[00:00:00] Clip: His interests include skydiving, channeling ancient spirits, and stamp collecting 

I don't collect stamps. You're making that up

Words sound really interesting when you think of them as just being sounds.

[00:00:30] Ian: Hello, everybody, and welcome to the Inter Millennium Media Project podcast. I'm Ian Porter. 

[00:00:36] Matthew: And I'm Matthew Porter. 

[00:00:38] Ian: I'm his son, he's my dad, and I've taken over for two days in a row, two episodes in a row. My goodness. Oh, my goodness. 

[00:00:47] Matthew: You've had a lot to cover, though. 

[00:00:49] Ian: I have. Because the first one, talking about other things, from this creative group, was really just the appetizer.

We talked last episode all about Humongous Entertainment, about their games like Freddi Fish and Spy Fox and such, but that's because I needed to set up context of what we mean when we're talking Humongous Entertainment, because there's one game series that I played so much of as a kid. I memorized these games and they have seeped into phrases I'm pretty sure I've used on this podcast, let alone in my daily life, and that is Pajama Sam.

[00:01:34] Matthew: Pajama Sam was such a part of your childhood, and therefore such a part of early parenting for, Mrs. Darling Wife and me. 

[00:01:43] Ian: Yeah. I, I, I remember playing these games and, um, uh, either you or Mom just sitting there playing with him, and the two of you cracking up at the jokes in these, at me finding them hilariously funny.

And in the weirdest way, these being games who are just the right amount of simple, that I was starting to understand what was running them in the background, and that led to future fascinations and, technological love in terms of, games and modding games and things like that in my modern day.

[00:02:24] Matthew: It's kind of like that moment when you're reading books as a kid and you suddenly realize, oh, there's somebody who wrote this book and decided that this should happen in chapter three so that this could happen in chapter five. We could almost see that light bulb go on about somebody created this as a game and structured it the way that it is structured for a reason.

[00:02:47] Ian: Absolutely. That was a major part of these I wanted to kind of establish in the previous episode, Humongous Entertainment is, this excellent brand of point and click adventure games made by these, former Lucas Arts employees who went off to build their own humor, child-focused, educational, but in the most roundabout way, games.

And these came into our house to be played on the family computer via Circuit City and the things like that But each of their games had a distinct niche, not just in terms of age range, but also in just terms of tone and style Freddi Fish was a m- very young kid aimed, , mystery series.

Spy Fox was a James Bond parody aimed for slightly older kids, I think. And the sports games were their own side project. But right in between those other two, right in between Freddi Fish and Spy Fox was Pajama Sam, whose style is something I'd want to describe as David Lynch for children.

[00:04:10] Matthew: That is not far off. 

[00:04:12] Ian: . It's... It is weird. It is surreal. And it is full of the sort of commentary on social scenarios and modern day life that you'd expect to see from a late night show more than you would from a kids game at times. 

[00:04:31] Matthew: It's, it's weird and yet it has a consistent internal logic.

[00:04:36] Ian: Mm-hmm. 

[00:04:36] Matthew: It very quickly establishes a world in which certain things make sense because that's how things work in this world, and then it's consistent and you can kind of start relying on it. And, and it's so full of weird and subversive humor. 

[00:04:52] Ian: Yes. Uh, if I wanna give an example of, like, the kind of thought process that these games use, there's one puzzle early on in the first game that I'm gonna go to, and that one's probably not even the one that you're thinking of right now, Dad.

[00:05:10] Matthew: Yeah. 

[00:05:10] Ian: That is a gondola- 

[00:05:12] Matthew: Yes ... 

[00:05:13] Ian: that you have to use to get up into a building. And it's a world where everything is vaguely sentient. Everything's got cartoonish eyes in that, you know, children's kids game style, and yet that means every single thing in the world has agency. So you've gotta, like, move the rocks into the basket, and there's this entire thing of our little kid character reaching for one of the rocks, and all the rocks just sitting there in a little stack turning to look at each other.

And there's this long wait. And then one of them decides to hop into his hands to let you solve the puzzle. And it's that thing. It's like, we're gonna make the kids just sit and wait for a couple of seconds while the rocks deliberate that, that sets this weird tone of, like, the world is not sure of you.

The world is deciding what it wants to do with you. And whether or not you're making it through these puzzles is not completely up to you, kid. 

[00:06:21] Matthew: And so many of the puzzles do involve persuasion of some kind. 

[00:06:28] Ian: Oh, 

[00:06:28] Matthew: yeah. And this first game that we're talking about is, is Pajama Sam in No Need to Hide When It's Dark Outside.

Each of the games is kind of teaching the kids about some aspect of maturity. Don't be afraid of thunder and lightning. Don't be afraid of the dark when you're... It's time for bed, things like that.

[00:06:43] Ian: Mm-hmm. I think I only played the first two when I was a kid, but they did l- like, two more from there. 

