The Glade 4.0

I was having a nostalgia trip this morning, thinking about an advertisement in CGW in the early '90s (you read that right). It was a humorous ad talking about the benefits of playing against another human being instead of a game's AI.

Back in the Before Time, in the Long Long Ago, when people wanted to play against other human beings they had to do so by modem. So this meant that they had to have a friend who A. Had a computer. B. Had the game. C. Had a modem too. and D. Awaited your phone call so they could be ready to receive your other computer's call. The ad I was having nostalgia over was for some service that made it easier to find other people wanting to play against you (similar to what QuakeSpy/GameSpy does).

I tried to find this ad again a few years ago to no avail. I didn't have many high hopes. I mean, who in their right minds would scan an advertisement from a magazine almost 20 years ago? Well, I decided to try searching again this morning. And I found two things. One: I discovered that CGW is no longer in print (not surprising, but still a bit sad... a staple of my youth now gone for good) and Two: Apparently I am not the only person who fondly remembers this Ad and with enough prompting someone dug it out and scanned it.

I don't know who the marketer was who designed the ad, but he should deserve a fat check for it being so memorable. I'm sure to many of you it's not going to live up to my hype. I am just excited that I was able to find something that I deemed lost forever.

Here is the ad in all it's glory

The above portion of the ad, along with many other pictures from CGW, adorned my high school locker. I was a bit pissed when some kid stole my ad for id software's DooM ("Want to be a hero? Go to hell!").

It got me thinking that I don't think I'll ever anticipate or savour video games the same way I did in the '90s. And I think that is in large part due to internet. You practically know everything about a game months, sometimes years, in advance of it's release. Back in the day, all you had were 2 to 4 pages of screenshots and text to tide you over. It was a completely different experience buying and playing a new game than it is today.

True, it wasn't always great. The lack of information meant that you could potentially get a dud of a game (the CGW in question had the game "Iron Helix" on it's cover... a game which I owned and wasn't very good). But I think that happened less frequently than you might think.

Anyway, just had to put my thoughts down. I enjoy my high resolution graphics and my "more hours for my buck" games of today. But I will always miss that feeling I had coming back from "Software Plus" with a new game in hand, and ready for a night of swapping floppies.

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Les Zombis et les Loups-Garous!

The page cannot be displayed.

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Well Ali Baba had them forty thieves, Scheherezade had a thousand tales
But master you in luck 'cause up your sleeves you got a brand of magic never fails...
...Mister Aladdin, sir, What will your pleasure be?
Let me take your order, Jot it down -You ain't never had a friend like me
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Really, Talya? I got it, and I'm behind a WebSensed corporate firewall.

Cool stuff, I remember GEnie. Never used the service, though. I like that they have the instructions right in the ad.

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This cold and dark tormented hell
Is all I`ll ever know
So when you get to heaven
May the devil be the judge

Heh, I remember that add.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

Technical Information (for support personnel)
Error Code: 500 Internal Server Error. The HTTP message includes an unsupported header or an unsupported combination of headers. (12156)

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Well Ali Baba had them forty thieves, Scheherezade had a thousand tales
But master you in luck 'cause up your sleeves you got a brand of magic never fails...
...Mister Aladdin, sir, What will your pleasure be?
Let me take your order, Jot it down -You ain't never had a friend like me
█ ♣ █

The problem doesn't reside on the internet's side. If you've tried multiple browsers and DNS servers, it is likely your ISP (or, more specifically, some type of packet shaper/sniffer/filter they've implemented).

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Les Zombis et les Loups-Garous!

Seems to have been IE8. It works fine in Chrome and IE7.

_________________
Well Ali Baba had them forty thieves, Scheherezade had a thousand tales
But master you in luck 'cause up your sleeves you got a brand of magic never fails...
...Mister Aladdin, sir, What will your pleasure be?
Let me take your order, Jot it down -You ain't never had a friend like me
█ ♣ █