John Steinbeck, Cave Adventures and more w/ Jake Elliott

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Kentucky Route Zero developer tells all

Last time on Sup Holmes (now on iTunes) we welcomed Jake Elliott of Cardboard Computer (Kentucky Route Zero) to the program.

Immediately after the show was over, I felt terrible. I was so in awe of Jake’s brain that I couldn’t help but talk about how weird I think it is. If you’ve played Kentucky Route Zero, you may have an idea what inspired my awe. Like the game he helped create, Jake seemed so casual and unaware of his surreal brilliance, like he didn’t notice that he was surreal or brilliant. He spoke of incorporating influences from real life American history, the work of John Steinbeck, America’s current Health Care System problems, instillation art techniques, the Great Depression, and the 1976 Zork-precursor Colossal Cave Adventure into the development of Kentucky Route Zero like it was something that anyone might do.

We talked about a lot of things, like Jimmy Corrigan, the difference between Videogames and “Art Ware” like Wikipedia Vs. Predator, the freedom to edit Vs. the freedom to create, why they Cardboard Computer continues to put out free content like The Entertainment, and a lot more. Thanks so much to Jake for appearing on the show, and if Sinistar’s tech is back in action, we’ll be back this Sunday at 1pm PST/4pm EST with Ludum Dare’s Mike Kasprzak. It’s going to be Ludarific!