[00:06:48] Matthew: Yeah. And, and yet the puzzles you have to solve, they're very often having to persuade one of these sentient things in this world that you explore to do something that helps you, as opposed to just find the thing.

You've got everything from the waiting for the rocks to decide to let you pick them up to the, the revolutionary carrots in the carrot patch. Yes. And you have to make a deal with their sort of Marxist leader to - 

[00:07:24] Ian: Oh, absolutely 

[00:07:25] Matthew: ... to liberate the rest of the carrots, and thereby he will let... He'll give you back something that you lost

[00:07:31] Ian: They've got like, yeah, they've got like a Che Guevara carrot going on here. I was like, what in the world is going on?

More so than anything else I played as a kid, this one is it's not just, jokes that will go over the kids' heads, it's jokes thrown with such wild force right above the kids' heads that the kids will notice that there are jokes that are not there for them It's like it's not subtle about that, and that leads to this brilliant instance of like, what are they referencing?

Am I old enough to ask what they're referencing? 

[00:08:14] Matthew: And the first times we were playing this, y- your mom and I w- watching this and playing this with you, there were so many jokes that had us wondering, "This is in a kids game." Yeah. Why? They're obviously putting these in to entertain themselves, the developers, and also to entertain us, the parents, who they know , are ideally gonna be playing these with their kids.

And yet, I mean, there was nothing inappropriate. It's not as if there was some- Mm-hmm ... joke that was inappropriate for, for younger players, and therefore the parents wouldn't want to explain them. No, it was just there, there was a sophistication and an expectation that you understand the context of these jokes, that they clearly were not made for the kids, and yet they did prompt you to ask questions.

Mm-hmm. Which in turn I think helped develop your understanding of humor and how humor works. 

[00:09:05] Ian: Oh, absolutely. There's, another piece in the first game. There's an entire set of, potential challenges because like any Humongous Entertainment game, every single time you play through it'll randomize which of the puzzle pieces you'll need.

Like, you're, you're going to find these items, but they're going to be put in one of three places each, and that means there's a lot of replayability. But one of the things it can lead you to is playing a quiz show. A strange out of pocket, out of nowhere quiz show with a pair of doors. The funny thing is every time you come back to that room- The doors will be talking with each other, and they've got an entire little back and forth comedy bit before Sam walks back onto the screen.

And I'm th- it's like you walk into this room and you get this whole like, "Oh yeah, you know, my contract's coming up. I'm not sure if I should renew." It's like, you got the other half of a doorframe. Of course you've got to renew. I'm doing this show too. It's like they're doing back and forth comedy bits before you even get to keep playing.

The comedy is front and center. 

[00:10:10] Matthew: That's a , great example in the way that , this setting, this cartoonish world, which is kind of the Oz-like world beyond- Mm-hmm ... Sam's, uh, closet door when he goes searching for something in his closet late at night. This world, it is not just a cartoon that's waiting for Sam to show up for things to happen.

There is always the sense that this is a living world in which these are all characters, these are all people who have their own... well, people, doors- Yeah ... potatoes, carrots, whatever. They all have their own lives, and they're doing their thing, and Sam kinda shows up and interrupts them- Yes ... and pulls them into his story for a moment.

But they've got their own stories. 

[00:10:52] Ian: Got their own stories. Well, he doesn't just show up and pull them into his story. He walks into the place, loudly announces, "I'm here to imprison the guy who runs this benevolent kingdom"- 

[00:11:03] Matthew: Yes ... 

[00:11:04] Ian: and stick him in a lunchbox. And everybody just is like, 'cause the entire point is like I'm afraid of the Darkness, so I'll go find Darkness, capture him with a flashlight and a lunchbox, and I'll use a mask so my identity is protected.

And everyone's response is just like, "Why?" "That kinda sounds mean. You sure about this, kid?" 

[00:11:28] Matthew: And it's all inspired by, uh, Sam's favorite superhero, Pajama Man.

[00:11:34] Ian: Yeah. A- it's the fact that you're going through this entire quest- ... and the entire game is constantly saying, "Really?" Is that what you want to do? It's, it's, I... There's a lot of video games out there in the modern day even that would, could be considered like a power fantasy.

It's like, "Oh, I can do this brave, amazing thing." Pajama Sam 1 is one of the few instances I've seen that is truly a, like, a power reality check. Right. It's like, like I want to go have power to defeat something that is causing me trouble, and it's like, "Have you considered the moral implications of your actions?"

It's like, "We are a game for children." "Let's talk ethics." 

[00:12:21] Matthew: Even as it presents a game in which you are progressing and you're solving puzzles in order to achieve the, uh, the goal that you have set out at the beginning, it does keep questioning that goal and asking, "Is, is this what you want to do with all the things you're accomplishing?"

