense amount now considering how much more that our Blu Rays can hold.

Right, right, right, right.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So, I mean, it was a 7 CD get up.

It.

It was absolutely crazy. It was. It was technically a problem. It was. The whole kit Kaboodle was just a problem. The whole kit Kaboodle was just a problem. You know, Phantasmagoria was a big, complicated production. It was uncharted territory. And. And the absolute truth of the matter is that the entirety was just something Sierra had never done before, but definitely something that they were willing to step up to the plate and do, you know?

Right.

And then of course, when you're making a movie, there's no argument that the music is an important part of any film score.

Right?

True. Absolutely.

So on top of everything else that they're doing, they had a whole. A whole musical soundtrack to put together. You know, there are different styles of music in this game. There's rock and roll music all the way up to opera music. The opening theme of the game is a neo Gregorian chant that's performed by 135 people. So it was just a. It was a big cinematic score. You know, it was a big cinematic score. They had to put it together like film. It's. It's a. The music kind of ramps up as the game ramps up. That was done deliberately. They saved the most intense music for the final chapter of the game when the game becomes most intense. And so, you know, as you're putting the game together on these seven discs, that ultimately makes five, seven, two. As you're working through all this music and making it bigger too. So there's just a lot of point is, as I get lost in the production part, this was just a big. A big production like this. The scale of which I don't know if we can find something else other than the aforementioned seventh guest. When they also kind of did a film production that was on this scale.

Right.

Because teams were. Video game. Teams still weren't this big. And they had 200 people on the film site alone, let alone the programmers, the musicians and all this. I mean, this literally took hundreds of people to put together in the mid-90s, which is crazy to think of because I I can't imagine the money that went into making this at the time, which I couldn't really figure out the answer to. They didn't really talk about things like that at the moment, you know, but was crazy, you know. They did the production over two years and it experienced multiple delays. It was originally going to be in stores by late 1993, early 94. Sierra said it was going to come out no later than fall of 1994. We got to see it for the first time at, at CES in Chicago in June of 1994. They announced then they were going to push the release date back to October 1994 and that the game was going to be made available on two discs. That obviously didn't happen, as we know. Game ended up on seven discs, a little more than two, only a couple. And then the shipping date was changed first to Christmas of 94, then to February of 1995. And then Sierra said in February 1995 they were going to delay it again because they had to refine the technology of liveaction video. And then there they announced that it was going to be ready in June of 1995. But then when Sierra started to put out road shows to market their new games for June, Phantasmagoria wasn't among them. And they said, yo, it's now going to be August 3rd. And then what happened finally was that the day that Windows 95 was released, August 24, 1995, Phantasmagoria was released as well. Kind of fun, huh?

Yeah, it's, it's definitely fun. But you know, we had to see how did the people feel, how did, how did it do?

We shall see. Needless to say, it was Sierra's most ambitious game to date and one of the most controversial. You know, Rob, Phantasmagoria showed how games could mix Hollywood production with interactive storytelling. And that kind of reminds me of how easy it is today to mix professional quality tools with the convenience of recording from home.

Wait, are you saying podcasting can be as smooth as blending live actors into a haunted mansion set?

Yeah, that's exactly what I'm saying. And that's why I use zencastr. It's an all in one podcasting platform that makes recording a breeze. You just log in from your browser, hit record, and you're instantly capturing studio quality audio and up to 4K video. There's no clunky setups and no ghostly technical issues.

Alright, but once I've got the recording, do I have to edit it frame by frame like Sierra did? With all those beta tapes?

Not at all. Zencastr's post production tools automatically clean up background noise, cut filler words, balance your audio, and smooth everything out. It's like having your own special effects team, but without the gallons of fake blood.

Okay, but how do I make sure my show actually reaches people? I don't want my podcast trapped in some dusty attic like Camo Secrets. Carno Secrets.

That's the best part. Zencastr also makes distributing your podcast to all the major platforms like Spotify and Apple podcasts as easy as clicking through a door in Phantasmagoria. No juggling extra services, no swapping seven CDs just to get it out there.

Sounds like podcasting without the horror movie headaches. So how do our listeners get started?

