Retronauts - Retronauts Episode 414: The Addams Family Games

Episode Date: November 8, 2021

Video games were but the fevered dream of a madman when Charles Addams invented his creepy, kooky cartoon family 85 years ago, but in the futuristic year of 2021, Gomez and his clan of freaks have quite the collection of interactive adaptations under their belts—most of them designed to make children as miserable as Wednesday herself. On this episode of Retronauts, celebrate Halloween as Bob Mackey, Henry Gilbert, and Todd Ciolek dive deep into the surprisingly rich and unsurprisingly gloomy world of Addams Family video games. You'll never realize you craved a Dan Hedaya-based platformer until now! Retronauts is a completely fan-funded operation. To support the show, and get exclusive episodes every month, please visit the official Retronauts Patreon at patreon.com/retronauts.

Retronauts is part of the Greenlit Podcast Network. For more information, please go to greenlitpodcast.com. This week on Retronauts, these games will make you scream. Hello everybody. Welcome to another episode of Retronauts. I'm your host for this one. Bob Mackey, today's podcast is all about Adams Family Games because it's a spooky Halloween edition of Retronauts. And it's extra spooky if you're listening on the free feed because it's like November. But if you're a patron, you got this on Halloween, the perfect time to talk about Adams Family games that are mostly bad but still interesting, just like the Adams family themselves. So five years ago, we talked all about Festers Quest. We We had an entire Retron's Micro about Fester's Quest. That was Matt Retron's Micro of 50. So I figured there's a lot of other Adam's Family Games around that time, and they're worth talking about.

So we're going to be doing that. And there's a surprising amount of them, even though they're mostly related to the two 90s movies. So before I continue, who is with me here today? Who is in the same room with me? Hey, it's Henry Gilbert, and I've got my shawl on for this. Exactly. And by the way, it wasn't until I saw the 2019 movie where they have.

at the end. They do a CGI recreation of those end credits, but they have a foul, a bouncing ball thing with the lyrics. I didn't know until this year it was, so get a witch's shawl on, a broomstick you can crawl on. I didn't know what those lyrics were. I never looked them up, but the movie informed me, and now I feel much smarter. Anyhow, that's besides the point. Who else is here with us today on the line? Well, I am Todd Seelik, and I am lacking any sense of the Aristotelian Unities. Yes, it's a problem we all have. I recommend a few glasses of water every night. But, yes, I want to know up front from all of you on this podcast, what is your experience with the Adams family as a property, the TV show, the movies, the games, the cereal even, the cartoon. There's two cartoons. There's a lot of Adam's family related things happening in our world in the past, like, 60 years. Where did you encounter them? What's your relationship with them? Henry, how about you?

Well, yeah, as a child of the 90s, the debut of the film really got me. like I was pulled in. It was also, it followed the same road that Batman did into my childhood life as well because my mom grew up loving the 60s versions of those. And as those started to rerun again in my childhood, I got into them and then right around the time as the movies started coming out. So, you know, obviously there's very little in common with the Adam West Batman and the Michael Keaton Batman. But Adams Family, the original, graduates well into the live action one. And, yeah, I just loved it.

I loved how hip and cool the Adams family were. The song was catchy. I think he even liked the MC Hammer song. Oh, yeah. There's a tag team song and an MC Hammer song. Tag team song, very lazy. That's one of the laziest songs who's ever been. They took an existing song and put the words, the Adams family in it.

Yeah. but is that the do what you want to do play how you want to play song or am i think that's the mc hammer one yes uh the tag team song is wump there it is the adams family well and that's there it is the adams family yeah there you go yeah i i only just rewatched adam's family values this weekend and was reminded like oh god that song so bad but yeah i loved it in the theaters then the sequel to like and i didn't even realize how you know awesome the cast was was it was one of those things like where I just thought oh things are always good I'm a kid it's a good thing and then as an adult rewatching him I was like oh these are about as good as it can get for remaking a classic intellectual property but as I get older I really appreciate them and I especially like that they're a bunch of like sex crazed weirdos like that's what I love about that but they're sex crazed weirdos who mean well yeah that's important uh Todd how about you well well the first Adam's family thing I ever saw was the cartoon from the 1970s.

It was made in 1973. It only brought back a few of the cast. Apparently it was a spin-off from Scooby-Doo. And I saw this in the late 1980s because some British TV station, my family lived in Germany, and that's what we got, was rerunning it. And my parents knew what it was, but I'd never seen it before. And the cartoon was not very good. I only really remember it because it was one of the few TV shows. that my parents didn't want me watching.

Normally when they didn't want me watching a cartoon, it was because it was something objectionable like Thundercats, talks. But this one, they just told me, this show is terrible. It's not funny. Don't watch it. Wow. So from there, I guess I really, there was only, I can only go up in my estimation of the Ams family

because later, I remember reading about Fester's Quest and Nintendo Power. I didn't play it until years later. But then I remember, of course, the big Adam's family Blitz of the early 90s and I got to see the movies and really liked them so that kind of led me to go back and look at a lot of things

and I'm surprising how the original cartoons and everything all the comics that is and so there's a lot to it so yes after that rough initial first impression

I do like the Adams family a lot you found the house family through a weird source I did too Todd I was exposed to them so there were a lot of reruns of old things on TV when I was a kid

In my area, though, they weren't rerunning the Adams family or the monsters. I grew up watching things like Gilligan's Island, the Brady Bunch, Andy Griffith, Happy Days, Beverly Hillbillies. For some reason, maybe they thought these monsters are too extreme for Ohio viewers to watch. So I was exposed to Adam's family through just like pop culture, osmosis, but also through the game Fester's Quest, where, of course, I was reading every Nintendo Power. And whenever they covered Fester's Quest, I would think, oh, I know the Adam's Family is a TV show and these characters seem fun. But I don't know how to watch it. I don't know where to watch it. I know it's an old show.

But like just reading about that game got me into the idea of the Adams family. And of course, I played the game. I thought I had the problem. It turns out the game did. I will talk more about that soon. But then, of course, the movies came out. I was the perfect stage for it. Nine.

I saw them. I love them. And yeah, like really, it was the Fester's quest to the movie pipeline. And I've honestly have not seen a lot of the black and white TV series. Although I have seen a few episodes here and there on Pluto TV. and they're still really fun. But yeah, weirdly enough, Fester's Quest was the gateway drug to the Adams family. John Aston's voice is still mesmerizing to me.

As a kid, when he would appear as a guest star and stuff, I was like, oh, man, it's Gomez. He's talking. I think I saw him a lot on Nightcourt as the main character's dad before I saw the Adams family. So I had some built-in John Aston love. But since one of our guests, Todd, he's the guy who got the dirt on Festers. Quest. Straight from the source, we'll still talk about the game, but again, we have covered it in 40 minutes on Retronauts Micro50, so check that out if you haven't listened to it. But I still want Todd to tell the story himself when we get there to covering the games. But yes, that is the first Adam's Family game and has an interesting story behind it. And by the way, I want to play out. This episode is topical. I didn't just pull this idea out of my ass because there is a new Adams Family movie in theaters now. Probably not anymore because it did very badly. But the Adams Family 2, they're Adam's Family Vacation movie. I saw it in theaters.

It was perfectly cromulent. And, of course, it's also the 30th anniversary of the first movie that came out in 91. Which that then was the 25th anniversary of the TV series ending. Yeah. When you had mentioned you had seen that, to me, that you'd seen that movie in theaters. I was like, wait, they made a sequel to that? And also, like, every Hotel Transylvania, it was their third one where they go on vacation. Like, it's always vacation in one of these sequels.

Yeah, like all these other monster-based things beat Adam's Family to the Punch in terms of CGI movies. But the first one did pretty good, but second one, it's all right. But, you know, it's good to see Adam's Family Awareness is still alive today. It really seems to work in cycles, I guess. I mean, I could compare it to Garfield, how, you know, there's a deliberate attempt to pull the brand back when it seems like it's getting too much. But it's basically Evergreen. And I'm kind of interested in hearing which side of the Adams family and Munster's debate. you guys follow on because I have very strong feelings yes believe me we'll get into this

oh boy first I want to cover the first I want to cover the origins of the idea of the Adams family. So Adam's family, created by Charles Adams, very clever naming there. They're his family, the little characters he created. He was born in 1912, died in 1988. It's no coincidence that Fester's Quest came out in 1989.

Widows were approving a lot of projects in 1989. Oh, man. The lady Coyleton, I learned to be about her. She's crazy. Though the individual TV characters were not named until the TV show came around. And the only reason

that Gomez is typically seen as a non-white character is that there was a choice of one or of two names and they chose Gomez. That's the only reason why. Well then Rao Julia you know actually codify it was that it was a non-white man

playing him for the first time not and now he's Oscar Isaac in the new movies. Yeah which that it did not to talk about those new movies too early but all that those voice casting is like couldn't they just be a live action one why can't they be the live action people. I agree. I guess

the actors won't sit still and be painted up for movies anymore. They'll do a voice acting because that'll be like three days tops of their lives. Everything needs to be in front of a green screen for them to be in it. But yeah, so the Adams family originated as a series of New Yorker cartoons.

One panel comics and Adams would write and draw around 150 of these total. So to date published works of the Adams family, there were only 150 single panel strips that were published. Sorry, single panel comics that were published in total it's part of the new yorker cinematic universe with that uh that guy with the monocle and the butterfly yeah he's in there too uh and and a lot of psychiatrists seven

thousand psychiatrists i you know i had an uncle who was the comic book expert uncle of mine and when i told him like oh yeah i like the adam's family he's like did you know it was a comic strip i was like what and that he showed me some of the like classics that he had in in collections around and I was like wow look at that it's kind of disappointing that you can read let's say every garfield ever written you can just go on to like what gocomics.com and say computer show me every garfield yeah you can start in 78 work your way up to 2021 and read the entire garfield run to read these comics I'm sure a lot of them are online if you do Google image searches you can find them but there's one comprehensive thing that's out right now a 2010 hardcover called the

Adams family and evolution. That is the only place I know of that actually contains all of the Adams works and some that were not published. How can they not have a digital deal for that yet? That's crazy. Yeah, I don't know why, but I mean, they're like, you can probably read a third of them, just people have scanned them or just like, again, Google Image Church will find you a lot of them.

But again, but this is not available digitally, but this could be the one hardcover book in the past five years that I actually buy because I can't get it anywhere else. Oh, go ahead, Todd Now, does that just have The Adams Family cartoons Or does it have like all of his other New Yorker cartoons Which were, you know, like, I guess It was kind of like the far side

Where he would have little Grim little jokes as well About unrelated characters I think it does It might contain some of his other cartoons But you can actually see those two online Because he didn't just do Adam's family stuff Because he had, I mean, they made him a lot of money

But he was also a working artist So his story is very, interesting. He was not this morbid morose guy you might think he is. He took his work very seriously, Charles Adams did, but his friends knew him as an eccentric fun-loving ladies man who was a hit of parties, always doing like fun tricks

and pranks. And the 2006 biography about him called Charles Adams a cartoonist life was just republished like this week. So I've got that coming to me on Kindle on the 27th of October, so it looks like a really fun read. That's nice. And he sounds like a Gomez-Adams figure

himself there. Everybody thinks he be dark, but he's actually just a fun dude at parties. And you mentioned he dated Jacqueline and Kennedy Onassis, or was that? Yes. Brief, like, right after the assassination, he dated Jackie Kennedy. And, okay, we're going to talk about the

Kennedy assassination up next year because I have some theories. That's just a brief overview of his life. Obviously, if you want to know more about him, there's a great biography ad about him. I recommend it, even though I haven't read it. People are saying it's good. The Adams family would be best known through the TV series, which only ran for

two years and 64 episodes so essentially the TV series was one pandemic long that's all that contained the entire 64 episode run of the Adams family but there was a competing monster sitcom the monsters that debuted a week after the Adams family but it only lasted two years and amounted to 70 episodes and also Bewitched started the same fall season wow boy be witch got to last like a million years yes that law I mean I mean I mean Elizabeth Montgomery, I guess she had a lot of power, too. I guess BWitts probably did better in the ratings than Adam's family monsters. And my theory is, President Kennedy assassinated November 1963, Innocence dies.