And, and eventually- Mm-hmm ... with spoilers as usual when we're talking about movies or TV shows or games. Right. Eventually, it does ask that question of, you know, who is Darkness and is he really a bad guy? And- Yeah ... in the end, he winds up becoming friends with Darkness and playing games with him, and, and he realizes that, you know, Darkness is kind of just a guy who likes to have friends and play games and all this.

[00:13:02] Ian: Yeah. I didn't expect a morally gray answer from a bright blue child. And a being of literal shadow. but then the entire game has a weird dark undertone at times. 

[00:13:17] Matthew: It does. Even, even things that are outside of Sam's perception that we see about the world- 

[00:13:23] Ian: Mm-hmm ... 

[00:13:23] Matthew: can be really weird and dark.

[00:13:26] Ian: Yeah. , There's a mine cart stuck rusted to the rails who kind of in- acknowledges that he is an immortal object and will sit here for eternity- ... unless you do something. It's just, you know, "Nah, I'm, I'm fated to sit here forever staring at what I cannot do." It's like, okay then. Or the, the, the scene that broke my mother.

[00:13:54] Matthew: Yes. It's early in the game. Early and frequently. And definitely set the tone for what to expect from this game. 

[00:14:00] Ian: Where you have to convince a boat named Otto that he can float because he's absolutely certain he can't. 

[00:14:08] Matthew: He's- And Otto talks like this really great slightly cartoonish Peter Lorre impression.

[00:14:13] Ian: Absolutely. It's a Peter Lorre impression through and through. It's, "I'm Otto. I'm made of wood, you know. But wood does not float." 

[00:14:21] Matthew: Yes. He's a boat that's afraid he's gonna sink because he's made of wood, and wood sinks. Wood doesn't float. And he, I forget where he heard this,

[00:14:31] Ian: it's like from my cousin's friend's dentist. 

[00:14:34] Matthew: Something like that, yes. 

[00:14:35] Ian: it's... He, like, he like ends , this weird, anxiety rant with wishing he'd been a car instead. But you've gotta go find a board of wood and toss it in this little pond, and show him that it floats to convince him that it's okay. And he's like, "Okay." And now you've got a boat that'll take you around the water.

It's great. And as you leave the first time- The plank of wood you use to show him that he'll float just tips up and sinks like a miniature Titanic. As a game design, it makes complete sense. They don't wanna have this little object sitting there every time you load the screen. It's a reset. But they didn't have to animate it and give it little sound effects , of it going glub, glub, glub as it sinks into the water.

It's only there to make you suddenly really nervous that you've led this boat astray and you're gonna die. 

[00:15:38] Matthew: And that, that phrase, and the board sank. 

[00:15:42] Ian: Yeah. 

[00:15:43] Matthew: That, uh, I remember us repeating that so many times because we were so both disturbed and impressed by that in this game design. 

[00:15:51] Ian: It's just the first time you, you know, put in this, "Oh, hey, it's another game from Humongous Entertainment.

We'll put it on." "Oh, this is lovely. We're playing around." And just, "Huh? Uh? Ah." You're like... That, that's where I describe it being akin to David Lynch. There's that unease, that slight sense of, like, uncertainty of the world that is, you know, very Twin Peaks, very, very weird. Like, the entire game should really have a, a theremin in the background just never letting you quite rest.

[00:16:30] Matthew: And it's a good example of how the gameplay works, in that before you got to Otto- Mm-hmm ... you saw this plank of wood somewhere, but you couldn't reach it, so you have to go to one place to get some rope, and the rope allows you to lasso the plank of wood and haul it up onto the bridge with you. And that allows you to bring the wood and show Otto that, yeah, wood floats.

[00:16:52] Ian: Mm-hmm. And then Otto lets you get to other places with other puzzles that m- you have to solve by finding other items in other rooms. It's, it's standard point and click in that sense, but it's very well done, and this I don't wanna call it a colorful art style. It kind of is, but it's a very, very moody art style, especially for the first game.

gives you a lot of interesting environments to look at, and each of those pages, it's worth going back to. There's plenty going on, and it's a Humongous Entertainment game. You can click on 17 things on every page, and they make weird sound effects and jingle around and do odd stuff. But I replayed the game for this podcast episode, and I was able to just play through without clicking on other random items.

And they were still well-made and fun. That, that jingling keys for kids element- ... was not the only appeal. They were well-built games on their own. 

[00:17:53] Matthew: Yeah, they were well-structured. And all of those other things, in some, to some extent it was the designers taking advantage of the freedom the CD-ROMs gave them to include so many little bits of animation and to include so many little bits of sound, that any given thing could have two dozen possible animations and noises. So you always had cool things to, to look at and poke around at. And it also, the game itself rewarded things, because very often, of the seven different random things on the screen you could click, one of them might give you a clue what you need to come back and do in this screen later.