Go to zencastr.com pricing and use our offer code, all one word memory card lane. And you can get 30% off the first month of any Zencast or paid plan. I want you listeners to have the same easy experience as we do for all of our podcasting needs.

So if you've been thinking about starting your own show, grab that discount and take the plunge. Maybe skip the creepy mansion.

Maybe. So head over to zencastr.com pricing and use our offer code, all one word memory card lane. And again, you can get 30% off the first month of any Zencastr paid PL plan.

And with that, let's get back to the story of Phantasmagoria.

When Phantasmagoria hit store shelves again on August 24, 1995, it wasn't just another Sierra adventure game.

Right.

It was marketed like a. An event. It had an oversized box that made room for seven CDs. That was, as we said, a staggering number in an era when most PC games still fit on a handful of floppies or at the most, one or two discs. 7. Not a comparison at the moment, fan. Tasmagoria was heavily advertised by Sierra in advance of its release, and the company touted it as its biggest game to date. It was also Sierra's first computer game that was specifically targeted to an adult audience.

Right.

So Sierra leaned hard into the idea that this was something new. They called it a thrilling interactive movie, and they made sure that the packaging also screamed cinematic scale.

Right?

Oh, yeah.

For players that were curious about the future of gaming, that was absolutely irresistible. Absolutely irresistible. You Rob. Just a side note, since everyone's complaining when this, like, you know, games nowadays are up to 80 bucks. Yeah, that's how much this was when it released.

Well, like it was $80, not. It's up $80 now. It was $80 release.

Yeah, it. It. It typically sold for $69.95, but some stores sold it for $80 because of supply and demand.

So that'd be. It's not a perfect comparison, and someone's gonna double check the math and see that I'm wrong. But that'd be like buying all of these ultra deluxe editions at $120 plus now.

Yeah.

And that's the base copy. Well, I guess there's only one version of the game, so it's not like base game versus dlc, but. Oh, man, that's a lot.

And also, might I remind you, this is pre ESRB, right? This is 95 is literally when they're debating the ESRB, because Mortal Kombat was 94. And we've been through that story in past episodes, or Mortal Kombat was kind of the game that pushed, you know, the U.S. senate to create the ESRB in the first place. We talked about that recently, actually, when we did our episode on E3, because the company that. That. That put on E3 was also like, that's their history. They. They. They came forward because of that process. So. So this is one of. This is before that was all ratified. And Sierra is one of the companies that kind of voluntarily supported the. The proposed rating system. So this got an M rating before an M rating was a thing, so to speak, which is a fun little fact about it. The game box may have screamed cinematic, but it also prominently displayed this. This rating and had a warning on the back panel that the game contained adult subject matter that was inappropriate for children. It also. It also kind of encouraged parents to review the material before providing it to children. And Sierra actually asked retailers not to sell it to minors. So they were trying to be responsible when they reduced it when they published it. As a side note, the game itself has a explicit content filter. There is basically a filter that would censor all the violent or sexually explicit content. And so. But it also. It only filters the seeing, doesn't filter the sound, so it blurs the screen during the violent section. So you can hear it but not see it.

Gotcha. I could see why that'd still be an issue for some.

Yeah, that's not that. That's not that. That good. So we have this game flies off the shelves. It really does fly off the shelves. Booting it up for the first time is an experience all in itself in 1995 terms. You know, for the first time for many people, you're not greeted with pixel art characters. You're greeted with a real actress that's moving through meticulously rendered 3D environments. Every gesture, every line gives the game a sense of weight and immersion that other adventure games at the time just couldn't match. And for many people, and genuinely, this is how I felt about the Seventh Guest, which was my comparison at the time. It felt like you were stepping into your own horror film where you were in control. And that was the hook, that was the thrill of full motion video. It was the promise of Hollywood production values blended with the interactivity of PC gaming.

Right.

But of course, we know that this is adult subjects and that promise comes with baggage. In this case, the gore. There are severed heads, there's scalping, there are buckets of blood. That was way more graphic than most players had seen before. There was. There was one moment in particular that really defined Phantasmagoria's reputation, and that is an incredibly controversial rape scene.