Ten months later, we get monster shows. I see a connection. I see a connection. This is the new normal. We are all in Monster Town. And the Beatles are very big, too. Like, we're rejecting American values all over the place. Yeah, I like that.

I mean, too, was that I guess it was hooked into how old monster movies of the 40s were like easy programming and television back then. So a whole generation of kids were being introduced to monsters, all these classic movie monsters. So everybody's going to get in on the bandwagon on that. Yeah. And I think that's why monsters and Adam's family were broadcast in black and white because they evoked the same idea of the black and white 30s movies you would see on TV over and over again with like Frankenstein and Dracula and Abbot. Stello meeting them and werewolves and things like that. And you did, you asked our opinion on Munsters versus Adams family.

I am firmly in the Adams family camp. I never particularly like the monsters. I think all the actors on it are fun. You know, Al Lewis especially, he's a lot of fun. But I guess in concept, and the more I think about it,

the more I dislike it, the monsters, they're just a one-to-one. It's like, there's, you know, there's Frankenstein's monster. there's a vampire lady there's a werewolf boy and all that

it's so much like better for me that the Adams family is like they're just weird there's not a you can't classify them as anyone thing and second that the Adams family they love being weird they're a bunch of crazy weirdos the monsters want to conform they're conformists

they're like oh we want to fit in in suburban life it's like ah you you disgust me you musters like Enjoy being like rich weirdos like the Adams is. And Todd, where do you fall on this camp? I agree, I agree. And, well, I've never really had too much of funnes for the monsters,

maybe because their video games weren't quite as weird as Fester's Quest. But I definitely agree with what you're saying. I mean, monsters, all of that same sort of recycling monster category, like groovy gullies or whatever, where you just have, you know, Dracula, Frankenstein, all the usual things. and I'm probably a hypocrite since I really like the Darkstalkers series of games but you know I do think Adam's family deserves a lot of credit for starting with something really unique that is true darkstalkers is when you get past the family itself

darkstalkers is the Munsters fighting game if you want to break it down like that but yeah I agree the Adam's family are their own thing their own unique thing like they're not based on existing stereotypes maybe Lurch is Frankenstein all right that's as far as I'll go but like what is Uncle Fester yeah he's dressed like a monk sometimes he's portrayed as like an old college boy like from the 20s and he has a blunderbuss and light puts light bulbs in his mouth like what is uncle fester it's such a unique creation and they just have like a hand that's like well it's thing it's just you know it's a hand it does stuff yeah oh yeah lurch i mean he's sort of a frankenstein but also he could just be like he's no homunculus you know or he's just

like a what what even is he what is he grandmamma is she like a witch not i mean sort uh yeah but yeah and and same with mortissue is just like she's just weird they're all just weirdos and also like i don't know that they've they have a sexy weird uh relationship instead of like again and the monsters just two button down the best thing in munsters i think other than al lewis is that the uh the daughter like they have a the problem daughter who looks normal like the perfect blonde teenage girl maryland munster yes uh but yeah so there have been four Adam's Family movies to date and soon we'll have a new Munster's movie

brought to us by Rob Zombie I didn't know there was an old Munster's movie until I looked it up but yeah like right after the series ended they made a movie called Munster Go Home or I think they go to the UK and it was made primarily to sell the idea to foreign markets for syndication. Of course!

I should have known man it was like the the monster invasion of Britain in our childhoods they tried to reboot the Monsters with a lot of the actors too. I remember remember there was that. The Munsters Today was the name of the new one. We're the Monsters Today. And I believe Brian Singer directed a Munster's attempt at a reboot pilot thing.

1313 Mockingbird Lane. Yes. Which they aired the pilot, but NBC didn't greenlight the show. And we've driven by the Munster's House together on our tour at the Universal Hollywood. They certainly like showing it off. The Addis Family House is better in the Munster's House, too. I'm just going to say that. Much cooler.

Look, did they, the Munstermobile and the Dragula, like, those are cooler cars if we're talking about just car versus car in the Adams family. But the Anna's family, like, they don't really have a specifically neat car, I suppose. So I looked into why these high concept monster shows didn't last very long. And, you know, people assume, you know, the public was being inundated with these monster-based sitcoms. They're like, enough already, I get it. But there's more concrete reasons. So Adam's family was never very popular in its first run. the first season was number 23

and then the second season it fell out of the top 30 so not a very popular show and also of note Batman debuted halfway through the second seasons of both the Munsters and the Adams family that was the primetime show kids flocked to it was in color too with Batman so what color

like so much color that show every bright color is in that show so it made these shows look dreary and uninteresting in comparison yeah I I understand I mean of course once you got Batman it's like 66 is known for like Beatles, Batman, and Bond. And by that time, like a two-year-old show like the Adams family, especially in black and white,

like how can that not look like old by comparison and old hat? You're dumping your black and white TV into a lake is what you did back then. Go to Sears. You get a new one. I was surprised to find that the Adams family only lasted two years, considering how much, you know, of an impact it had in pop culture in general. I mean, I was expecting it would be something with a really long running time on TV or something like that. Yeah, when you ask people, if you would just ask someone in the street or whatever, which is what I do every day, I just say, hey, how many Adams family episodes do you think there are? And they are like, I don't know, 100, 150. But yeah, people probably are surprised. There's only 64. There's more episodes of the new Adams family. There are more episodes of the monsters today than there are of the monsters.

Man, that's that, I mean, that information is still shocking me right now, as you say. I guess, do with 64 episodes, you'd also think, oh, that it was at least on for three years. Like, no, two. They just cranked out that many back then. The seasons were much bigger back then. Let's move on to the 90s Renaissance before we talk about the game. So Adam's Family, not a hit on TV, but this 64 episode series found a nice home in the world of syndicated rerun packages, which were rerun over and over. And this is where Boomers and Gen Xers fell in love with this small collection of Adam's Family Adventures. Yeah, and like you were saying, Todd, because the Adams family, like they had that one appearance on the Scooby-Doo crossover. episode. I think it was one of the new Scooby-Doo movies that and then that led to Han

Barbera doing a show. We saw that same with the Laverne and Shirley one. Right. In the 70s, all of these 60 shows like Star Trek and Gelligan's Island got big with children in afternoon programming that then new seasons in animation started up for him. And they became so popular in reruns that they even came back for a 1977 made-for-TV revival movie called Halloween with the new Adams family, which features mostly the original cast, although it's very cheap-looking, filmed on video and in color, but it is really the last hurrah for this cast. And it's on YouTube and full because nobody cares.

See, that's why shows like Adam's Family, original, or Batman 66, look still great because they were filmed on film. They look gorgeous, and Star Trek, too. Yeah, yeah. Oh, and Lurch was on a Batman as well. I discovered that. But you revealed to me the shocking information about it. Yeah, he was on Batman six months.

after Adam's family was canceled so that's why they could only get lurch yeah Ted Cassidy was available there were no monster roles that week so yeah so you know not a hit when it first aired kind of unpopular but it's real great syndication fodder real great rerun fodder people are watching it over and over again they're loving these characters they get a cartoon they get a revival movie and then 25 years go by and just a snap and it's time to appeal to the richest and therefore most important people there are and that is baby boomers. So a lot of TV adaptations

sorry movie adaptations of TV shows are happening in the 90s. Like so many things became movies like the Little Rascals and Beverly Hillbillies and the Mod Squad. I mean you name it no matter how unpopular a show like I was putting out on another podcast we were doing the show SWATs which nobody

remembers has a movie starring Samuel L. Jackson I'm pretty sure. Yeah and Colin Farrell I only know that because I worked in a movie theater when that movie came out. And I saw the end of it while cleaning the theater. So I remember the last six minutes very well. The fugitive. Yeah, the fugitive.

Another one. Like a TV show that I don't think is that memorable, but the movie just eclipsed it. It was so big. And now we're as old as our baby boomer parents were in the 90s. So we're getting that for most of the stuff we had growing up. Or honestly, it's already happened. Yes. Just waiting for someone to make a Pirates of Dark Water movie.

Oh, so, but I'll be, that's my revival, White Whale. I think we're going to need several kick starters to get that off the ground. Yeah. But yeah, like the scary math is, so you're right, as you said it up front, Henry, that 25 years after the TV series ended was 91, we had our Adam's family movie. 29 years, sorry, 28 years after 91, we had the new Adam's family movies. So it's very frightening to think about. Yep. Yeah, same with Rocky and Bullwinkle. I did that math on Rocky and Bullwinkle. Like, Rocky is the new, the first season of Simpsons is older than Rocky and Bullwinkle's first season.

season was when the Simpsons debuted. I don't like it. Let's talk about these 90s movies, though, because I love them. So there's a lot going on behind the scenes. I'm just going to give you the gist of it because this is just one podcast about a lot of Adam's family things. But Tim Burton was going to direct this Adam's Family movie, which probably would have been good too. But it makes too much sense to not have happened. Yeah, they found the right guy.

But he passed to do Batman Returns, although he hated working on that movie. And, you know, currently he's come back around because he is working. on the Wednesday Adam show for Netflix. He's finally, he's like, I, I can't fight the, I can't fight this feeling anymore. I got to do it. I mean, when he did Dark Shadows, I was like, well, this is, you should just done Adam's family. Yeah. But yeah, he's back to the Adams family 30 years later.

So I wonder who would play Gomez in his version of the boy. Do we need, do we need him back? I mean, yeah, it could only be Johnny Dap. I hope it's just Wednesday in this series. Yes, I hope so, too. So the directing role went to Barry Sondonfeld, a first-time director, although he was no, you know, new person to movies. He was the cinematographer for the Cohen brothers on things like Blood Simple and Raising Arizona and the movie with all the Irish people in it. Yeah, the Miller's Crossing.

There you go. So he knew what he was doing. And if you go back to Raising Arizona, there's a lot of like really Adam's family shots in there, just especially cameras like zooming through places. Oh, yeah. Oh, man. I mean, the camera, now once you know that Sondonfeld got as a star as a cinematographer, like, it makes so much sense because the camera is just flying around all of the time of this. And, yeah, actually, I guess, you know, Raising Arizona, too, is full of a bunch of, like, weirdos all hanging out with each other. They've got a trailer, not a house, but still, the idea is there.