[00:18:34] Ian: Mm-hmm. And yeah Sam's story is well-established, the system of being able to get hints, click him and he'll think, he'll talk his thoughts out, make him a very good protagonist for that sort of structure you're describing. It g- it means that there's never a true way to get stuck unless something goes wrong with the game program it's hard to actually be lost, although they are weird and winding.

And yet they're animated here and back. Everything, every direction you can walk, every combo you might do has a voice clip or an animation. And some of these animations are detailed, complicated, multi-camera angle, very well done for being able to make things feel energetic and successful. But it's a cartoon show that randomizes every time that you can re-watch with new story pieces.

[00:19:26] Matthew: And it is, you're right, it, it's, it's really not possible to get locked in this game. It is possible to get to a point where you're really not sure what to do next. Yeah. Especially if you missed clicking something that might have given you a clue. But then you can just wander around looking for what's next, and there's enough interesting stuff that that's not a boring process.

[00:19:45] Ian: Yeah. 

[00:19:45] Matthew: And, and you talked about the art style a bit. When we were talking about Freddy Fish, we described that as being very coloring book-like. 

[00:19:53] Ian: Mm-hmm. 

[00:19:54] Matthew: This advances a bit more, and it's more comic book-like. It's more structured. It's a little better defined graphics, more layers in- Yes ... the, uh, the images, more sense of space and perspective.

It's not just a flat screen to interact with with water in the background. Instead, it is, you can interact with things on different planes of, uh, of the visuals. It's al- it's all simple animation, and simple drawing, but they use little perspective tricks to make it seem bigger and richer.

[00:20:26] Ian: Yeah. And I would definitely say it's comic book, but it's also got some classical art in there. The first game has some impressionist in it- Yes ... with its weird swirly environments. There's, there's a little something, um

I'm gonna, I'm gonna pull in one of my favorite painters of all time. There's a little something Rene Magritte about the strange, like, not quite real spaces. Like, the room designs don't fit together. 

[00:20:56] Matthew: Yes. 

[00:20:56] Ian: Which actually also fits this very much like a kid imagining spaces. The logic isn't quite there.

But if you try to map everything, it doesn't work 

[00:21:08] Matthew: Yeah, and, the adjective dreamlike is, is- Mm-hmm ... used a whole lot. But here it, it is both accurate to, I think, the style, and it fits the story. Because this is all about a kid checking out his closet to see if there's a monster in there when he's half asleep already because it's bedtime.

Yeah, it is gonna be dreamlike. It is going to be odd. Absolutely. And, and the first few screens that he visits, the first few locations, have random things from his closet. You know, a baseball glove and a jacket- Mm ... or whatever. And, l- there's less and less of that the deeper he gets into this world. It's, it is kind of a Narnia thing where he's going through his actual closet into this world led by Darkness.

[00:21:54] Ian: He literally does get stopped by border patrol the moment he crosses into the fully non-closet environment and has all his stuff confiscated. 

[00:22:02] Matthew: That's true. 

[00:22:03] Ian: That's... Huh. 

[00:22:06] Matthew: Yeah, it w- And that's what drives a lot of the puzzles. He has to get back- Mm-hmm ... all of the things that he had taken away from him when he showed up.

And he needs those before he confronts Darkness. And that's where he has his Pajama Man mask and for some- the, the, uh, the revolutionary carrot winds up using that- Yeah ... to protect his identity from the man. 

[00:22:28] Ian: But all of his items could go different places. You find them, and in the end you get, you, you meet the, you meet Darkness.

You have an ending. And the ending itself completely depends on whether or not you did a side mini game of- ... learning tic-tac-toe-

The first one, though, is the one I played the most. Th- there is a room I would go back to just because all of the things to... There's no good reason to do so, but the characters were fun enough. There is a room with three candles. 

[00:23:02] Matthew: Yes. 

[00:23:03] Ian: And each of them is a different personality, and they are all just stand-up routines.

But the order you click them in is a different sequence of jokes. And so you can, like, three different characters, three different personalities, and you... I don't think you can ever click the same candle twice. But there's an entire flowchart there of different potential answers and joke combinations. 

[00:23:29] Matthew: And all of these random lines that they might deliver, they fit together in different ways.

But however they fit together, it always seems as if they are responding to one another and actually having a conversation. 

[00:23:42] Ian: Like, somebody took a while to program that one room, but they did it so perfectly. I would f- I would play the game, not even have a puzzle that needs that room, and just go there to listen to the jokes again.

Just the candles saying, "Well, here we are, burning." And that was the start of every joke. It was... I, uh, it, it, that is where I'm saying that this game changed my sense of humor, where it affected the way I think and live nowadays. Because there's that love of the, the absurdist. There's a love of the, of that kind of structured pattern-breaking comedy that Pajama Sam had in there.

There are, there's humor, the sense of humor from people who worked at Hu- Humongous Entertainment that they put into this game, and it changed my own sense of humor as a child. 

