KMGW Appreciation Week

Discussion about Knightmare in youtube's Geek Week.
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Pooka
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KMGW Appreciation Week

Post by Pooka »

Both people on the Forum and in Knightmare Chat last week were quite critical of KMVR, so it'll be interesting to see what they think of KMGW. Some people say it's not their cup of tea, but it's certainly more divisive than that. I, in fact, watched it on the morning of its release, in a room full of Knightmare fans, after a day full of anticipation and teasers.

So yeah, I do quite like it - and as does my girlfriend, who is a fairly recent Knightmare convert. I'm surprised - I didn't think she would!

Anyway, my good points are numerous: I'll try to list them succinctly:
- Treguard. Brilliant acting and brilliant script, with the gleeful yet gravelly demeanour. His best line, I think, is "parents can be so cruel" - perfect delivery. He's back in his rightful place as overseer and avisor during the quest. I've missed him.
- Lord Fear and Lissard. Again, a great amount of witty banter here, and I'm very relieved to see Cliff back as Lissard - very relieved.
- The team. It's a great idea to use YouTubers - they're not children, but not in their forties either. They're just the right generation... and, actually, they're a pretty good team as soon as they start working together!
- The rooms. We get some of the old-style rooms as well as some new CGI environments; both Level 1 and 2 Clue Rooms are as I remember them. Interesting bits of the rooms I noticed: NILREM over a door; the prime puzzle being a mixture of Combat Chess and the Trial by Spikes, and the first room in Level 2 being very similar to the Great Corridor of the Catacombs, with different-style walls.
- Tips of the hat to old Knightmare such as the opening sequence, the sign-off at the end, the leaking of energy water from above, the life force, the blocker in the form of a gargoyle (PASS! WORD!), and Treguard's sign-off at the end.
- I like the floor puzzles too: SMDM claiming a victim, of course, and the prime puzzle is inspired and genuinely quite tense.
- I like Theodora Snitch - very well acted, believable and it's clear where she fits in. I like some, but not all, of Daisy: I'm not keen on her at the beginning, but she gets more bearable and more useful as the show goes on - a bit like Pickle, in fact, in the way she watches from behind the team.
- And the threats. It's been said before that Ariadne would be a good addition to new Knightmare - well, you have your wish. And it's good to see Garstang actually posing more of a threat, in Ben Child's fleeting appearance. And we get to see the fireball graphic again... oh, goodie.

Some things I think I could have done without:
- The editing's a bit choppy - there's about half a minute of nervous laughter when Ashens falls to his death before Treguard says "ooh, nasty!".
- I don't like the opening sequence. It's a bit ropey, even by Knightmare standards. I mean, really? Magic featherduster and swivel chair?
- Nitpicking here, but I don't like the way the characters say the name of the spell after they spellcast. Emma does it without saying so and the spell works, so why do Treguard and Daisy have to?
- Sorry, Nick, but I really don't like Sylvester the Jester. I get the idea of the character, insofar as he's a dark jester akin to Folly (or Iokus from KMRPG, if you're one of the few to remember him), but his speech is confusing - switching to semi-mediaeval with thees and thous to modern English at will - and I don't think the acting's particularly good. You can also see his bauble rolling around after he throws it; it even rolls over the wall at one point!

Overall, though, I think this is a cracking effort, considering the time and resources they had available - a fun adventure, a genuine attempt at recapturing the spirit of Knightmare, and a vast improvement over KMVR in every single way. If they were to ever make another whole series of the thing, I'd love it to be like this.

Share your thoughts for now, and today's Draw Phil Naked is... ;)
Last edited by Pooka on 11 Jun 2017, 23:38, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: KMGW Appreciation Week

Post by Canadanne »

Regarding Series 8, pjmlfc05 wrote:The problem was by going back to it's dungeon roots Knightmare went full circle. It was never gonna recapture the feel of the earlier series. It's as if it forgot it's golden rule, the only way is onwards, there is no turning back!
I think this nails part of the problem with KMGW for me. It was *weird* seeing the original dungeon rooms used again after all this time, despite that dungeon being destroyed in Series 3 and all the evolutions we went through after that. It was especially weird seeing them in unfamiliar situations (Level 3 rooms in Level 1?) and with new textures that looked far less natural than the originals. I guess they chose those rooms for the nostalgia factor, but it didn't feel right to me. If they ever made a new series I'd prefer a new set of rooms to go with it.