The Adams is without money and aristocratic means, yeah. So this original 91 movie was being developed and produced by Orion Pictures. now defunct, but it was going way over budgets. So they sold the film to Paramount, and Paramount made a lot of money. This movie made $191 million in 1991. Man, that's big. You know, this is before movies made a billion dollars. That's a big, especially for, I don't know, like, musty old stuff gets remade all the time.

It doesn't always make a bunch of money, but I say that really speaks to the quality of the film as well. Yeah, I remember it being really like pretty much the big film for the end of 91. Maybe I think I remember having an argument over whether we were seeing that or Beauty and the Beast with my family. But there really weren't too many other choices. I mean, Hook, I think, was the other movie that kind of dominated. But not too many people talk about that one nowadays. That's true. Yeah.

Hook was the other big kids movie that season. But everybody I knew was so excited about Adam's family, nobody talked about Hook or mentioned Hook. No, only my Filipino friends who love Rufio and Huck. They're the only people talking about it. I've heard a lot about Huck recently because the film Space Jam and New Legacy just rips off that plot of the Huck. Great. That's also the plot of 80 other movies from that time period. So, yeah, $191 million was made on like a $30 million budget.

Tons of merchandising, tons of money and other channels too. So, yeah, it's a great movie. you know, Sonnenfeld really showed himself off in his first showing as a director and it's funny that this movie could have just been garbage, right? It could have been like the Beverly Hillbillies movie which has good performances but who cares.

Yeah, yeah. But this captured the spirit. All of the casting is just perfect and despite how the plot is a little weak and there's a weird idea about a fake fester and stuff everything still works. I mean, it's one of the best casts of like a movie ever.

like everybody is perfectly cast in it like it's all it's all the people you cast they even were like you know oh a few like two years before this the hottest show on tv twin peaks there's a very tall weird looking guy in it well that's obviously should be lurch like every i mean ral julia the great it's like everybody just rules in it so hard they even you know i as somebody who doesn't like that colin feral has been cast as like a fat guy in something they just put a fat suit on him when I'm really of the belief of like there's so many overweight actors out there who never get to star in anything

instead you're putting fat makeup on skinny people that's also what they do with Christopher Lloyd but man is he good he's great in it at the height of his powers like immediately post Doc Brown yeah and I think he shaved his head for real I think he did yeah looks like he did

who does that now nobody shaves their head I even remember back when you know we were having a debate in a family about what movie to watch. And I think I even asked my mom, why do you want to see the Adams family? And she just said, the actors.

I'm going to go see the, it's for the actors. She loved all the actors that were in it, even if she was only sort of so-so on the Adams family itself. So I think that really helped put it over with a lot of people. Yeah, like, I still kind of don't know who Rall Julia is. I know he's Gomez Adams. I know he's M. Bison.

I know he's an overdrawn at the memory bank. To me, he's still like, where, like, who is this guy? Where did he come from? He was 50 years old. He had a 25-year acting. career before this. But this is what made him a unknown star. And unfortunately he would die three years later.

It's very sad. Yeah, that he just is so, so much that he brings to Gomez that you wouldn't expect. I was rewatching values this weekend and my husband said his only note on why Raoul isn't truly perfect is he says Gomez should not be taller than

his wife, but that he is like which is, you know, hey, Raul he's just tall, you know, I agree that Gomez should be a short king, just like Sean Aston, sorry, John Aston and his son, Sean Aston too. Both short kings. Yes, and yeah, one little fact about the movie I wanted to point out, which I thought was very cute.

I can't go into the history of like every fact about the movie, but the plot of Adam's family, the first movie, is that, you know, their lawyer owes money to a loan shark, and together with the loan shark, they get this guy they know, the son of the loan shark, who looks a lot like Fester to infiltrate the house say I'm Fester, I'm back and find the money to steal from the Adams and in the end of the movie the plot was going to be we don't know if he was

the real Fester even though he joins the family at the end the cast had the table read and they were shocked at the idea that Fester wasn't the real Fester so they all got into a huddle and Christina Ritchie spoke for the group little eight year old Christina Ritchie spoke to Barry Sondinfeld and said we have to

make Fester the real Fester and Barry Sondentfeld went to Christopher Lloyd like, do you care? And he's like, I don't care. So he decided to rewrite the end of the movie to make sure you knew this is actually Festerer. He lost his memory and he's back in the family. And I thought that was a great idea.

That movie would be way worse at the end. You just go like, well, you know, I think what it was like, you're supposed to go like, well, you don't know. Like, no, you need to know that you saw the real fester and not just some faker that the family. I mean, I get that there's a certain, it speaks to the weirdness of the Adams is that they would just go like, you know what, we don't care. We feel like you're one of us, whether you're fester or not, but it's all about much like the Fast and Furious films. It's about family.

And so I think it needs to be, you need to be sure it's actually fester. Yeah. Right. I think the audiences, they wanted a fester in the movie guaranteed. And I think either they had to have the real fester show up or, you know, confirm that this was him. Because otherwise, the plot doesn't really have a satisfactory. fine conclusion and i think sonafel too he really showed off like why he was a director for the future because he was so into special effects and filming around special effects like the

i i think a big payoff or like my parents seeing this movie was that they watched you know this crappy thing as a kid or like we had no money and yes that things are a thing especially really is a forearm me just that time i'm doing the effect on the zoom call right now it's Oh, thing is right here with us. Yeah, but here you can finally see where thing ends and where he can just skitter around on his fingers. Like, yeah, I mean, just the visual of thing running down like the street to chase after something was like, whoa, that's crazy. Yeah. Yeah, and Sondentfeld in recent interview, like looking back on the movie, of course, he's an old guy.

I'm starting to feel old too. And he's like, if we made this movie today, it costs five times as much money, it wouldn't be good. The reason this is so good is because we had like physical actors, nothing. a CGI and it was filmed on film when you film in 4K you see the flaw of every special effect and because of film and because of practical effects you believe everything

and that's why the movie is so good he does sound a little like a grump but also he's right he's right he's right yeah well I probably help that like Orion just seemed like they trusted I've heard this on a podcast with

Mike Mitchell who's you know very funny guy but also works in Hollywood a bunch And it's just that Hollywood is now full of executive. Those Orion execs were like, I guess people have heard of Adam's family. And let's just hand it to a director. You know what you're doing. Whatever. Now the film studios are full of people who read, you know, like Robert McKee's story or whatever.

Like, I know what the story. Oh, you know, the hero's journey should actually be this. Like, where's the save the cat moment? Exactly. Every executive has all this information that makes them think they know as much as a filmmaker. And so they just, you end up with how everything is just like a, fucking like slurry of the same type of movie all the time.

Overly focused group. Yeah. I do want to have a little sidebar here because we do have time. I want to talk about just our brief thoughts because it will be a fun conversation to talk about if we like the first Adam's family movie more than the second one or vice versa. My own thoughts up front are I watched both of them recently. I think

the first one has a weaker plot but the performances are better and they usually stick to the inside of the house which is where you want the Adams to be. Yes. Second movie my own thoughts on that are I think it's good I think the villain is better And the story is better

But they take them out of the house too much Real Julia clearly sick Can't do as many things Which is a bummer The summer camp stuff is fun But it's very much like 90s anti-political correctness humor Where it's like

You want to watch Disney It's gonna brainwash you man That kind of humor Is a little like eye-roly But still good performances there I still come out on top Saying I've declared myself the winner already

By the way By the way The first movie is the superior film, and that's all I'll say. Todd, do you have any opinions about this? I would have to go with the second one. I kind of think it's a funnier movie overall, and I like how it really gets into, as you said, Roll Julia doesn't get to do as much, but I feel like it gets into a little bit more with the kids and gives them a little more time.

And the characters, I think, get a little more time to do a little more, especially they introduce the baby, which normally introducing a baby to a plot is kind of, of the weakest idea, but I feel like it's just a more active movie, and especially as far as the villain goes, I mean, Joan Hughes actually is just perfect for it. And compared to the first one, where I think the villains in the first one never really feel like too much of a force in the movie. And the first one, as I said, it also has the plot with Uncle Fester, which feels like on a almost an elaborate loop to get back to where it started. Like at the end of the movie, you thought, oh, well, they're back to normal. This is how the Adams family era.

recognized, but it took an entire film to get there. So they're both good films, but I kind of have to go with the second one on that. Yeah, I like how in the second one, it starts off with, yes, the entire family is here. And my last comment I will make on the second one is something I thought was very clever. I totally forgot about how that movie went because I haven't

seen it in like 20 years, 20 plus years, but watching it again, one of the first things that's said in the movie is Gomez, I'm pregnant. I'm having a baby right now. And then she has the baby immediately. There's no, like, oh, wait till the end of the first act. There's going to be a a bunch of pregnancy jokes, it'll be wacky, fun.

But no, immediately within five minutes, the baby is there. I do love the russedness of it. Yeah, so I'm hearing all you guys say, what you guys have to say. You're going to be the tiebreaker here, Henry. So I do think that it's great that fester's my favorite Adams, and I like that he is complete in this film. And also in the sequel, that it's not about him finding himself or questioning, like, am I I I don't know like I I like that he's that the whole way through and him and Joe

Kusack are perfect the other she's so good like amazing yeah uh oppositely after just rewatching family values I think the camp stuff goes on almost too long I do but I love Christine Baranski as well but I just that baby some of that baby action is a little baby geniuses for me yeah I don't I don't like seeing that I have the baby like Rube Goldberg's his way into the climax and defeats the villains is just like the weakest way to end the movie. Yeah, I, though there's a couple of times where

thanks to special effects magic, I do have the reaction of like, they're about to drop a baby. Oh my God, but yeah, I don't, man, it's so close, but I think I like Adam's family the first more because I even though Fester

isn't fully himself, I think he's great as a vision to go through. Like, the introduction to the world of the Adams family and get to know everything like the like the party where he does the sword dance and the babushka yeah I love that yeah it's amazing every most of Adam's Family Values feels like just a replay of the first movie they're like oh here's the dance sequence here's the party here's the this and that uh yeah I I pick the first one uh just ever so slightly but both both are great and yeah Christina Ricci like when in

Adam's Family Values especially. When Wednesday has to smile. Yes. That is like Oscar winning performance of her in character there. I forgot about that moment. I wanted to stand up and applaud. Just the face acting as she's just moving her mouth into this rectus grin. Yeah.

Oh, God. It's so, so good. So, yeah, both are great, but I'm going to have to go with the first one. Just because that I don't like the baby. The baby holds it back a little, but I'm sorry, Todd. Yeah, I must disagree. Honestly, the whole baby thing at the climax, watching it now, it kind of reminded me of, well, Maggie Simpson almost, how they would have her work her into some gags and things like that and have her be the one to save the day, so to speak. And I will say, not to go on too long, but one of my favorite parts of family values is where, you know, Joan Kusack's character, she's confronting them all at the end and going over how she murdered her husbands and the Adamses are completely on her side.

Yeah. They're basically agreeing with her. like she would have fit into the family perfectly if she hadn't tried to kill them. They should have made a point to her of like, you absolutely fit in here, like to stay, but they already did that with the woman in the first movie who married into the family with Cousin It.

Right. Yeah. It would just be a repeat of that if they, you know, the nicest thing I'll say about the baby is it is some silly baby hijinks, but it does just straight up murder Joan Cusack's Debbie. Like, it kills her into a pile of dust. Turns to a pile of dust. Yeah.