[00:24:41] Matthew: I think it is safe for me to say that for our family, our favorite late night comedy show was The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson.

[00:24:51] Ian: Yes. 

[00:24:52] Matthew: I think Humongous Entertainment primed you to enjoy that when you got older. 

[00:24:57] Ian: Oh, absolutely. You could have put entire segments from Craig Ferguson's show- ... in the middle of Pajama Sam game, and they wouldn't have felt out of place. It's, it's got that same, I don't wanna call it irreverent, I wanna call it reverently bombastic humor.

It's not here to put anybody down. It's just here to say, "Ain't this all weird?" 

[00:25:26] Matthew: It's, it's not afraid to be smart. It's also not afraid to be goofy and silly. 

[00:25:33] Ian: Mm-hmm.

And that, that is why I loved that game. I played the first game to death. I could immediately know which paths I had gotten in the randomizer after a few pages. I knew the answers to every piece of it. And I, I loved that game. And somehow still my favorite jokes are in the second game. 

[00:26:02] Matthew: Is that right? 

[00:26:03] Ian: Yes, because the second game is the one where Sam takes on corporate office culture.

And those are the ones that still pop up in my head today- ... at my current work. 

[00:26:17] Matthew: And it's corporate office culture representing cosmic weather control up in the clouds, because- Yeah ... this one is, uh, Thunder and Lightning Aren't So Frightening. 

[00:26:28] Ian: Where he's bothered by a thunderstorm, so he decides, "I'm gonna go talk to them about shutting this off."

He climbs up into the attic, winds up in the clouds, and goes into the offices to file a complaint. , Every machine in the place gets broken because he hits the big red button, and chaos ensues. 

[00:26:50] Matthew: Yeah, why do they have that button? That button is not a thing. It was 

[00:26:54] Ian: just- I believe the why do we have that button is the question directly asked and never answered- It should be

in the background lines, which is the sort of writing that makes this so great. And this one, they're having fun with these weird towering concoctions and, machines that run the weather. Giant percolators that gather sunlight. 

[00:27:17] Matthew: It's a little more Dr. Seuss-like, the way the, the illustrations in this one have that weird loopy shapes and perspective and things.

[00:27:28] Ian: Very much so. And it's got kind of two different sides. It's got the factory floor side, and it's got , the offices side. But it's the same sort of game. Oh, everything broke. There's four things you need to find. Go find the things, fix the machines, and everything will be okay. Because with the br- with the machines broken, weather across the world is going crazy.

the puzzles themselves are a little less complex. I think there's fewer potential settings. I'm not sure. But something about the humor, it felt more polished in the second one. 

[00:28:07] Matthew: I think it was. It was a little more focused. I think that some of the puzzles were a little sharper in that there was more back and forth and more precision required- Mm-hmm

in terms of not, you know, video game timing, but understanding what needed to happen in what order. And again, it was impossible to get locked, but it could leave you wondering, "Okay, there are, like, three different things I think I maybe I could do. Which one do I need to do now?" Which is not a bad part of puzzle-solving.

[00:28:39] Ian: Not bad at all. Um, I'm just thinking of the jokes, though. The idea of walking into a place, and the second game does a lot more with clicking on things more than once to create a sequence of returning to a joke. It's the walking into an office building. There's a front desk, and there's a little bowl of nuts there.

And you go over to click on it. It's like, "Oh, you're looking quite lovely today," and Sam just stops, pulls his hand away, goes back to where he stands. If you keep clicking them, they say different little things to you. You know, "Oh, you're a very lovely shade of blue." And, you know, "Have you done something different with your hair?"

And it's like, why do they do that? "Oh, they're complimentary nuts." "I think it's to keep you from eating them." It's like, okay. That's the sort of jokes this is. They're not, they're not grand, but they're dang well made. 

[00:29:44] Matthew: And Sam, who is this blue shaded little kid. At one point he's in another office and there's a photocopier.

One of the random things you can do is click on the photocopier, which makes Sam sit on it and push the button to make a photocopy. And then the paper comes out blank.

[00:30:01] Ian: "Oh, I must be non-photo blue." I remember that so clearly because I then had turned to you and asked, "What's non-photo blue?" 

[00:30:13] Matthew: So I got to pull out a pencil and say, "This is non-photo blue."

[00:30:15] Ian: You got to pull out your old comic book drafting sets from when you did comics for, I think, your college newspaper. 

[00:30:23] Matthew: Yeah. 

[00:30:24] Ian: And I remember that that led to an entire project that I did in school explaining how comics were made. That one throwaway joke inspired a kid to research things about photocopiers, and printers, and image production, and I'm now a person who works in 3D printing.

I think I can trace a line- ... from Sam making that one joke- 

[00:30:51] Matthew: Yeah ... 

[00:30:51] Ian: and Humongous Entertainment writing that into there, into my career. Because it led me down a path of wondering how copiers work. It's, it's wild, but it's that sort of thing. There's an entire back and forth about, like, having to get files and documents sorted.

