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Che-Che-Check it out, folks! I just about fell outta my chair when I saw these!! One for QFG1 and one for EcoQuest:
Man oh man, if someone had a whole game’s worth of these, they could RE-CREATE THE ADVENTURES!
Ken, what usually happened to these once they were scanned in? I know
in the old days of animation, the original cells were just discarded
once they were photographed. I could understand a company not wanting
to hold on to thousands of sheets per cartoon (or per game) of artwork.-Tom.
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Hi!
I used to work for Sierra as an artist and was probably one of the last people to see many of those images alive.
Originally, under former Creative Director Bill Davis, they were archived and stored properly. After a while we got pinched for space and the storage locker was moved into a hallway, where it was continually in the way. At some point, someone decided to take all the art in there and move it to a self-storage unit in town (not the most friendly environment for a painting).
I went up there one day to do some research for another game (wanted to see the original images) and was apalled to find them in a cardboard box, being nibbled on by mice and getting moldy.
I am amazed at the price those BGs are going for but given how few may still be around, maybe it’s not such a surprise.
I have no idea what happened to all that artwork after the Oakhurst studio was shut down. I know a few artists may have some of the stuff. As far as i know, the Oakhurst facility was pretty well emptied out, I don’t believe any particular care was taken to preserve that old stuff.
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Now that I think about it , and have the advantage of a number of years of hindsight, it seemsto me that the lack of regard for that old art is pretty indicativve of what caused the Oakhurst studio to go into decline.
We lost sight of our heritage and our purpose. After senior management moved to Seattle, we had a succession of General Managers who never really understood what was special about that place. We lost our continuity with our past and lost our vision along the way. So no wonder that all that old art ceased to have any meaning to anyone in the place -it was old work from a byegone era. Most of the people working there by the mid 90’s never even played KQ, QFG, LSL, etc. It meant nothing to them. It didn’t help that adventure games went to into decline. But what I feel now was more germain, was that we didn’t know who we were as a studio anymore. We became a studio defined more by project than as a whole with a grand legacy.
Ken, I was fast to judge you on many an occasion (not to your face of course 🙂 ) But, I have to say, that when you were in Oakhurst, the place had spirit and a sense of mission and identity. Boy, I miss those days sometimes.
Marc
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Wow, cool thread. Can’t believe how much nicer the painting is than the game art itself, especially with the QFG1VGA Healer hut piece (though, music not art is my specialty field).
And, Marc- Bloody hell, how depressing. 🙂 You sound like me when I’m ranting about Sierra. I’d hate to think what you must think of Vivendi!
Regards,
– Alistair -
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I want to cry. There were some beautiful paintings done on these games. Especially such pieces as Lord of the Dead from KQ6. I guess all of those nice paintings of the witches forest, Mordack’s Island, the two dragons, etc. are all erased from existence too. I wish I had a time machine. It’s a shame no one scanned them back them to preserve them digitally forever. One thing I do as an artist is keep everything, despite my lack of room. I hope someone out there is at least taking care of what Sierra art is left.
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Actually, they were all scanned as hi-res (not sure what res) TGAs as part of their first step along the path to game asset. I recall those images being kept on tape backups, but again, what happened to those tapes , who knows. I would assume that like much of the rest of it, it’s in a Fresno landfill.
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Perhaps we can contact other Sierra artists to see if they managed to keep some themselves. It really saddens me to think all of this is forever gone. There were some lovely images from these games. It reminds me of when Richie Valens’s brother was digging through the garbage and taking all the discarded cartoon cels. I remember Sierra sold a few lithos from some games and I wish I had money to have bought them, but alas, I was only a teenager. Anyone know any way to contact other artists to find out the whereabouts of some more art or backups so we can possibly try and save whats left on this site or elsewhere through people like Brandon who is archiving the Sierra magazines? I was able to ask Andy Hoyos, but that’s as far as I was able to get. What about Bill Davis or Bill Skirvin??
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I would love to see those up close. Thanks for sharing, Tom!