But yeah, great watches, even if you, in November. Check them out. Adam's Family movies are very fantastic. But we're going to take a brief break now and come back and talk all about the world of Adam's family games. Oh boy, I can't wait for future history 101 today. I hear Prof. Timesworth is going to teach us about World War Six. Gather around, students. It is time to learn.

where history and future are the same class. Available on iTunes, Spotify, and everywhere you get podcasts. Hey, Lassie, what are you doing here? Timmy's in a well. Sequelcast 2 and Friends is a podcast looking at movies in a franchise, one film at a time like Harry Potter, Hellraiser, and The Hobbit. And sometimes the host talk about video games and TV as well. And now it's part of the Greenlit podcast network.

Oh, Lassie, we don't need to rescue Timmy. He likes the well, well enough, I guess. Darth Vader is Luke's father. Lassie, I told you to play off the spoilers. So now we're back to talk about the world of Adam's Family Games And Todd is on this podcast for almost this reason entirely And that Todd, you got the dirt on Fester's Quest You've solved like, I don't know, a 25-year mystery

Like, what is up with this game? Why is it so mean? Todd, can you explain your journey and how you found answers? Well, I was basically, I've drawn to Fester's Quest because it has a reputation. and it's sometimes even lumped in with like the worst games on the NES and I think it's even on one of the one of those 100 worst games of all time list on a website so I had to give it a shot because it was made by Sunsoft and that's a company I didn't really think made too many bad games but when I played it I thought you know this is really hard and unfair but it's not terrible it's not like you know Rocky and Bullwinkle terrible or Captain Planet game terrible or something like that because it overhead sections and Blaster Master even some of the enemies look the same. So I wondered if, you know, this was originally a Blastermastermaster game that they just

redid as Fester's Quest, or if it started off as an unrelated game, maybe based on an anime series, that Sunsoft's American branch just reworked into a Adam's family thing, which would happen with a lot of games back then. But, so I went looking around and I actually found the designer that was Michael Mendenheim at Menheim, and the producer, Richard Robbins, and so I just sent them emails and asked what was going. And I found out, now you can listen to the older retronauts episode for the full story and read the interview and everything.

But the gist of it is, is that the producer, Mr. Robbins, he basically based the game on a dream he had. And he decided he wanted to make a Festers game. He talked to Lady Colton and basically called out at all sorts of conferences. And I think he was lucky that he came along before the movie or they signed a lot of those because I don't think they would have let Uncle Fester fight aliens after the films. They had to basically stick to a new vision. But the game

is basically based on the original Adam's family. So Uncle Fester has a big blunderbuss gun called Genevieve that he carries around and he shoots things, walks around. And it's very difficult. It doesn't have any continue system in the American version because they kind of forgot to put that in. and it's harder in other ways but Fester isn't really as he doesn't have the mobility he can't fire diagonally or move diagonally so he's

it's a very difficult game in that part you have to take it really slow you have to basically spend a few minutes when you first start building up your weapons making sure you have the best weapon and at that point it's I would say it's a great game but it becomes tolerable in a sense and it has

the thing I like about it is it has that sun soft feel to it The sprite graphics, especially the bosses, they look really nice. And the music is really catchy. Yeah, the best remix of the Adams Family theme in all of video games is in this game. Oh, yeah. Yeah. The opening, yeah.

Yeah, and I didn't know, like, when I was doing that last podcast, I didn't know the European version was actually fixed. So when I did that retronauts in the past, people were saying, oh, I beat this game, and I didn't believe them. But now I think they probably play the European version because they make it a lot easier. In Festor's Quest, a big problem is your shots, when they hit something they cancel out and because a lot of your shots

are like in a sign wave pattern like you fire the gun and immediately goes into a wall and it doesn't hit the enemy so they fix that the shots now go through walls and enemies take fewer hits to kill and really that's all that fixes the game

that's all you need yeah it does prove the game a lot and in the original stick best gun which fires a straight ahead this barrage of just little triangles that wipes a lot of things out and one thing that it'll come up in some later games is

If you're damaged, you basically lose that level of the gun. You have to go back to a weaker weapon, which is punishing you even more. And Fester can only take two hits at first. So it's a game that frustrate a lot of people back then. Although, oddly enough, the producer said it sold about a million copies. Oh, upon doing this podcast, I thought if that fact is true, maybe that convinced Paramount to buy the movie. Maybe without Fester's quest, we wouldn't have an Adam's Family movie because they're like, do we care about Adam's family?

Does the audience care? And somebody said, hey, people bought a million copies of this Fester game. People know about the Adam's family. They want to know the story of Fester. So maybe without this game selling so well, they wouldn't have made the movie or like Orion would have made a worse movie

and it just would have failed miserably. Right. And even today, it's a pretty common game. So I kind of believe it sold so many copies. And if you're out looking for old Nintendo games, if you're still buying those, I would kind of recommend it because it's not that expensive.

And I don't think it's ever going to get reissued. I don't think we're going to see a limit had run games, reissued Fester's Quest with a... Well, now I want one. Novelty head vicer light bulb or something. I'm sure the Nintendo Power cover helped quite a bit on that, too. Well, with the, you know, that Blunderbuss thing and all of his weapons, it does make me, you know, think about how the Christopher Lloyd version of Fester

is less, he's more of a purve than, like, especially in family values. I forgot there were so many jokes about just, like, Fester watching people, uh have sex like there was so there was way more of those than i remembered he didn't invent too many things he mostly just watched it talked about watching people have sex or stalking women so yeah and like lloyd's performance is different than the tv show and that the guy jacky kugin the actor was kind of doing like a curly voice a bit because he looked like curly the stooge and then when you get to the um the new house family and then the movies with um the cg i movies nick kroll he's doing a kind of a Jackie Coogan voice too

so Christopher Lloyd's performance is unique it's a little Doc Brownie it's a little just him sinking his neck into his chest or sorry his chin into his neck it's a fun unique character it's like Doc Brown after some bad things have happened to him I also as a child watching at his family values

is I did not understand the wedding night scene of him when I was like oh I guess he just wanted to go to sleep at the end of this scene I did not read it as him climaxing prematurely. That's right. Yeah.

But yeah, the Fester Squads. I played it a little bit as a kid, but I definitely bounced right off of it because it was like too. If something was too hard on rental, I just told, I would ask my mom like, please return. We give a... Take this away from me. But yeah, I want to talk about the other Adams family games.

They're not nearly as notable or as popular as this one, although I don't have sales figures in front of me, but let's talk about them. So, to get things started here, this is very confusing. Many of the games we're talking about are simply called the Adams Family, based on the 1999 movie. There are 12 of these. There are 12 of these games. I'm not sure which of these is the core experience, but for the most part, there are two distinct versions of this game that different ports are iterating on. So there is a 16-bit Adams family game that's a lot like a Super Mario game, and that came out for the Super Nintendo, the Genesis, the Amiga, and the Atari ST.

So there's an 8-bit-on-family game, and that is a weird 8-bit microcomputer-style game that's part-bad platform or part-bad adventure game. That came out for the NES, the game gear, the Master System, the Spectrum, the Commodore 64, and the Amstrad. There are also two other versions of this game that are completely unique.

There's a Game Boy version that is all about a very weird Gomez Sprite running around and throwing daggers, and finally, and we're going to spend a lot of time on this because it's so weird, There's a turbographic CD version that I think was the first Adam's family game to market that is so obscure, even the Wikipedia page about all the Adams games does not even list it. This is the game where you play as not as an Adam's family member, but as their lawyer. And it's insane.

Crazy. That's a bold decision. I had never heard of that before until the podcast research you did, Bob. that is insane to me that that happened. It's one of the weirdest adaptations I've ever seen video game-wise, you know, just playing as not even the main villain of the movie, but as a side villain. What an odd choice of how to have your own, like, who pitches that as a game people want to play? I don't understand that.

I have theories and I think they check out, so we'll talk about them soon. So one weird thing, and this is related to my theories, by the way. One weird thing about these games is that for the most, part, Raul Julia's likeness is not in them. My theory is he must have asked for more money when it comes to Lexus Rights or he was the

only one who asked for money. Because in these games, the little guy on screen is not Raul Julia from the 1999 movie. It is like a caricature of John Aston from the 60s series, which nobody has ever talked about and I want to get to the bottom of this. Yeah, he seems

close, you know, in a lot of those it seems close enough to how John Aston looks that it's like but just with like 5% Raul Julia put in there that they can just say like oh it's you know basically the same it's all right it's it's its own unique thing instead yeah yeah these sprites usually have a big John Astin grin on their face which the Raul Julia character in his performance he doesn't do that yeah that's not

I he's he crafted his own performance I was looking up on the real quick here that uh julia apparently does appear in the street fighter the movie the game but only only in archival footage he obviously um was not doing motion capture for the game like uh like jean clob van dam and and uh kiley minogue did so maybe his estate took over for that who knows by that time yeah but yeah all of these games almost all of these games are developed by a familiar name if you know about bad games bad licensed games it's ocean software yeah nobody likes them uh i don't know maybe i feel like Stuart Jip needs to be on this podcast because he is from the UK. I think he would agree, though, and you'll probably comment on this. Ocean Games are bad. They only lasted until 1998. They were established in 1983, and they got a lot of huge licenses,

so I'm surprised they didn't stay around for that long, but maybe that was the reason why. They paid a lot for these licenses. They didn't always deliver. You know, in 98, that's when, like, Disney Interactive and Warner Interactive, like, it was getting a lot more internal. And plus, like, you know, by 98, like, Ubisoft started getting into, It was a bigger publishing deal thing to make the movie games.

And maybe 2 by 98, people could tell that the games were too bad by then. Like, that's, you remember by the next console generation, everybody was selling movie games like, no, they're not shitty anymore. Look, every actor's in them. This one's actually good, we swear. Yeah, I mean, even by 97, it was like, no, Golden Eye is good. Don't think about it as a license game. It's actually a good game.

Todd, any thoughts about the world of these games before we start talking about them? Well, I think it's kind of very strange that with these games and even Fester's Quest, they kind of restrict you to playing as just one character, which I think is common in a lot of the Mamm's family games. It's always a little puzzling because it's, Ham's family is such an ensemble thing. You know, you have Gomez, he's kind of the main character, but if you picked up a game, you'd probably want to play as Lurch, Fester, Cousin' It.

And I'm surprised that of all the, you know, the platformers they made, nobody had the idea of saying, hey, let's do a Super Mario Brothers 2 where you can play as a morticia and Fester and maybe a thing. And there'll be like places in the house that only thing can get to or something like that. That's a really good idea. Yeah, it's a really good idea. I think it's because they didn't care and they had 12 of these to make and they wanted to make as much money off of what was probably an expensive license. But who knows, maybe they got it for cheap because nobody knew if this movie would be big or not. Well, you know, like, if you're designing a Ninja Turtles game, every turtle is essentially the same, at least like sprite size, and it's just really about the reach of their weapon.

But if you're designing a Gomez, that's not really how Mortisha is going to play or Lurch is going to play. And I mean, if you're going to design more than one lead in it, that's, the notion's not getting this out in time for release, you know? No, most of them came out like in winter of 92. So right after the game, like the prelude to the VHS release, so it was like the perfect time. So right after the movie, sorry. Back when, yeah, it's something you ought to remind yourself like in your childhood DVDs didn't exist. VHS tapes would come out by the Christmas after.