You can interrupt a board of directors meeting, which is a bunch of planks of wood debating- ... what they should paint the, corporate, , bathroom instead of getting anything properly done. 

[00:31:27] Matthew: And they're led by a sentient chair because he's the chairman. 

[00:31:31] Ian: Yes. You can in fact, ironically enough, depending on what randomizer you get, find your old friend, the carrot.

[00:31:40] Matthew: Really? 

[00:31:41] Ian: Bring him, install him as a proxy for you on the board- ... and then every time you come back into the room, he's taken over a bit more until he's turning the entirety of the weather operations into a socialist commune- ... where every employee ha- has a percentage ownership, and the board is getting more and more scared of him.

And this is, like, an ongoing story every time you enter the room. It's weird, but strange callback. 

[00:32:15] Matthew: Yes. 

[00:32:18] Ian: Um, I take it the carrot shows up in every game in the series? 

[00:32:24] Matthew: He's just- Which tells- He's an influential character 

[00:32:26] Ian: He's an influential character. I'm starting to wonder if that was a little, like, Humongous Entertainment employee protest or commentary or- Maybe

some- someone's, uh, someone's pr- uh, pet character there or something. even the p- the puzzles are fine, but the background stuff is so well made

Thunder and Lightning themselves feel like a classic comedy duo of this very passive and calm person and the very frantic character And they're this, this running commentary in the background for you. I don't think the world is quite as memorable, but the office jokes of, like, you know, " can I have some staples?"

"Well, no. What if someone needs staples?" "Yeah, I do." Like, this ba- these back-and-forths with the c- with the office supplies manager. Yeah. Things like that is what goes through my head at my day job now. 

[00:33:20] Matthew: I guess in some ways the, the background is necessarily more mundane because it's supposed to be taking weather and making it a mundane, , office environment.

Mm-hmm. And yet it does set up so many then, so many opportunities for jokes about that boring-seeming corporate environment. And yet they still add weird things based upon that, like the, the... There's a room where there's, it's constantly hailing. 

[00:33:48] Ian: Yes. 

[00:33:49] Matthew: And the puzzle is that Sam has to find a, uh, hard hat somewhere in the complex in order to survive going through this room.

This very, you know, uh, strange kind of Rene Magritte sort of surrealism again. 

[00:34:06] Ian: Yeah. A- a- and that even has a funny thing where the first time you enter with a hard hat, Sam, like, realizes it's fine and does a tap dance routine- ... through the room proving that he's fine as hail hits the hard hat. I'm also just thinking, one of the items you have to find every game is a Y pipe that connects multiple devices together.

It's this Pajama Sam game, everything is sentient. So the Y pipe is this little sentient pipe guy who can get stuck in one of a variety of places. The funny thing is that he's a Y pipe, so everything he says is a question. And you, Sam and the pipe get in these little loops of just trying to answer everything.

It's like, "I'm here to rescue you." "Why?" "Because you're needed in the machine." "Why?" "Because it won't work without you." "Why?" "'Cause it was designed that way." "Why?" It's like- ... you can watch, like, this small child have an aneurysm trying to get this object to listen and come with him. 

[00:35:15] Matthew: And in a similar way, the wing nut is very grumpy and distrustful.

[00:35:20] Ian: And is certain he's the most important piece of the entire device. 

[00:35:23] Matthew: Yes. 

[00:35:25] Ian: Also, there's the w- there's an entire puzzle of, , finding the snowflake inspector, who's a device that confirms all the snowflakes are different, 'cause no two snowflakes are the same. But you can't just find him. You have to find the snowflake inspector detector-

who is a separate character whose entire job is just to get the first guy to get to his station and do his job. So there's even, like, commentary on the corporate middle management elements there. 

[00:35:57] Matthew: And yet it opens up this really clever sequence of gameplay, especially for the target- Mm-hmm ... age, because it's a hot and cold game, where you start in one room where you, you activate the detector, and then as you go into other rooms, he tells you if you're getting...

or other screens, he tells you if you're getting warmer or colder. 

[00:36:16] Ian: Mm-hmm. It's a very well-made game. It's funny, and there's not a lot to talk about. I mean, it's kids games. But the style and the design are stuck in my head. And- I've actually gotten to see now, like you can easily type in, codes to see the entire structure, like of how the games are built.

If you go into the games nowadays, . and Control + D, you pull up a little menu, and you can type in room 45, and it'll show you a flowchart of the entire structure of the game. It's supposed to be a debugging tool, but they didn't, they didn't remove these things, which means that they're proud of what they made.

They're proud of the structure. The fact that everything is tied together, the fact that the pieces are laid out the way they are is done so in a way that, as a kid, I was able to start seeing, "Oh, if this is here, then that will be there. Oh, someone had to build this. Someone had to write all these jokes.