Oh.

Now, Roberta Williams had always maintained that it was essential to the story. There is. It is in itself a brutal turning point that makes one of the main characters realize that their husband is no longer himself. And without it, she always argued, the rest of narrative would not make sense. But on the other side, in practice, the players and the critics were really sharply divided about how they felt about it. Some appreciated that the game was willing to treat adult themes seriously, while others found it exploitative and upsetting. And that controversy didn't seem to stay confined to message boards or magazines. We've talked about this with other titles, but Phantasmagoria was no different. Around the world, Phantasmagoria ran into walls. Australia banned it outright. Germany placed it on its index, which we've talked about before, which severely restricted its distribution and advertising. And even here in the us, despite the M rating and all the suggested, you know, mature themes and clear explanations on the packaging, major retailers still debated whether or not the stock hit. And of course, the watchdog groups that led to the ESRB in the first place condemned it. And they pointed to it as specific evidence that games were becoming too adult for younger audiences. Again, it's the mid-90s, just a few years after Mortal Kombat and Night Trap had been. You know, it's like a year, two years after they had been dragged in front of Congress. So all Phantasmagoria did was, like, fuel the ongoing conversation about what games should and shouldn't be allowed to depict. Right, right. Makes sense. I mean, it was the topic of conversation. So when you just Add another aggressively adult game to the mix. It's just gonna get added to the conversation, you know, but to be fair, controversy sells too, doesn't it?

Maybe people.

Do you. Do you think this still stands true to this day? That when. When a game is talked about, when there's some controversy surrounding helps boost sales? Or do you think that people are just so numb to the concept nowadays that they're like, man, whatever, I was either gonna like it or I wasn't.

Again, I repeat.

Maybe.

Maybe it's kind of one of those things. It's not possible to tell because the controversy could be a great thing or it could be a terrible thing. I mean, it could be that some people are for it just because of what it is and. And everything. And it could just be that some people are against it just because of what it is. But then you're going to get people who still do one thing or the other out of pure spite. So, like, what kind of publicity is it? And like, what kind of audience did you get with it?

You know, I do know in this case, controversy sold well. In fact, the game sold phenomenally well. Acera reported that they sold 300 units in its very first weekend. Phantasmagoria quickly became the best selling game in the United States. It debuted that first week at number four, behind MechWarrior 2, Microsoft Flight Simulator, and of course, of coast and of course Myst. But by September, it had reached number one on the list. It was actually third at the time for computer software behind Windows 95 and Microsoft. Plus, by the end of its first year, it had sold over. They estimated they had sold over a million copies. And that's a milestone that pretty much put it in the same league with mega hits like Myst, you know, and that's Sierra's first title to ever reach that milestone of selling more than a million copies in its first year. And that I said earlier that I didn't find out how much money it cost to make this.

You just did.

I just did. I did find it. I found it in my notes.

Yeah, put it in there.

Yep.

Great job, Dave.

I know I'm gonna leave this in because I'm a bonehead. That success did matter, selling more than a million. A million copies. Because the game wasn't cheap to make, Sierra poured more than $4 million into its production, and that didn't count the 1.5 million they put into custom building that studio that they created just to film it. So, I mean, expensive endeavor. Oh, boy.

Right?

Definitely an expensive endeavor.

Oh, Yeah, I would say so.

And that for Sierra was a massive gamble. You know, the, the sales were there and they proved, they proved that there was an appetite for, for mature games, for ambitious games. I mean some of your best selling games at the time, Myst isn't quite so adult, but it's puzzles definitely lean towards adult. And then your other games were the seventh Guest and you had, so you had this, the seventh Guess and Mystery. Two of the three are adult style horror games. And so like there, when you, when two of your three best selling video games at the time are mature games, you gotta read, read the room, you know what I mean?

Oh, 100%.