Like they would be that spaced out. And it would be an event like, oh boy, Batman finally on VHS, yours to own on VHS. Yeah, I'm guessing Adam's family movie, November of 91 was the release in like Christmas of 90s. was the VHS release for that. That would line up with all these video games also. Yeah, yeah. Let's talk about the first game on our list. Fester's Quest still counts, by the way, but we already talked about it,

but this is the first game on our new list, and that is the 16-bit version of the Adams family. Let's talk about the S&S version, because identical to the Genesis version. It's the most tolerable of all of these, I will say. It feels inspired by Mario World, although made much less artfully, and it takes the form of a fairly non-linear platformer with lots of secrets and a handful of power-up. So it's basically An idea it's kind of cool Because it's like you have all of these choice of levels

Kind of like Mega Man where you go in the Adams house There's all these doors There's level behind each one You gotta rescue all the family members And Gomez controls like Mario Again worse hit detection He's got a power up where we can throw fireballs For a little bit

They're marbles I guess I don't know what they are He's got like a little sword he can use As a power up and like a fez he can fly around with And I mean it's It's as good It's like it's above average for what the license games were at this time

but it's still not super fun but it's I will say at best tolerable like a tolerable platforming experience right it feels a lot like it's very typical of the European made platformers of that area kind of like James Pond and other things like that where the hit detection is just a little bit not quite there but it's for what it is

it's not too bad I do like that they did that whole nonlinear approach and things like that and one thing that kind of strikes me is where does the enemy choices. It ranges from, you know, actual monsters to just little tiny rabbits and stuff like that. So it made me wonder if they had started off as a

different game with that they just sort of drop the Addis family into. Yeah, there's a lot of, I mean, you get all of your stock, like here's the fire level, here's the ice level. And Nick, these enemies could be anything out of any of the fire levels and ice levels of, you know, the video game world. But I mean,

it's a smart idea to start with the I'd have the cavernous like endless house. of the Adams family and that's what you explore and anything could fit inside of there because it's just so crazy like that's smart and also you know what John asked it

at least short guy with a mustache that's Mario you know yeah it makes sense he was the original Mario and he dressed better too he could if if they if in the 60s they had wanted to make a Mario movie he could have been the star of it for sure not a lot going on with this game again

it's like the most stock platformer ever and I like that it's not ambitious because it's just like, well, we know what kids like. This is, they like jumping around on things. They're like lots of levels with variety and that's it. Just not executed very well because it's a licensed game and they don't really have to try. And it's of the British game design sense, which I have never liked because I grew up with a different design sense for the platformer and not not necessarily what they're doing here. Right.

And at least you don't have to push up to jump like you do in some British platform. Yeah, they figured that out by 92. And two by 92 They're at least ripping off Super Mario World And they're not stuck in like Super Mario Brothers Or crappy British platformers as much At least they recognize Super Mario World And also it does have kind of a more of a Sonic style

Invincibility power up I'm watching the long play of the thing that spins around it Also like in Sonic it has a shoes power up that makes you faster But that just makes you easier to be killed So it doesn't make any sense to me Never like the Sonic shoes I mean just like in Sonic Yeah

It makes it easier to die As you move faster But yeah That is it for the SNS And the 16 bit iterations of this Let's talk about the 8-bit ones Because they are much worse But the ideas are much more interesting

So this game I'm talking about the NES version Because that's the one I played It's a real big mix Of complete amateurishness But also surprising ambition Because it's this very specific To the UK genre

that I have not seen American games ever do where it's a mix of both a platformer and an adventure game. But neither one is a good version of either one of those genres. We just covered Garfield games and a lot of them are from the UK and like two of them were that I think

where it's like your Garfield, you got platforming stuff to do but also you have an inventory and you have to use items at a certain time. It's just very awkward. I guess it's just meant to make it last longer and waste more time than a straightforward, just run to the end

the level thing. Yeah. Now, the one thing I remembered about the NES version. It was

pretty much one of the only games that I recalled GamePro really ripping into.

Now, GamePro had a reputation for not really doing critical reviews of games, but for

some reason, they decided to go in hard on this Adam's family game. They trashed it. They were

pining for the days of Fester's quest, and they gave it their lowest rating, the little purple sleepy face.

Wow. I was going to say GamePro's lowest rating, 3.5 out of 5. Only slightly awesome. Yes, but that's what I remembered about it. I guess they didn't really go over too well with that.

But I was surprised by now that it was actually different from the Super Nintendo game because back then you would get games that were kind of very similar on the NES and the Super NES. Yeah, this... Especially from licensed properties. The 8-bit versions of this were a platform

adventure game hybrid. Not a very good one. But as a kid, I found this game like very interesting because I love Maniac Mansion I played it like over and over again I love the idea which was fairly new to the time of like levels that were representational in a way that you know

I'm in a house there are different rooms in the house I can go in all the rooms it's not like here's World 1-1 here's one two they're all different themes it's like it's a semi-realistic space as realistic as the Adams Mansion can get and that's what's cool about this game is that you can explore the mansion

as if it were a real place you can go into doors you can look into like here's Wednesday's room here's Pugsy's room here's Fester's room but unfortunately it's a very hard game because you have to do things

in a certain order what you have to do is very cryptic and it controls like absolute trash I mean checking out the long play of seeing some of the platformer areas like it looked like uglier and cheaper than

you know a bad Mega Man level and then there was one bit that I was like oh come now which was like just this area you walk under a bunch of of you know jagged teeth and they just with you have no chance on first try of knowing which one of those jagged teeth are going to fall you have no chance of like reacting at the last second like oh oh no it was just a a prank to pull on you and then the next time you go there

you'll have to remember like right this tooth falls this tooth falls like it's it's one of those many things where you watch it like oh if you had safe states this wouldn't be a challenge it would still be annoying though but it would be very I was playing this with safe states recently and I was like yeah I'm getting impatient with these things yeah no I think I think this definitely I probably played this out of same with the love of the movie I don't when I saw this one I was like this feels familiar to me I don't think I touched the super any S one in 92 but this one I was starting to get angry all over again watching it upsets me because there are like really cool ideas because we never got an M's family adventure game and that feels like that's the perfect format for this idea but yeah I It's just very amateurish For a 1991 game It looks like it's from 1986 or something It's just very, very ugly The Gomez Sprite is just awkward

And just very amateurish And doesn't move very well And there's a big problem with That when you're hit by an enemy There's no period of invulnerability after it hits you So like if an enemy touches you You keep losing health until you get away from it And so like if a projectile hits you

For every frame that it's like passing through you You lose health That's horrible Yeah This is 19 In 1992, that should not be the rules any. Like, people should know that the standards or expectations at least for, again, a children's-like platform. Yeah.

Like when Mario got hit in 1985, you flash. Yeah. And then you're invincible for a few seconds until you, you know, revert back to small Mario. That was six years before this game. I mean, the standard was there. This is Post Sonic the Hedgehog. Like, people, the kids are not accepting worse than that at this point. And one last thing about this game is that we were robbed of a much better Gomez Sprite that was present in previews of this game in screenshots in that the original sprite of this game was not this tall, awkward, weird thing you control.

But a little Chibi Gomez, it looked like something out of a Japanese game, even though this was made by Ocean. So they failed by not including that original Sprite. It is so adorable. He is so cute. I want like his giant head and big eyes. Like, yeah. Instead, the other one is just so square. Like, that's also, I like that Sprite, the OG Sprite Gomez, much rounder and adorable.

Yeah, I, it just go all the way. If you're going to make him cute, like that Sprite, despite having less tech behind it than a 16-bit system, it looks way cuter than the cute one that's in the Super Nias version. Definitely, like way more stylized, way more cartoony. Now, why do you think they would have changed it to just not match what they wanted to reflect the movie or? Maybe they were thinking, this looks too much like John Astin. We want people to think, like, could this be raw, Julia? Because the face is just so, like, you know, there's not a lot of detail in the face that they eventually use.

So if you squint and if you've got a CRT, you could be like, well, that could be an accident. It's whatever I'm feeling today. Not a whole lot to talk about this game. It's, like I said, the weird adventure platformer hybrid with cool ideas. Like, watch a long play to let you know what you have to do to actually go through this game. You have to do certain things in the right order. It looks like a big pain in the ass. But other bad things I want to mention, there's, like,

four songs in this game and for the most part you listen to a very bad version of the Adam's family theme throughout the entire game which it's 90 again it's 1991 there's at least like 10 songs in a video game by this point yeah it reminds me of uh when we just did a replay of bar versus space mutin's like it's just the theme over and over again of the simpsons theme which it's actually a better rendition than the adams family uh rendition that's in that game but it's still something you don't want to hear in a loop either. And most of these adaptations kind of follow the plot of the movie, or at least there's hints of it. In this one, it's very odd in that usually in these games Morticia is kidnapped, which kind of happens at the end of the original movie.

But in this version of the game, you fight both Fester, which sure, you know, he's an imposter, you fight him. But then you fight a, like, Imposter Gomez as well. And that's the last boss of the game, which they're just making up their own movie at this point. That's weird. So I don't know what was going on there. there. Well, maybe it was like, you know, the mirror match at the end of a fighting game or something. Yeah.

It's like the end of Double Dragon or Super Dodge Ball where it's like, well, this is the true evil. It's you. Look in the mirror. Exactly. But yeah, that is the 8-bit Adams Family game. Please let us know if you have experiences with these because I played most of these growing up, except for the next one, which is the most interesting one. So, once again, it's called the Adams Family.

And it's for the turbographic CD released in 1991. So, developed by ICOM simulation. What they did, they made some very important and very cool games. They made the Mac Venture game, so things like Shadowgate, Dejave, and the Uninvited. They sort of patented before LucasArts the verb-based adventure game, where you point and click around on the screen. They were the first of the scene when it came to that. That's cool. And here they are in just a turbo graphics platformer.

Yes. So they went from that to saying, you know what, we're really good at making adventure games. We kind of pioneered this kind of style. let's only make bad platformers until we run out of business and that's what they did because this is one of their first ones they made I guess maybe they thought

licensing was where was that I don't know that's crazy I guess so they were a big developer for NEC that developed the turbographics of course yeah I guess if you're in the NEC that they're gonna shove you

money for some exclusives but it sounds like that marginalized them to the extent that they had nowhere else to go after the turbo graphics fucked up. And this is, like, if I would have got this game as a kid, I would have been very disappointed. Todd, go ahead.

Oh, no, it was going to add. Now, this game only came out for the turbographics, right? It wasn't a port of a PC game or anything like that. For wholly unique to the turbographic CD platform. Right, which is surprising, too, because the turbographics tended to, you know, often get stuck with table scraps or no game or even miss out on trends. Like, you know, with the Street Fighter, they didn't even, street two, they didn't even release the, the turbographics version of that in North America. So I was surprised that this was the first Adams family game that came out because somebody had to be pretty on the ball to get that licensed and out in time for – it was 1991? Yeah, it said I looked everywhere.

I couldn't find a specific date, but it's the one one that came out in 1991, the one of these. Everything else is 92 or later, except for Festure's Quest, of course. All right, Bill. That was surprising. And, of course, like you said, it's surprising that you play as one of the bad guys. Yes, let's talk about that. This is so weird. This is the one that I want to talk about the most.

