{"id":134756,"date":"2023-09-13T19:00:00","date_gmt":"2023-09-13T19:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.nintendolife.com\/#article-155235"},"modified":"2023-09-13T19:00:00","modified_gmt":"2023-09-13T19:00:00","slug":"feature-impossible-port-master-randy-linden-talks-jurassic-park-botw-and-his-favourite-ports","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/2023\/09\/13\/feature-impossible-port-master-randy-linden-talks-jurassic-park-botw-and-his-favourite-ports\/","title":{"rendered":"Feature: ‘Impossible’ Port Master Randy Linden Talks Jurassic Park, BOTW, And His Favourite Ports"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\"Randy<\/a>
Randy Linden (centre) and Alena Alambeigi (left) from Limited Run with the Nintendo Life PAX team \u2014 Image: Austin Voigt \/ Nintendo Life<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

If there\u2019s one thing you should know about art, it\u2019s that changing it after a long time is really, really hard.<\/p>\n

Just look at classicist Emily Wilson<\/a>, who in recent years became the first woman to ever translate Homer\u2019s ~3000-year-old epic, The Odyssey<\/strong>. It was a staggering work that seemingly garnered as much heel digging as it did critical praise. Then, sometimes, the original artist themselves gets to live out the controversy of adapting their own earlier work, as director Steven Spielberg did after altering scenes in one of his finest movies. \u201cThat was a mistake<\/a>,\u201d he\u2019s said as recently as this year.<\/p>\n

But unlike passive mediums, interactive mediums, by contrast, force<\/strong> change, because, well, will the thing even run on a different platform?<\/em><\/p>\n

\"Jurassic<\/a>
Image: Limited Run Games<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

That unique challenge has long been the purview of Randy Linden<\/a>, a video game industry veteran with accolades so distinguished, they\u2019d light up the back of a baseball card.<\/p>\n

For starters, Linden is responsible for Bleem!, a PlayStation emulator for the PC and Dreamcast that was so good, Sony became litigant; he somehow brought the literally animated world of Dragon\u2019s Lair<\/strong> to the 1985 Amiga system; he is most famous for bringing the bloodless version of Doom<\/a> to the Super Nintendo, a feat many still lovingly refer to as ‘impossible.’ And all that is to hardly touch on things like his prototype of Quake running on the 2001 Gameboy Advance<\/a>, his work on the original 1985 Nintendo and Microsoft\u2019s 2010 motion-based Kinect device, and much more.<\/p>\n

On the heels of the release of Jurassic Park: Classic Games Collection<\/a>, which is being published by Limited Run and releasing for the Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X|S, Nintendo Life sat down with Linden to discuss the general public\u2019s perception of ports across various generations, his obsession with Breath of the Wild<\/a>, and the philosophy behind what it means for anyone to translate somebody\u2019s else\u2019s work, when it\u2019s a video game.<\/p>\n

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Alan Lopez for Nintendo Life: In 2016, a developer named Panic Button created what many people at that time were calling an \u201cimpossible port\u201d of DOOM (2016), creating a fully playable version of that game for the portable Nintendo Switch console.<\/strong> My question to you: \u201cWhy do things never change?\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

Randy Linden:<\/strong> That\u2019s a good question! Wow, why do things never change\u2026<\/p>\n

Well, programmers love the challenge. Speaking as a programmer\u2026creating an \u201cimpossible port,\u201d like I did when I created DOOM for the Super NES, is one of those challenges that you just know in the back of your mind, if you push hard enough, it\u2019s sort of like the little engine that could. You just have to keep pushing, and eventually you\u2019ll end up at the top of the peak.<\/p>\n

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