Now to be fair, like we're talking PC games, right? They may not stand a chance against console games. And, and at the time PC gaming definitely skewed more adult. Well, well console gaming definitely skewed more towards the younger generation. I think that's a better blend nowadays. But still, I mean people were buying PCs and homes and kids were using it for school. Well, I guess the parents were using it for mature games like Phantasmagoria. Critical reaction to the game just as divided as the cultural one. Some reviewers praised its atmosphere and ambition. You know, they pointed to the gothic mansion, the sound design and just the sheer cinematic scope as reasons to recommend it. Glad they liked the cinematic scope considering it was the whole drawl of the game.

Right.

But others were less kind. Some called the puzzle shallow. Some argued that the interactivity was just slightly more than clicking your way through a movie. And that was, that was really. So that debate became part of the game story.

Right.

Was this the future of interactive entertainment or just a flashy dead end? And to be fair, when FMV first became a thing, that was a very common question. Fmv, full motion video was a lot of fun because it was literally like playing a movie. But there were some people that will always like that style. Even to this day there's full motion video, that's like playing a movie. While there are some people that won't like that style. Fair.

Yeah, I would, I would argue that.

It'S fair, you know, and so when your most popular games are full motion video, when it's again little more than clicking your way through a movie, in their opinion, people were kind of worried that that was the future of gaming. Is this, is this all gaming is going to amount to in the future? Clicking through an interactive movie? The answer is no, it did not, as we know now.

Right?

It did not amount to just that.

Well, thank you for answering, Dave, because Honestly, I had no idea.

I know, I know. Well, that's the legacy part of what we do around here.

Yeah, the legacy is Dave's played it and Rob is not.

I've actually never played Phantasmagoria.

Oh, well, I guess you're saying the seventh guest or whatever.

Yeah, yeah, this one, this one came out. I, I, you know, I genuinely meant to take time this week and watch it like a playthrough or something. And I just got caught up, you know, I've been working on other projects. I just got caught up and didn't get a chance to. So, speaking of legacy, however, to kind of roll into the end, Sierra did not wait long to capitalize on the success of Phantasmagoria. Just a year later, in 1996, they released Phantasmagoria, A puzzle of Flesh. Despite the name, it was not a direct continuation of the first story. It was a completely new narrative that leaned even harder into a mature subject matter. Whereas the original focused on gothic horror and domestic violence within a haunted mansion, the shift, the sequel kind of shifted into psychological horror with a heavy dose of science fiction. And so this time you kind of stepped into the shoes of an office worker that was haunted by trauma from his childhood. And his story explored themes of abuse, sexuality and paranoia, kind of culminating in this, like, bizarre tale of corporate conspiracy and extra dimensional beings. While the first Phantasmagoria shocked players with gore and the one infamous sexual assault scene, Puzzle of Flinch was controversial for different reasons. It openly dealt with issues of mental illness and sexuality in ways that few mainstream games of the 1990s dared to. The main character has relationships with both male and female characters. That kind of makes it also one of the earliest adventure games to feature bisexuality and a protagonist. Some critics kind of argued that the execution leaned into sensationalism rather than genuine representation. But the representation was there nonetheless and should be recognized from a production standpoint. Puzzle of Flesh still used live action video and digital sets, but its budget was significantly smaller than its predecessor. It did not have Roberta Williams involved, so it didn't have her writing, nor did it have Sierra's top creative talent behind it. And frankly, that difference showed. Whereas the original Phantasmagoria was kind of framed as an ambitious cinematic experience, the sequel was more of a mid FMV full motion video thriller. It was earnest in its attempts to push boundaries, but it kind of lacked the same sense of scale or polish that was reflected in its reception. Critical reception was mixed at best. Some reviewers appreciated its willingness to tackle taboo subjects but many felt the game was campy and poorly acted and the puzzles that they included did little to take away or add to that experience. So it should be no surprise that that commercially it underperformed significantly compared to the sales of the original. By96 here with puzzle of Flesh, the full motion video trend was kind of already on its decline. 3D graphics technology was rapidly advancing. We've talked about that in many episodes with games like Quake and Tomb Raider that were pushing it. And so what once felt cutting edge a year, two years sooner was really genuinely now starting to feel outdated. And so because Puzzle of Flesh was so mid, it did not have the staying power to overcome that perception that it was already technologically outdated.

At least it had a cool name, but that's it.