Loved seeing the old characters again, and with Lord Fear looking much better than he did in Series 8 (albeit with a silly helmet). Theodora is a great character too, it's a shame we probably won't see any more of her. I found Daisy a little wooden, but to be fair both Pickle and Majida took a while to settle in properly, so I expect she'd be fine after a few episodes. Not sure Sylvester the Jester has any real potential, though - I can't picture him doing jester-y things at all! (I'd much rather they brought back Sylvester Hands and Motley the jester...)

I hated the awkward, unnecessary contestant intros (it would have been much funnier if they introduced themselves as in the original series, just saying their name and hometown into the camera!), and I didn't like Dan's piss-taking attitude to the whole thing, but the other team members were fine - I've somewhat warmed to the idea of YouTube 'celebs' taking part, as long as they took the game seriously enough and didn't try too hard to be entertaining. (It was still better with kids though, who tend to be less self-aware.)

Treguard's line about Stuart reaching Level 3 was hilarious. ;D

I'm glad this came along so that KMVR is no longer our last impression of the Knightmare universe - thank god we got the real Lissard back! - and it was nice how they picked out some of KMVR's better contributions (e.g. Slice Me Dice Me) to appear again here. They also got rid of the Series 8 antechamber, hurrah!

Oh, and I *love* that we finally got an explanation as to why the leaking roof in Barry's quest allowed him to restore his life force energy! And confirmation that 'old skull-face' is Lord Fear, not Mogdred. :)
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Re: KMGW Appreciation Week

Post by pjmlfc05 »

It was a plesent surprise when this was shown and I did enjoy it much more than KMVR.

Highlights:

Lord Fear and Lissard - still got it even though it was almost 20 years since the last episode.
Treguard - also still has it after all this time!
Sylvester the jester - not as good as motley but still liked him.
Old feel to the 1st couple of series - although I preferred the later series, it was a nice throwback.
Theodora Snitch - like a modern Elita

Lowlights:

The team - not being personal but I've always said I would have preferred to see people maybe off the forum. That would have been incredible and a once in a lifetime thing. The team where okay, but found Dan a bit annoying at times. I thought Ashens was a good dungeoneer though.
Daisy - not for me.


In all a good episode and if Knightmare ever came back, I wouldn't mind seeing it like this. A modern approach to the early series. But I would incorporate it with the outside feel of later series. A mixture of s3 and s6. Anyways, still enjoyed the episode and am grateful that it saw the light of day.
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Re: KMGW Appreciation Week

Post by wombstar »

A bit hit and miss but more positive than negatives, the extended version giving us a more complete adventure, and I wont fault the Ep for not having the correct sounds effects or editing due to the time restraints.

Sylvester the Jester was great, not quite as good as Folly but out shined Motley.
His character just needed a bit more tweaking, as they all do at first. Wasn't really fussed about the other new ones, none of them were that memorable too me.

Silly intro was the biggest disaster for me, hate the idea of Treguard just sleeping all those years in his chair just waiting for someone to turn up, lol and Lord Fear doesn't appear to have done anything In that time.. I just a bit it was all too weird.

Team was far to jokey, I guess they're used to doing silly things on youtube for attention and tried to do that here, it didn't work.

Too much of a spoof than the real thing, at least it got people talking about it again. Also, I liked seeing the old rooms re-invented, seems like a logical step.