It's just a bizarre game. So in this game, you play as yes. We've all been waiting for it. I want to play as Tully Alford. I'm begging my mom. When are they going to make me a Tully Alford game? You got to write to Nintendo. Well, guess what?

It can only happen on the Tobographics because you play as Dan Hedaya in the movie. Character actor Dan Hedaya has his own video game and he's the star. It has to be the only video game where you play as him. I can't imagine there's any other time. And yeah, he was one of those actors who you just go like, oh it's that guy like look at that there he is the guy from I mean I guess what was he most famous is as Carla's

husband on Cheers her first husband and he was Cher's dad and clueless I believe yes yeah yeah that's right yeah I guess that's but of course that would be like if they made a clueless video game where you play as Claire's dad his dad not his share

this is just as weird because if you don't remember the movie one of the first scenes of the Adams interacting with a normal person is him and he's their lawyer and he goes in with this loan shark and her son who looks like faster to steal from them. So he is one of the lesser villains of the movie. Not even the lead villain. Yeah. And the plot is different. And we'll play a clip of what the plot is soon. But there are some similarities between this movie and, sorry, this

game and the movie. In that, Fester is seemingly still an imposter in the game. And you actually fight him a few times until he regains his memory as he does at the end of the 191 movie. And I want to talk more about likeness rights, which is while you you all are listening to this podcast. So, Dan Hedaya is the only major cast member fully depicted via in-game photographs. Like production stills of the movie. It's really just him. And then at the end of the game, there are two photographs of, like, the Weird Adams Relatives.

And that's it. Wow. So I think they paid for likeness rights of three actors to make this game. They pay for the license of the movie and for the rights to use Dan Hadeghazzo. Hidia's likeness. I would bet he was pretty getable at that time. Yeah, I mean, also, like, I would bet he didn't understand video game licensing rights and just, I was like, what, 10,000 bucks?

Well, sure, whatever. I, I, that's just a spurious number, but that doesn't. I don't even think it was that much money. Yeah, what am I saying? But when I, when I clicked on the long play he shared with us, I didn't know that this was the lawyer game. Yes. It's the original ace attorney.

So when I skipped ahead to just see some of the combat, I was like, man, that's an ugly-looking Gomez. Why does Gomez look that way? And then it hit me like, no, this is the lawyer. Yes, you play as Tully Alford, and you have a umbrella that fires projectiles, and you're infiltrating the Adams Mansion. And actually, Henry, can you play our first clip in which Gomez, this is supposed to be Gomez, by the way, he explains the premise of the game to the, man playing Tully. Dan Hadea is not doing the voice of Tully in this, by the way. They couldn't even... I guess, yes, this has audio

clips because it's a CD game, I'm guessing. Okay, here, I'll play the clip. Tully, my boy, you seem a bit stressed these days. I'd hate to think my humble family is the cause for your duress. But I have an idea which I think you might like. If you're able

to successfully find the family fault, you may take as much money as you wish. There is one catch. The family and I shall all be at home waiting patiently to well let's just say to make your task a bit more

difficult than one might have originally imagined hmm I mean how hard could it be to find that silly vault anyway and what could they possibly do to me that they haven't tried before by George I mean

by Gomez I'll do it so there you have it that's the premise of the game they just was like uh the movie would be better if they knew Tully was trying to rip them off but they welcomed it and they challenged him and they fought them in many different battles. That's okay that makes so little sense

I mean first the acting quality that sounds like people who worked on the game like just office employees like well I can sort of do an accent like yeah I and that Gomez is like nothing it's like he sounds like Santa Claus

oh Tully I don't think there'll be Christmas this year Yeah. Todd, any thoughts on the premise of this bizarre game? So they don't really reposition him as a hero so much as he's more like a, I don't even know what to call it. Do you think that they basically started off with a completely generic character infiltrating the Adams family and basically realize that they had to connect it to the movie somehow?

That's a good point. Yeah, I feel like someone should have stopped them and told the developers, no, you want to be the Adam's family. You don't want to fight them in boss battles. Nobody wants to fight the Edens family. They don't. Yeah, I mean, that saves them the trouble of designing bosses, I suppose. Like, it's economical in that way.

But also, when you think about it, you know, wouldn't it make more sense you're playing as fester before he gets his memory back and he's fighting the family? And then especially because so many times when he, like, is trying to kill the family members, they just go like, oh, you want to fight? I love this. Oh, boy. Oh, you brought him. He brought poison.

That's great. I love that. That's a better idea, Henry, because in the game, you run into Festers and he's seemingly the imposter also going after the goal. It's like, you stay away from that gold. It's mine. What? And then he comes to his senses when you fight him in a boss battle.

That doesn't make. Yeah, that's terrible. Yeah. If you're already got him in there, obviously the, I, yes, the likeness writes things. It sounds like they really, it must have just hinged on, well, technically you want to play as a guy who's the real guy or you see a picture of them. But if everybody else is a fake anyway, I'd rather play as a fake fester than a real Tully Alfred.

Yeah. Now, I don't want to get too far ahead, but he actually becomes a monster himself in the game. Yes, I'm glad you pointed that out because it's so weird in that I'm like, okay, I know the weirder part of this game is that you turn into a monster. What are your powers?

Like, what does being a monster turn you into? Half you through the game after you beat Pugsley, you get a potion and you're automatically turned to a monster. All it does is give you another bar of health. it just makes you gives you more health and that's it your attacks are all the same you're still shooting things out of an umbrella

you know at least in altered beast you get better attacks you know but yeah it's kind of a werewolf is that what he's supposed to be I guess so but yeah they really went off on like their own tangent as they're writing their own like fan fiction almost

or like being script doctors for this movie but it feels like they forgot the like no the monsters have a werewolf like a werewolf is too pedestrian for the Adams family like that's That's not, you know, the Adams family is really about a circus freak show mentality, not monster makeup mentality or transformations, you know? Regarding the fan fact thing, it just feels like somebody thought, oh, here's my all original Adam's family character. He's a werewolf because we don't have one of those yet.

Someone was like, no, we have to link it to the movie. Someone worked their OC into this game. But yeah, it's what you expect. It's very awkward. It's like a 30 minute long game. You're exploring the Adams family mansion. You're getting keys. You're opening doors.

You're fighting them all in boss. fight throughout the game like a narrator is telling you things about the story over production stills of the movie no other actor outside of Dan Hada and the two other like Adam's relatives are seen or depicted at all like I think you see them in shadows

but I mean you see sprites of Gomez and mortician Fester and stuff but you don't actually see photos of the actors and I have a clip of the ending that tells you what happens to Tully after his grand adventure when he wins all the gold Ah, this is the life.

I knew one day I'd have everything I'd ever dreamed of. Those nutty Adams almost killed me. But Talley Alford's the victor this time. And from now on, no more Adam's family for me. Just me, this island, and all the mitis one man can drink. Oh no, it's you! See, I told you the old boy would be thrilled to see us. And look, he's all ready to play.

wait Tully you forgot your saber Tully Tully Tully And so it was And almost everyone Hived happily ever after The Adams family Terrible editing on that song Wow

I have edited 10,000 hours worth of audio They couldn't find a way to link the beginning of the song to the end So there's like there and then it goes The Adams family So bad Terrible All bad man Also it's all around

Also, it's like, yeah, the end of the game, like this, you're the boss who you're like, you're the villain of it who then didn't get away with it. Like that's the, I guess that's at least like a silly ending like an episode of the show would be like, well, at least I'll never, now that it's like a million Looney Tunes. It's just like, well, I might be in prison, but at least I'll never see that guy again. Like, Bugs, Bunny, what could be? It was very much like a Looney Tune style ending. Yeah.

But I also just again, that voice, that voice actor's like, well, I got all the mitis I can drink. Tell me, old boy, I'm Gomez Adams. He's like Sala from Indiana Jones or something. Yes. Though, where was that an actual sword fight? How about you actually have a sword fight, not just saying, oh, I brought a saber with me, we can have a sword fight. He fights Gomez with a sword or like a few times, so there you have it. All right.

But, man, that's, that is. still insane to me that Dan Hadaya or like that he would be the star of a video game that that ever happened and that it was on this turbographic CD of all places.

Yep, yep, and it's because they wanted to make it as cheap as possible and all those actors cost money. Yes, and that's really downhill from when I mean, they NEC wasn't always quite that desperate for, to save money. I mean, back when they did East Book 1 and 2, they hired

some professional voice actors like Michael bell for that but wow I mean yeah it does sound like it's just one guy when you hear Gomez and Fester and Tully

and the narrator it feels like this is just the one radio guy they had come in for half an hour well I mean all their budget went to just the an official photograph of Dan Hadaia yeah it's they got their Dan Hedaya NFT that's what they paid so much money for

yeah Let's talk about the only good game here. Let's talk about the only really good game here. And it's not a video game. You know what? We rarely talk about pinball. I want to do a pinball episode. episode, but this is the best pinball game ever.

It's the Adams Family Pinball, and you know what? It was available digitally for a very short time, and I'm kicking myself that I never got it. So there's this thing called Pimble Arcade, and it's like official digital recreations of classic pinball tables. So from February of 2015 to June of 2018, you could download the Adams Family Table because this company had a Kickstarter that raised over $10,000 for just the likeness rights of this game. but they still could not afford Christopher Lloyd. Wow, man. I mean, you know, Christopher Lloyd should be protective of his likeness. You know, it's his face.

He shouldn't just give it away. But it's too bad they had to change his face off of the old pinball machine. But man, that pinball machine was like everywhere in our childhood. Yeah, I have some citations. I don't know how reliable they are, but everybody was agreeing on this. It was the best-selling pinball machine of all time, or rather is. with 20,270 units sold and then a thousand gold units made to celebrate its high sales. So it's funny to think about how relatively small the circulation is for the biggest pinball game of all time,

just like 21,000 units. Right. If that were a video game, I don't think you could even get, it wouldn't even sell its first printing or something. So it puts it in perspective. Now, I have a lot of experience with this table. Do either of you have experience with the Adam's family pinball game? I've played it. because it's shown up so many places like laundromats

and airport arcades and things like that and it's really an eye catcher. Yeah, it was just so consistent around in my life of like pizza parlors or just that, you know, the pinball alley that there would be in an arcade of like, oh, against the wall, here's the pinball machines, you know, and as you got older, like it would, you could still count on it being most places.

If most places had a pinball machine, it would either be that or Terminator 2. I could consistently count on. And yeah, a few years ago, I went to a pinball museum in Las Vegas, Nevada, which was really, had a lot of, it was incredibly stripped down. It was just like, you know, it's a strip mall. But the collection was incredible. And I played my fill of Adam's family that day.

And I wish I had gone into, I had done galloping ghosts this Labor Day, but only the arcade games. one i didn't go to their separate building for pinball which i really wish i had but yeah it's i i'm pretty experienced with it i pinball i'll play for about 20 minutes once a year or maybe every two years i've never been that big into it i'll admit there's the pacific pinball museum in alameda actually where you pay a certain amount of money and you get in for you know as much as you can handle it turns out that's about 90 minutes that's the most pinball anyone can handle in a day for that uh you know that all you can eat price all those clackers yeah So much clacket.