What it is remembered for though, is its audacity. It was fearless, sometimes recklessly fearless according to people, in exploring identity and trauma and sexuality in a few in a way that few games had never even attempted. And while it didn't achieve the same level of success its predecessor, it did carve out its own strange cult legacy as one of the like last gaps of the full motion video era. Looking back, I think it's fair to say that Phantasmagoria as a series is very much a product of its time. While it remains controversial, its legacy in that respect is undeniable, right? For Sierra it represented both the peak of their creative ambition and the beginning of a difficult transition. Because within a few years that company would be sold leadership with Swift, AKA the Williams, would kind of move away from Sierra Online and the kind of bold experimentation that gave us Phantasmagoria would kind of give its way to a more risk adverse approach. Basically the corporate overlord approach is what takes over. So I guess in hindsight, in terms of its place in gaming history, Phantasmagoria feels more like one of the last great gambles of what's known as the golden Sierra era. It's a monument also to the rise and fall of the fomotion video craze in 95. It was cutting edge. It was proof that CD ROMs and live action cinematics could transform gaming. But just a year, literally just a year later, it was, it was part of a genre that was already eclipsed by the increasingly increasing evolution of true 3D graphics. And so compared to that, it's flaws, the limited interactivity, the awkward acting, the heavy file sizes, they really showed the limits of full motion video just as clearly as its ambition at the time showed its potential.

Right.

For the horror genre. Though I think it left an important mark, it proved at a time when this didn't exist that there was a real audience for mature cinematic horror experiences in gaming. And that DNA, that concept can be traced forward into survival horror classics like Resident Evil and Silent Hill and very much into the modern narrative drive and horror like until dawn and the Dark Pictures Anthology. And while the technology changed and we got away from motion video, the idea that a video game could feel like a horror movie never really ever went away. Now, even today, Phantasmagoria lives on. It's been re released on platforms like Good Old Gaming, so retro fans, streamers and horror enthusiasts can keep revisiting it. Some admire its ambition, others like the laugh at its campy excess. Some play it simply to appreciate its place in gaming history. It may not be universal beloved, but it is unforgettable. It's a game that dared to push boundaries at a time when the media was still defining itself. As we leave the Haunted Mansion of Phantasmagoria, we're reminded of how Sierra Online wasn't afraid to gamble big with technology, with storytelling, and with the very boundaries of what a game can be. It may not have aged perfectly, but it lasts a loving but it laugh but it left a lasting legacy in horror, full motion video and interactive cinema. And of course, this is just one stop on our trip down memory card lane. If you'd like to Explore more of Sierra's story, you can go back to episode 89, the quest for the Crown, where we covered Roberta Williams and the Bertha Kings Quest, or check out episode 201, let's get lucky where we dove into Legion Suit Larry and Sierra's quirkier side. And if you're in the mood for more horror history, you'll want to revisit episode 196 Dark Seed or or episode 252 on Eternal Dark On Eternal Darkness. You can find all of these episodes along with our show notes on our website at www.memorycardlane.com. rob what else can our listeners find on our site?

You can find a calendar of our future episode topics. Know what we are going to be talking about in our coming shows. You can find a link to our Patreon where you can help support us and get access to ad free and unedited versions of our episodes. You can find links to our Discord where you can come chat with Dave and I about episode topics or whatever else gaming related or not that you find. Fancy that you want to talk to the two castings about and you can also find links to our social media where I am on several platforms as Rob O Raptor and Dave.

I can be found on various platforms as David is wrong. Each week ladies and gentlemen will tell you one story relevant the current waking game history. It can be about a game console technology. We did a circus once. We do all sorts of fascinating stories throughout gaming history. While telling you each story we hope to teach you something new about the topic. What it took from the world as its inspiration or what it gave back to the world in its legacy. Each week when we sit down to research a new topic, we get excited, we find new things, they're exciting. We want to bring you all the weird, quirky, kooky things stuff about gaming, all the new stories that you may have never visited before. And this is one of the best things we do. We learn things and we get to excitedly teach you things. So it is recognition of this cycle of like learning and teaching, teaching and learning. We like to talk about what we've learned each week. So Rob, what did you learn today?