Sadly, this will probably the last ever knightmare episode.
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Re: KMGW Appreciation Week

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wombstar wrote:I guess they're used to doing silly things on youtube for attention and tried to do that here [...]
Ah, no, they didn't.
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Re: KMGW Appreciation Week

Post by Mashibinbin »

Interesting points so far Party People...one thing in my head atm is

"The team - not being personal but I've always said I would have preferred to see people maybe off the forum" by pjmlfc05.

Given there are that many forum dwellers - the majorly active, sometimes active and those as active as Nigel the racing tortoise what criteria would you use for a picking a future forum team? :)
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Re: KMGW Appreciation Week

Post by pjmlfc05 »

Mashibinbin wrote:Interesting points so far Party People...one thing in my head atm is

"The team - not being personal but I've always said I would have preferred to see people maybe off the forum" by pjmlfc05.

Given there are that many forum dwellers - the majorly active, sometimes active and those as active as Nigel the racing tortoise what criteria would you use for a picking a future forum team? :)
Maybe a competition? There would be enough active people to enter this. I guess it would have been an amazing opportunity.
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Re: KMGW Appreciation Week

Post by Mystara »

pjmlfc05 wrote:
Mashibinbin wrote:Interesting points so far Party People...one thing in my head atm is

"The team - not being personal but I've always said I would have preferred to see people maybe off the forum" by pjmlfc05.

Given there are that many forum dwellers - the majorly active, sometimes active and those as active as Nigel the racing tortoise what criteria would you use for a picking a future forum team? :)
Maybe a competition? There would be enough active people to enter this. I guess it would have been an amazing opportunity.
That doesn't really seem to answer the question. Any way of choosing people from the forum could be classed as a competition :P

One could claim that the players were picked from the forum by competition. In particular, a competition to produce the YouTube video having the most downloads that happens to mention the word "Knightmare".
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Re: KMGW Appreciation Week

Post by pjmlfc05 »

Mystara wrote:
pjmlfc05 wrote:
Mashibinbin wrote:Interesting points so far Party People...one thing in my head atm is

"The team - not being personal but I've always said I would have preferred to see people maybe off the forum" by pjmlfc05.

Given there are that many forum dwellers - the majorly active, sometimes active and those as active as Nigel the racing tortoise what criteria would you use for a picking a future forum team? :)
Maybe a competition? There would be enough active people to enter this. I guess it would have been an amazing opportunity.
That doesn't really seem to answer the question. Any way of choosing people from the forum could be classed as a competition :P

One could claim that the players were picked from the forum by competition. In particular, a competition to produce the YouTube video having the most downloads that happens to mention the word "Knightmare".
That would be open to bias though. I just think in general it would have been nice for a forum member to have been given chance to have taken part in the geek week episode.
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Re: KMGW Appreciation Week

Post by wombstar »

Mystara wrote:
wombstar wrote:I guess they're used to doing silly things on youtube for attention and tried to do that here [...]
Ah, no, they didn't.
I don't share the same opinion as you.
I've always said I would have preferred to see people maybe off the forum
Trouble is the Ep wouldn't have gotten enough publicity and as it was a youtube project it's only natural they wanted youtubers involved, the risk being they play to their fans which is what happened for the most part.

Personally, I would have liked to have seen a team of past contestants/winners as it was a one off special episode.

Oh Well. The fact Km was considered worthy enough to be part of 'Geek Week' and got people talking about it again and maybe introduced new viewers to the show I think it did it's job.
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Re: KMGW Appreciation Week

Post by Mystara »

wombstar wrote:
Mystara wrote:
wombstar wrote:I guess they're used to doing silly things on youtube for attention and tried to do that here [...]
Ah, no, they didn't.
I don't share the same opinion as you.
The way that you see the players in that episode is exactly as they behave in real life. They aren't doing anything special, different, or unusual from what they're usually do when the cameras are off.

As for who they wanted to appeal to, they seemed far more concerned at being accepted by Knightmare fans than producing something extra that their normal fans would appreciate.

(As a side point, why would they need to appeal to their fans in the Geek Week episode? They can effortlessly produce an infinite number of YouTube videos at a moment's notice that would appeal to their fans. Why go to the effort of appealing to your fans in a video that only 1/50th of your fans will even see?)