Someone had to animate all these scenes." And those are multiple people. I could see the fingerprints of a team building this thing for kids like me to enjoy, and that was very inspirational as a child. 

[00:37:42] Matthew: And the gameplay itself, it rewards curiosity. 

[00:37:46] Ian: Mm-hmm. 

[00:37:46] Matthew: In the same way, the way the game was presented, the way the game was delivered rewarded curiosity outside of the gameplay.

[00:37:55] Ian: Yeah. You didn't get a joke? Ask about it. Nothing they're gonna make a joke about is something that is completely outside of the scope of a kid. Maybe they won't get it all. Maybe the parent will have to explain parts of it, not all of it. But if a joke didn't land and you realize it didn't land for you, you wanna find out why, and then you'll go in.

And then the next time- Yeah ... a joke comes past and you don't know what it's talking about, you're confident you can go look that up and learn something. 

[00:38:32] Matthew: Yeah. 

[00:38:32] Ian: And that was the entire point of their stuff, making these games that were teaching you things. 

[00:38:36] Matthew: Right. 

[00:38:36] Ian: But they weren't educational games. 

[00:38:39] Matthew: And there's the whole, uh, you know, what does this button do aspect of discovering that debug mode and seeing how- Yeah

the game you've just enjoyed is built. 

[00:38:48] Ian: Mm-hmm. 

[00:38:50] Matthew: Well, I think we're headed towards our final questions. 

[00:38:54] Ian: I think so.

Before we do, if you've been enjoying our episodes, either my takeover episodes or the things from my dad's childhood that he usually shows me, you can find us at immproject.com. There you can find all of our back episodes. you can find links to our social media

can find a co- uh, links to our Discord where you can chat with us directly, talk about games. Hey, Discord's got the what game are you playing? You can see next time I fire up, uh, a, uh, Humongous Entertainment game to poke around in my own childhood stuff. You can also find our shop. If you're a fan of coffee mugs or shirts, we've got fun things, be that for the podcast itself, uh, wonderful weird shows that have a similar tone to Pajama Sam, such as The Prisoner or of course the holiday classic that is Die Hard

And you can of course find our Patreon. Our Patreon is where you can hear some bonus episodes or even join our movie club, where you can get, random pieces of media to join us in the same process of exploration that we do every single time

No matter what you do, no matter how you wanna connect with us, we appreciate it if you share the podcast, give it a five-star rating on whatever platform you're on, because the more people that can hear it, and the more people we can talk to, we're always happy to, and we're happy to hear what you think as well.

Dad, where can they find you? 

[00:40:30] Matthew: Well, you can find me just about anywhere as ByMatthewPorter, and that includes bymatthewporter.com, which will have a link to my Blue Sky and Mastodon accounts, where I'm also ByMatthewPorter or YouTube, uh, ByMatthewPorter, where I review, movies and movie theater experiences, among other things.

And also at bymatthewporter.com, you can find, more information about my book. If you like mysteries, if you like humor, if you like strange characters, you will probably enjoy my mystery novel, Questions for the Dead, about a grumpy private eye and his crew of misfit psychics who help him solve crimes.

[00:41:09] Ian: Woo! It's a fun read It's a very, very fun story, and I think it's got a lot of cool concept and nice world building going on. 

[00:41:18] Matthew: Well, thank you. And Ian, where can people find you? 

[00:41:21] Ian: I can be found most places as ItemCrafting, be that ItemCraftingLive on Twitch or ItemCrafting on Blue Sky. I try to stream most every Thursday, and I'm happy to chat about stuff online.

come join me for, building craft projects, playing games, and a general good time. 

[00:41:41] Matthew: I love how you take things from the games that you complete and turn them into props and trophies that you have in your lab there. 

[00:41:50] Ian: I thank you, yeah. I'm slowly building up an armory of completed games, so... Huh.

Well, I think we're coming to our final questions. 

[00:42:03] Matthew: Indeed. 

[00:42:05] Ian: This is a game, so I guess this is, play or no play? 

[00:42:09] Matthew: Yeah. 

[00:42:09] Ian: Oh, yeah, this is a play. Oh, 

[00:42:11] Matthew: totally. 

[00:42:12] Ian: Absolutely. 

[00:42:13] Matthew: Play these games. 

[00:42:14] Ian: Play these games. If you have a kid, play these games with them. They are wonderful. They are, they are fantastic.

And as we're describing, they are not dumbed down, but they are the right tone for kids. If you don't have kids, pour yourself a glass of whiskey- Yeah ... and play these games. They're fun. 

[00:42:36] Matthew: Find them on sale. You can- Play them anyway. You don't have to tell anybody. 

[00:42:39] Ian: They're all on steam. 

[00:42:40] Matthew: Oh, tell us. Tell us, we'd love to hear if you enjoyed these games.