Well, I think my favorite takeaway from this is just the pure size of the game for its time. I mean we think about it now and you know, this is probably gigabyte. Someone's going to look it up and they'll tell me exactly what the size of this is. And it's not anything comparable to games nowadays but for the time seven CDs is mind blowing. I remember, I think the most that I ever had was three for one of the Grand Theft Auto games or Final Fantasy 7. Wasn't 7 on 2 disc or was.

That 333 or 3 or 3 3.

So I remember 3. And when I think the GTA, now that I'm thinking about it, I'm pretty sure that was just a two day. It was a two disc but it was two different edition. You had the Standard or the, the London edition, the UK edition, I forget which it was but seven discs for a single game is just mind boggling to me. And all it takes is losing one.

All it takes is. Yeah, that was definitely a problem back when you scratch like this three, you were screwed.

Yeah.

So Good Old Games has the series on it. I went and looked it up. If you want to play phantasmagoria it's 10 bucks. If you want to play a puzzle of flesh it's $6 or you can buy them both together for 13.

Okay.

The first game, the size of it and this isn't going to be the same size as old because you know things have Changed. Yeah. The size of it nowadays is 1.8 gigs for the first one and 1.9 for the second one.

So I wasn't terribly far off when I said a gig that's 50%. But you know, in today's gaming, yeah.

And they're not long games because, you know, now they show you on like good old games how long games take. The first Phantasmagoria has a six hour time to beat. Actually they're both six hour games, so we spend way more time playing that sometimes. Which means in a weekend you could probably comfortable play through comfortably play through both these games.

Very true, very true. Very, very true. If you're interested, go give it a try. But seven discs back in the day, that is just insane to me. So that's, that's my big takeaway. Dave, what about yourself?

Well, you like the scope of the memory? I had no clue about the scope of the production. You know it. You don't ever go into the mid-90s thinking that someone, someone literally built a studio and did a Hollywood film production to make a video game. You know, we talk about a couple hundred people making a game and nowadays that's pretty freaking normal, right? Like if you're in a triple A title, you're gonna have hundreds of people making a game. But this wasn't now, this was 1995. This was a time when the industry was changing from the 8 bit era into the 16 bit and beyond era, so to speak. Because in the 8 bit era you had really small teams that made games, right? And now we're kind of increasing that, but we're still not at the point where we are now where hundreds of people do it. So to have a sudden production that takes years and hundreds of people is surprising. I really enjoyed learning about the scope of this production. So that was what I learned today.

Well, it is pretty amazing when you stop and think about it. You know, I just. For the time, it's unprecedented. And it's like I said, it's like a movie. It's not like you think a video game for the time they treated it like a movie. And that's, you know, it's, it's interesting.

It's cool.

Still, seven discs, come on.

Seven discs. All right, Rob, well, before I wrap it up and take it into next week, is there anything you'd like to add to today's episode?

I'll just take one quick moment to say thank you so much to everyone for listening. It means the world to us to have you along as we take deeper dives into all of these crazy zany games and consoles and whatever else gaming related that we feel like talking about week after week. So thank you for joining and we hope to see you next time.

Roberta Williams Vision gave us a game that was as shocking as it was groundbreaking. One that sparked debate, drew controversy, and ultimately left a lasting mark on both horror and interactive cinema. It may not have been perfect, but it proved that video games could reach into darker, more cinematic territory. And it left behind a legacy that still echoes to that respect today. So whether you're wandering haunted mansions or breaking new ground in your own creativity, always remember the power of storytelling and gaming. This time we got to do adult themes, right? Next week we'll trade the haunted halls for the open highway with Road rash. Released in 1991, this adrenaline charged racer put you on a motorcycle and then handed you a chain. Because winning wasn't just about crossing the finish line, it was about surviving the ride. With its mix of speed, combat and attitude, Road Rash carved out its own rebellious corner of racing history and became an instant classic. Join us as we look at how it redefined the genre, spawned sequels, and left skid marks all over gaming culture. On next week's wild ride down Memory Card Lane.