The difference between the players and previous teams is that previous teams present a fake polite, camera-shy, demure, persona - probably because they want to look their best on camera.

In contrast, the GW team behave as they usually do because, being very popular people, they don't feel the need to sterilise their usual persona.
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Re: KMGW Appreciation Week

Post by HobGoblin »

I don’t think I have much to say about Geek Week that I haven’t said already. It’s a very watchable quest and, viewed in the context of how and why it was produced, does a great job of capturing the feel of the early series. The extended version is much improved with an additional floor puzzle and wall monster (shame no riddles though). I do still think the first five minutes are weak and it’s a shame to think this was many people's first sight of KM. Similarly, although it’s harsh to criticise the pacing/editing, such technical issues probably didn’t enhance the first impression it was making on younger viewers. That said, YouTube comments were pretty favourable…

As to the thorny issue of using YouTubers, I can absolutely understand why this was done and was a much better way of raising the show’s profile than using forum members. You need teams with a bit of personality and even in the normal run of things I suspect the producers would have tried to pick teams who were both competent and entertaining. However…

I suppose my main beef is that, for something which intended to capture the spirit of early KM, the team themselves (or at least the advisors) weren’t very KM; they just didn’t seem nerdy enough to me (it was called Geek Week for a reason!).

Of course, I’m basing this on not very much at all; I don’t really know them and they’re obviously very intelligent. I just felt some…cognitive dissonance or something I suppose…whereby these cool kids – who probably enjoy weird things like going out and talking to people - had been dropped into an alien world. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with trendy haircuts and skinny jeans but I didn’t see many of them at the KM Convention.;)

I always thought that KM gave kids who never got picked for the school football team a chance to be heroes; the use of wildly popular contestants jarred slightly.

Ok, I’m exaggerating slightly (and generalising appallingly) for comic effect – but at the same time this is sort of how I feel. Many apologies to all the KM fans who don’t consider themselves nerdy – this is just my personal perspective and says more about me than anything. :)
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Re: KMGW Appreciation Week

Post by Mystara »

HobGoblin wrote: I suppose my main beef is that, for something which intended to capture the spirit of early KM, the team themselves (or at least the advisors) weren’t very KM; they just didn’t seem nerdy enough to me (it was called Geek Week for a reason!).
There's an article to be written on this subject...! :)

For a while, I had a similar opinion to you. But on reflection, aside from their popularity, the players tick many of the nerd boxes. They're very up to date on their tech, they're games players, they hate sport, they're intelligent, good at music, love sci-fi, etc.

The major difference to whT I would recognise as a geek is they're seen as cool/trendy.

So isn't this just a generational thing? Is it just that nerds are now starting to be seen as cool?

By contrast, you would find the fans of the advisors to be much more relatable and would fit in with the convention far more. But then, not being popular themselves, I imagine they lack the self confidence of the advisors.

Another observation would be Stuart. He's our generation. But he lacks the trendy jeans, haircut and piercings of the others. Again, that would seem to suggest that the advisors are simply representative of today's geek. :)
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Re: KMGW Appreciation Week

Post by Mashibinbin »

Geek = chic, innit ;)

Given the tightrope the YT participants had to tread I'd said they did an admirable job and I'd much prefer that than an assortment of ex Big Brother and reality tv detritus.

Celebrity teams that would get my backing would be including Bradley Walsh, Bruce Forsyth (esp on a PYCR revival!), Jonathan Ross, Rob Brydon, Craig Charles and Lee Mack.
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Re: KMGW Appreciation Week

Post by wombstar »

I don't tend to buy into this idea of being nerdy, geeky, trendy or whatever labels people come up with, you get put into a box when you're at school yet everyone is individual, I know plenty of science fiction fans who are huge sports fans, and sports fans who are great musician it's perfectly acceptable to like both.

Saying that, if you're a Km fan, you're one of the cool kids.
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