But I can't really articulate what makes a pinball game good. I'm not, I don't have a sense of like what is pinball game design more as much as I do video game design. But everything just comes together with this machine. Like the themeing is perfect. The sound effects are perfect. The sound clips are perfect. Just the attractive arts on the marquee or whatever you want to call that. And it just is, I am so attracted to it.

Every time I see it, I have to play it. And I remember playing it as a kid. When it was new, it was the first arcade game that I can remember. that costs 50 whole cents, not a quarter, but I was like, wow, arcade games cost 50 cents now. The world has changed. It's 1992. Things are different now. I'm just so sad that it's not, that it was only so temporarily available as DLC. And that took a whole Kickstarter to make it happen to. Yes. I kick it myself once again. This is such a great pinball game, though.

And, you know, we've had a pandemic for the past two years. I don't know if you notice. It's been pretty bad. And I used to go all over the place to these retro gaming conventions, especially. Portland and I would go to Ground Control and I would go to Quarter World. Ground Control has an Adams family machine and I would play it every time, at least three or four times. So I desperately miss playing

this game. It was a yearly tradition for me to play it at least once in the month of October. Ah, man. I hope for your sake next October, you can finally return to Portland for that. I want to do a Pimble episode of Retronauts and it's going to happen at some point. I need

like experts on our guest staff because you know I just like playing pinball I don't know about like how it's made or what design means any other final thoughts in this game before we move on I just think it's great play it if you find it it's so so good in you know as much as you talk about Raul Julia likeness writes he's in the game

Rao Julia recorded new voice lines for the game Raul Julia doesn't say multi ball in the movie you know maybe maybe it's pinball was flush with money then and they could they could pay the for it or perhaps Rao Julia was like oh well pinball now That is an adult's game.

That I respect, not like these video games. That's the game of gentlemen, yes. Sport of Kings. Yes. And it's used for gambling often, but it's illegal. Yeah, so Addis Fembaal, like the standout game in this list. Let's get on to the last two, which are bad. And we'll start with Adam's family, Puglies, Pugsley's scavenger hunt, 1993.

I hate Pugsley. the downside of the 2019 movie is they try to make it about Pugsley in a way and I'm like Pugsley sucks this actor's not very good as him I like how he is in the movie in that he is just a very hapless victim of Wednesday who's just grinning through all the punishment

that's as much characterization as I need from Pugsley I don't need a Pugsley arc okay I guess if I'm a screenwriter and trying to say well I've been assigned to Adam's family who's the unexplored character I can finally do something with I suppose Pugsley is that because he's just so

interesting like his his character's just like a gross little fat kid like a mean like a mean fat kid who just like stares at you the stripes aren't thinning either yeah no i know it's uh no i feel bad for the the heavier actor uh childs who had to do that it's like it i was just rewatching sopranos which a j sopranos is a j soprano is the pugsley of the soprano's family and but but but that actor after two seasons i think as a kid he was getting tired of being the fat kid on the show So he got in really good shape. And I feel for the kids that had to play them in both the 60s and the 90s. I really wonder how many, you know, budding young chubby actors are like, they got to make an Adam's family movie.

I am Pugsley. I can't age out to this role. I've only got two more years of perfect Pugsley shape here. But yeah, so this is Pugley Scaveter Hunt. And we could talk about the different versions of the game. So there's an S&ES game. There's a Game Boy game and NES game. The 8-bit games are like unfinished garbage.

They are basically stealing the level designs of the 16-bit Adam's family game, the first one. Oh, geez. And the N-E-S game does not even have music. In a 1993 video game, no music. Like, you're just playing through levels in silence. That's evil. So, yeah, the NES game, and I think the Game Boy game, too,

are just re-skinned versions of the 16-bit S-NES, Adam's family game. Pugsy Scavenger for the S&ES is a unique game that is very not great but for some reason it got a Nintendo Power cover and I think Ocean and Nintendo Power money was changing hands Absolutely. I mean that's they saw that Fester's Quest had a cover

and that helped himself so much so here you go I must correct you Fester's Quest never got a cover Oh I thought it did yes you could be thinking of seeing this triple creep I must have I thought like when I saw this cover I was like it's just it reads so flat too like they really did just give them i mean they didn't it doesn't look like they drew an original thing it just looks like it came out of like the press kit yeah the cartoon series it's based on and it just reads so flat and ugly it was like the clip art they gave them i'm

sorry todd go ahead i remember festers quest did have a poster in nintendo power but that could be what you're thinking of all right thank you yes yeah sorry it deserved the cover more than this i like you're rewriting history henry because this got the cover that didn't so in case you don't know based on the popularity of the 1991 movie there was a ABC Saturday morning cartoon it ran for two seasons 21 episodes from 92 to 93

almost entirely unknown today but it was nominated for three daytime Emmys and won one of them you know I've watched a teeny bit of it on on YouTube the original that animated series and I'll give them credit for

they decided the character model should look as close to the Adams comics as they could get while still being a cheap looking cartoon and they bothered to get like John Aston to play Gomez so I believe

by that time Jackie Cugin was dead so I think he died in like 88 or 84 or something like that yeah I didn't really watch the cartoon I think I gave it a shot but at this point kids cartoons are becoming like very sophisticated and this is probably not crap but it wasn't as clever as you know tiny tunes

or your Nick tunes or whatever so I didn't really watch it but yeah it's based on this license and there's not a lot to talk about because it is kind of like a sequel to the 16 bit Adam's family games but made much more difficult. Enemies are swarming the screen. Pugsley has like no offensive vocabulary. Like he can jump on enemies and kind of do like a weak little stomp in front of him. You got to see the stomp he does.

He's like he's stepping on a bug. No enemy is getting hurt by this. And that's it. And it's very easy to die. And it's just a lot of very, you know, European platformer style levels that are just really big. not really artfully made and I mean it looks okay they really carry forward the look of the cartoon series but it's just an odd game I guess they thought like little boys play games let's have the game starring the little boy character I that was my big assumption there because you know Wednesday is so much more popular everybody loves Wednesday everybody loves Christina Ricci in the movie nobody remembers anything about Pugsley the actor who played him Jimmy Workman But then, you know, when you're ocean and the publisher of the game, you're not going to make a game starring a girl. You're just not.

Like, your market research will tell you a girl on the cover means boys won't buy it. Like, that's the lie everybody is telling themselves that they still tell themselves today even about girls on game covers don't sell video games. And that's just, that's why you end up with something as stupid as a Pugsley video game. a scavenger hunt. Have you played this game, Todd? A little bit, yeah. And I can see why they basically were limited in what the character could do to attack. I guess because it was a child character. They didn't want him swinging an axe around or throwing knives or doing anything that Gomez or Fester could get away with. So it just feels like a really odd game. I think the first level you go up the stairs

and you're looking at the stage through a crystal ball. Yeah, one of the levels, I think the way they make it more challenging is like some of the levels are the rest of the screen is like taken away and you're playing it through like the center of the screen as through Grandma Ma's crystal ball so you're like just your limit your view is limited to the center of the screen

only it's it's very odd I mean it's a cool effect but it makes the levels just like way too hard to play yeah right and before I forget I will never forgive this game for taking that Nintendo power cover away from Cybernator which was this cool neck shooter from Konami and Messiah that totally

deserved a nice cover for Nintendo Was there an internal battle Pugsley versus Cybernator? I'm sure there was a heated debate in the Nintendo Power editor's room or something. I mean Nintendo Power was just promotion for games and I think like what they thought was popular would dictate what was on the cover and I'm

sure they assume like people love Adam's family it's 1993 there's a new movie coming out let's put Pugsley's game on the cover and I mean I would assume literal checks were exchanged too for that yeah now I haven't watched much of the cartoon but Was it really Pugsley-centric?

Not at all. I mean, I think they did more with him than the TV show did. I mean, if you watch the TV show, there are not a lot of things going on with Pugsley and Wednesday, just like these two little kid actors who are kind of dead-eyed and they're kind of saying lines phonetically. Like Wednesday from the TV show does not have the same, like, zing that Christina Ricci's Wednesday has. And I think they tried to put that zing into these animated characters, but it's not a Pugsley-focused show from what I've seen. Also, Rip Taylor plays Fester.

That's right, yeah, he's fun. I like him. You know, he's much more the inventor wacky. Like, he's in a couple clips I watched, it was Fester going like, oh, it's my new invention. She took it. Like, he's more of an inventor than a creep. A creep, yes.

But, yeah, that is the Pugsy Scavenger Hunt, and the last game on our list here, and that is Adam's Family Values. So 1995, the property is kind of dead at this point. Nobody really cares anymore. Because family values did not light up the box office, like the first movie did. I don't think it made back its budget. I believe I had read that too.

Yeah, yeah. So, yeah, back in this time period, game adaptations really trailed behind the movies they were based on. This is no different. If you think about, like, Golden Eye, I think that was 18 months after the movie. The movie was Holiday 95, and I think the game was fall. 97 or something like that Yeah, yeah, it was fall 97 And same with

There was the Superman Returns video game That I think was like a year Over a year after as well, yeah So yeah, these would often lag behind And so what's unfortunate here Is that between the release of the movie And the game, the lead actor is dead Raul Julia dies in 1994

So instead of starring Gomez It would be weird if you're like Well, now the actor's alive and he's dancing around in the game I mean there is a depiction of him in this game but he is a very side character. And when Adam's family is so macabre, like, that's, I mean, that's something in Adam's family values, I had one real bring down of just seeing, like, there's a scene where Gomez, I think was just being dramatic, but he's like, oh, swing low, sweet chariot, because he feels that he's about to die just out of being so bereft that his brother won't talk to him.

But knowing that he's, like, probably very sick at the time. he's filming the scene of him saying oh I'm gonna die I was like this is a darker moment than they meant it to be it's very very unfortunate so yeah he is not the start of the game we're back to Fester and it's kind of I consider it a spiritual sequel to Fester's quest

but it's very very inspired by a link to the past so yeah we're all Julia not on the box the box cover is very weird it's a promotional shot of the movie with like lurch holding a toy over the baby carriage right right yeah it's not the whole family which also is a lie that it's like just get it if you're going to get a promotional image get fester on it if you're playing with fester like if i saw that box i bet i did see that box and by

95 i knew i wasn't going to play a a movie based game but if i saw that box i would think oh so i plays the baby in this or i play his lurch like that would be my first thought even it makes so much sense to make fester he should be the main guy you play as in all of these because especially if you're going to strip away details and cute something up round bald head on like a burlap sack he's so simple to make a sprite out of and the second movie has a lot of fun with him being indestructible because his fiancee is trying to murder him and he just can't be murdered that's so fucking funny now is that where they got the idea to give him um electricity powers in this game because it seems like they took he it's based on the movies and not the um the tv show so he doesn't have a gun or he doesn't have you know anything like that but so he has like a lightning bolt. Yeah, like the TV show, and maybe it was based on the comic, it infers that Fester can conduct electricity. You know,

the TV show had him putting the light bulb in his mouth and it lighting up. In this game, he just fires it out of his hand. You know, that's the easy, I can see how you make the walk there. You know, the, in the first movie, it ends with him finally doing the light bulb trick again. And so, then

they make the next step in values of having him, the first death trap he survives is electrocution in a bathtub, which really is like, well, yeah, of course, you can't electrify him. He's, he is electric. We all know this about Uncle Fester. But yeah, one last thing about Raul Julia in this game, RIP, of course.