[00:42:42] Ian: We'd love to hear. These are hilarious. These are, even for adults now, I think these are great, and that's surprising to be able to so enthusiastically recommend a kids product to adults feels weird, but these are just so well-crafted and silly that if you're looking for something light that's not gonna take a lot of mind power, but you wanna laugh, these are good.

[00:43:07] Matthew: To refresh my memory for this podcast episode, I watched the play throughs by The Game Grumps on YouTube. Yes. And it was a lot of fun to watch, and you could tell they were kinda having fun playing these, too. 

[00:43:18] Ian: Oh, yeah. I admit, I never played the third or fourth games, but after this podcast episode, I think I'm going to.

[00:43:27] Matthew: Sure, why not? 

[00:43:27] Ian: I'm gonna go explore these because I wanna see how well they kept going. The first two are so great. Ah. That leads to a, to an, an interesting other question though, 'cause our, our normal other thing is revive, reboot, or rest in peace. Now, revive might be weird. Sam was, like, what? Six when the game came out in, like, 1996?

[00:43:52] Matthew: Well, I mean, Sam could be eternally six years old, just like the Peanuts kids were. 

[00:43:58] Ian: He could be. Also the idea of, the, the idea of a Sam that's in his early 30s like me now- ... is just hilarious. It's like, like, "Dude, I don't know what to do. I just got laid off, and if you looked at me, I'm blue." It's like, I don't know, very different story here.

That feels more like what the, uh, what the creator Ron Gilbert has done with things like Thimbleweed Park. Uh

But, so yeah, he could be eternally six, but it's like, do you, continuing from where you left off, you do other story pieces with him. A reboot would be new Pajama Sam, but that's kind of the same thing. And then a rest in peace. What are you thinking, Dad? 

[00:44:46] Matthew: I am thinking that, it's a rest in peace. I don't think we need more of these specific games, partly because we still have the original four, I, I think you said it is, to enjoy.

Partly because the talents behind this have gone on to do other really interesting things. Like you mentioned Thimbleweed Park. Mm-hmm. A weird and fun game, kind of an X-Files parody, but in a point-and-click adventure style. Uh, the, the voice actor who did the voice for Pajama Sam is probably much, much better known as the voice of Bobby Hill in King of the Hill.

[00:45:24] Ian: Yes. 

[00:45:25] Matthew: So I think I'm more interested in seeing and enjoying all the other things that these talented people, all of them l- involved in the game have done and, and are still doing, than I want either them to get back together or other people to try to do what they did to make more of these. So I say rest in peace, and let's enjoy what we've got.

[00:45:47] Ian: I'm absolutely with you. Pajama Sam was excellent, and it says so much that everyone who seems to have worked on this that I can find has gone off to do more in their industry in wonderful ways, and be influential and continue that creativity. Pajama Sam was a coalescing ... of creative people at a specific moment in time.

But I'm not gonna say that I need more of that exact thing when there, when the DNA of this sort of comedy and gameplay and everything else is spread so far and wide. I think that's wonderful. And yeah, this is a, this is a loving rest in peace because it's there when it's needed, and what's there is still good.

[00:46:30] Matthew: it's, it's hard for me to have an accurate perspective maybe, but I don't think that as games they are so old-fashioned that a kid of the appropriate age now, 30 years later, wouldn't still enjoy these games. 

[00:46:43] Ian: Yeah. A few of the references might not land because they were references based on scenarios of the '90s.

[00:46:52] Matthew: Yeah, like TV game shows are not as ubiquitous a reference anymore. 

[00:46:57] Ian: Yeah, but they're not gone. 

[00:46:59] Matthew: Right. 

[00:47:00] Ian: And so it's like, it's, yeah, it balances out. And absolutely, I'm looking at some of these, creative people. Ron Gilbert's releasing stuff just last year. The people who have worked on this are still doing things, and that is wonderful

So I am happy to say that this is a, a loving rest. You know, Sam, go to sleep. It's okay

[00:47:21] Matthew: And with that, I think this was a, a fun takeover. I'm glad we, uh, we got to talk about these Humongous Entertainment games, and I'm glad we got to, to focus on Pajama Sam, because he was certainly the most influential for you. 

[00:47:33] Ian: Oh, absolutely. This, this has been a delightful trip down memory lane, and I do hope that we've convinced you to, to try out some of Humongous Entertainment's games in one form or another for you or your family.

[00:47:47] Matthew: we are going to return to our usual kinds of episode where I introduce Ian to something that was important in, uh, in my youth. But we're spanning generations here- Yeah ... because our next topic is going to be something that I know of and that I experienced as a kid because my dad was such a fan.

[00:48:06] Ian: Oh, yay. Those are always fun ones. I'm looking forward to this now.

So listeners, we'll be back in two weeks with more media from the 20th century 

[00:48:18] Matthew: And in the meantime, uh, go find some old things and some new things to play