He's not in the box, but a depiction of him is in the game. When you talk to Gomez on the screen, the little dialogue bubble pops up and it's a digitized image of Raul Giulio. So either they figured it out or they didn't bother asking and nobody noticed. Yeah, I mean, they probably did think, like, yeah, what's he going to do? He can't sue us. he's uh you can put a dead man in a video game right or maybe his estate was more uh forgiving or they were able to cut a deal in ral julie himself was holding out for more could be yeah if i can see

that this is all just my theory by the way so but it's just i'm keeping track of when he does appear so yeah it is a super inspired by link to the past video game and you know what it's still not that great but i will give them credit for not just making another bad platformer because it takes a lot more work to make a link to the past rip off than a mario rip off so i will give them that even though this game has a lot of flaws. It's very pretty. The music is great, but it's very difficult, as you would expect, from an Ocean-style licensed game. At least they can't, I mean, I'm impressed at Ocean, at least picked a better game to rip off

than just like dizzy. Yes, exactly. Todd, any experience with Adam's simply values, the Fester's Quest's spiritual sequel? Right. Well, it does have a few things in common. Like the way that if you get hit, it takes away your energy and your lightning attack. that gets weaker, which seems like a really strange way of punishing somebody who's

bad at playing the game. But that's kind of something that Fester's Quest and Blastermaster do. All the Blastermaster games have that as a mechanic. And one thing I was interested in is, I did not play all the way to the end of this, so I don't know if the last boss is that Joan Cusack cannot, but he's basically trying to rescue the baby

in this movie. That's right. That's right. I think when you get to Joan Cue, you fight a boss and you get to Joan Cusack and then the floor drops off under her and she dies. So there's a boss. before her. They play a lot with the canon of this movie where it's like the first thing you encounter is like, well, Debbie's in control of the plants now. You got to fight the plants.

It's like, well, that would have been cool in the movie, but it didn't happen. Well, like, he never even fights her. He always, even when after the third attempt, he's like, but I love you. What's going on, sweetness? Yeah, so. It's true to the movie in that regard. There should have been multiple Debbie boss fights in this. But who knows why they did it this way.

But yeah, it feels like someone just had an idea for a link to the pastile action game. And they just jam fester in here because, like, nothing else really is Adam's family related. It's just a bunch of spooky levels. But, you know, it's too hard. And enemies can, like, hit you when you're behind objects. And, you know, your lightning bullet attack comes out of only one side of your body. So it's not like the center of your body. Like when Link swings a sword, even though it's kind of on one side, the hipbox is in front of him.

Right. In this game, the hipbox is always on the right side. So it's just very awkward to play. I honestly I'm surprised they put all that effort into it too because once the box office results for family values came back I feel like they should have just said like

you know what let's just skip this if nobody saw it in the theater kids aren't going to buy the video game or rent the video game either so let's it but the fact that they put it out makes me it makes me surprised I mean the world of games was changing

but it shows you the difference between the first movie and values and that Adam's family won 12 games Adam's Family Values Two games And they're both the same game Yeah Yeah

So yeah That's it for Adam's Family Values And you know what That's kind of it For that era of Adam's family And the related projects Because that was the mini renaissance

We're kind of I hope we're in one now I hope it continues Because I want people To be into the show And the characters and stuff But for the sake of completeness I can name a few other things

So there is a 2001 Game Boy Color game based on the new Adams family that's a point and click adventure game with some bad platforming segments so in the late 90s when nobody cared anymore Sabon Entertainment

our friends who brought the Power Rangers over here and made live action Ninja Turtle shows they said Adam's Family is cheap and that's where we come in so they made a a DVD sorry direct to video movie called Adam's Family Reunion Tim Curry is Gomez I've never seen it

you know it's who you cast I guess if you're going for cheaper but good. Tim, Tim Curry is that, yeah, but I mean, in 1991, he probably would have been cast as Gomez in some other, some productions. Yeah, like a stage production. This had Daryl

Hannah as Mortisha, wasn't it? Or am I thinking of something else? Oh, no, that was Darrell Hanna. Yeah. So, uh, in 97, there was that movie. And then in 99, there was a Sabana Entertainment's, a Canadian produced television show called the New Adams Family. Uh, so between

vacation and the TV show, sorry, between Reunion in the TV show, the new TV show, only Wednesday was the same actor. So all the actors are newer and cheaper in Canadian. And guess what? There are 64 episodes of Adams Family, 6466. There are 65 episodes of New Adams Family. Wow. Yeah.

You know, Saban knows how to pump this stuff out. Cheap and fast. I can see with all their Power Rangers money in the mid-90s, they're like, all right, we're investing in Adams family and Ninja Turtles, the two big. biggest movies of 1991. Yes, exactly. We're going to get them now. And so, yeah, there's that, that Game Boy Color game in 2001. There is the Fester arcade game where the handles vibrate, you hold on to them.

And it pretends it electrocates you, but it doesn't really. Yeah, I was mad that it didn't actually zap me when I played it for the first time as a team. I never played it because I was too scared. I was a little wimp in the arcades. That they would be, that game would be taken off the market if it actually did electric you do that. You know, you don't know that as a little kid. The game came out in 1999. Well, hey, I was a child at heart.

Okay. And also, yeah. In latest news that we have here for Adam's family, this is also topical because there is a new traditional Adams family console game in 2021. The first one in 20 years, it's the Adams family colon mansion mayhem. I cannot believe a console movie games don't come out on consoles anymore. They're phone games. Like, well, what's going on here?

There was a phone game in 2019. It was like a gotcha game kind of I expect that They made a real ass game For 2021 that came out this fall Incredible man I'll take a look at this But just to see that like somebody made a movie game

For a console which never happens For kids movies anyway Yeah and I will say this does kind of Go back to something I didn't see in all the older games You do get to play as multiple characters You can play as Gomez, Mortisha, Wednesday And it's got that

Like, we can do four players at once. So it's kind of like almost if somebody made an early 90s brawler for the arcades, but with Adam's family, which I'm surprised never happened back then. But it doesn't look too bad for what. Yeah, I'm sure it's not great, but it's just weird to see like, oh, someone made a real game based on a movie. That doesn't really happen anymore. Yeah. Even for the Marvel stuff, like people don't make a, you get a Guardians of the Galaxy video game that looks enough like it but is not tied into it. Like, you don't, video game movie tie-ins that direct don't happen anymore.

So that's wild that that did. It's, it's quite retro, really. And yeah, I guess my final thoughts on this are, it was a fun time to be a kid, reliving through this mini renaissance. And I hope modern kids today are enjoying the new movies and even the older ones, because they're still fun. There's nothing weird or problematic in them. At least, I don't think so.

And, yeah, I'm just happy to see that the property can live on. It's not dated. You can still do things with these characters Because ultimately they're just fun to watch Because they're all just well-meaning creeps Who are they just want to have fun And you know Gomez is such a great character And he is the dad of all dads

We all want a dad like Gomez Such great yeah I mean in a healthy Relationship doesn't hate his wife Like every other can meet comedy character That was the spooky premise of the show Like what if a husband loved his wife And then also like he loves his mother-in-law And she lives with them

Yeah and he has children he sees instead of i mean i guess he does smoke to the amount that most men smoked back then though when i was watching uh one of the old tv shows i forgot that a joke was he lights a cigar and then puts the match in his pocket like he puts out the lit match inside of his shirt pocket that's funny yeah that's good it's literally a smoking jacket everyone i loved all the children smoking in the uh in adam's family values like he hands a cigar to pugsley and then also the he gives the he gives the baby uh hair of the dog like the egg and a vodka thing like like up too late partying.

Here you go. Any final thoughts, Henry and Todd Henry. Adam's family, your final thoughts on this one? You know, I hope those movies still do all right, at least that the kids can enjoy Adam's family. There's always, as the world can change, but the Adams family stays the same and they can just react to the weird world around them.

Like, they were too weird for the regular normies of the 60s. Then when the 90s comes around, they're too weird, been in a different. way for the 90s and then in these days they can be weird in a totally different way for our time but they are always a bunch of weirdos and in 91

cousin Nick came into the movie listening to MC Hammer in his fun car and in 2019 he drives in listening to Snoop Dog and he's played by Snoop Dogg what yes but with a garbled voice so they just really wasted their money yeah that's uh yeah why would they do that so you can put Snoop Dogg's name on the

cover because he's now a lifestyle brand that is true yeah I Yeah, and I guess the last thing I'll say is I My favorite joke in the first Adams family movie is when he calls into Sally Jesse Raphael Because they're just like they're too weird for even TV daytime TV Like I that's why I feel like the Adams family will always work because you just find something in this world Then that will be like no the Adams family are too weird for even this thing That's how weird they are

I really love unemployed Gomez in that movie sorry I'm just remembering all the fun moments And Miss Gilligan Ty, how about you? Final Adam's family thoughts before we wrap up here. Well, like you said, it's really an idea that doesn't get old

and you can always expand it and do things new with it, which, and I guess I do miss the days when you could really do an off-the-wall idea like Fester's Quest, but who knows, maybe they'll do something like it again

where I actually had to go back through the Adam's family episodes and see if aliens ever came into this series before. But at the time, it didn't really seem like that much of a stretch for the Adams family because as like Henry says,

they're just a weird and loving family and you can kind of do whatever you want with them and put them into any sort of situation and you could potentially have a good good and funny story there. They are immortal and they should be. So let me wrap up here, everybody. Thanks again for listening to Retronauts.

And if you want to support our show and get all these episodes one week ahead of time and ad free, please go to patreon.com slash retronauts. Sign up for three bucks a month to get just that. But if you want to get access to two full-length bonus episodes every month, At the $5 level, you'll get that. We've been doing two full-length bonus episodes every month since the beginning of 2020.

So now there's like almost 50 exclusive episodes that you have not heard if you're not a patron. At patreon.com slash retronauts. We do this as our full-time jobs for the most part. So we are fully supported by you, the listener. We appreciate anything you can donate to us. And we'd like to give you something in return. So again, that is patreon.com slash retronauts. Let's start with Todd.

Todd, anything you want to plug or where people can find you online? Well, I do this video series with my friend. And Joel, it's called Unsung Game Creators. You can find us on YouTube under that title. We like to spotlight developers, especially from the older systems that people might not have heard of. And I still do a blog called Kid Fenris at Kid Fenris.com. And that's where you can find the Festus Quest interview.

Excellent. And Henry, what about you? Oh, well, listeners, if you liked hearing me talk about old TV shows and with Bob here, I think you'll really enjoy our many podcasts we do at the Talking Simpsons Network. Me and Bob go through the entire series of The Simpsons for the Talking Simpsons podcast. where we are about done with season 12 and season two redo at this point. And also we do the What a Cartoon podcast, where twice a month we cover an animated series, super in-depth, and we're doing the same for a movie once a month.

All of that can be found at patreon.com slash Talking Simpsons or at Talking Simpsonspodcast.com to check out the free feeds or wherever you listen to podcasts. And you can follow me on Twitter at H-E-N-E-R-E-Y-G. And as for me, I've been the host of this episode. Bob Mackey, find me on Twitter as Bob Servo. But we'll see you again very soon for another new episode of Retronauts. Thanks a lot for listening. Thank you.