Talk:Roberta Williams/Archive 1

Archive 1

Return to industry

In recent interviews Ken Williams has said that Roberta is happy being retired and has no plans to return to making games. Although Ken Williams still manages a Sierra fan site as a hobby (using forum software he wrote), Roberta has declined interview requests for many years now, and has only rarely commented publicly, through her husband. I deleted the line mentioning her potential return. Feel free to put it back if you find newer information.Technitai 13:21, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

Photo

Thanks to whoever put that new photo of her up! Much better than having just that Softporn cover there. :) Technitai 08:58, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

You're welcome. :-) It has since been deleted though. Tiba5000 16:58, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

Roberta has two sons (not a son and daughter.) Those aren't her children in the photo; they're just models. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 121.1.201.89 (talk) 21:35, 4 April 2007 (UTC).

Softporn

I removed the following addition by an anon user:

William's also posed naked for the cover of Softporn, an early On-line Systems adventure game by Chuck Benton.

Though I am familiar with Softporn (or was, 20 years ago), I doubt Williams posed for the cover of this game. If someone can verify this, go ahead and add it back in. I think it was just someone's idea of a joke. — Frecklefoot | Talk 19:26, Apr 12, 2005 (UTC)

This information is true, since I read it from Al Lowe's book (a valid source) which delved a bit in Sierra's history. 62.74.9.133 21:50, 18 May 2005 (UTC)

Cool. Just a note, when you post comments on the talk page, please sign them. You can do this with either 3 or 4 tildes (~~~ or ~~~~). The latter is usually preferred, since it also adds a timestamp. :-) — Frecklefoot | Talk 16:07, May 18, 2005 (UTC)

It is easily verifiable that Robert Williams was one of the three women on the cover of Softporn Adventure. Yamaguchi先生 05:02, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

Cleanup

I think this article contains some flowery language such as "legendary storytelling and creative prowess" that could be removed. I'm not knowledgable enough on the topic myself to do such an edit, however.Technitai 16:18, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

I gave it a shot. Nach0king 17:14, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

"Roberta posed nude (appearing from shoulders and above) for the cover of the game Softporn Adventure by Chuck Benton, published by On-line Systems." I take issue with this line because saying "nude" just seems really irrelevant and inaccurate since she wasn't visibly naked. There's so much more to say about Roberta, like the stories behind her own discovery of the text-game "Adventure" and the birth of the animated adventure game genre. I think the aforementioned is true, but it sticks out sorely in the couple paragraphs listed there; she was a pioneering woman and it's fairly degrading and undeserved. Does anyone agree? 68.174.66.219 04:38, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

• I agree. Just add them :) As for the 'nude' phrase, it was I who wrote it, however I took it from the Larry Book by Al Lowe. Pictureuploader 09:08, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

I don't think it's degrading at all, if she did it, she did it, it was her own choice and she didn't have to do it if she didn't want to. If you own a company, you can still have fun. [3|16|06]

No it's not degrading, but that doesn't make it relevant. She modelled for some box art... big deal. It's not like posing for publicity material was a huge part of her career, so let's leave it out. People keep talking about this only for the trivia value and being able to say "whoa Roberta Williams appeared NUDE on a game box!!! (except not really)". So, basically: not at all relevant for an encyclopedia.Technitai 11:07, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

We don't have to highlight it, but I don't think including the image scan of the cover of the game is in anyway degrading. It's completely G-rated stuff and adds interest. We don't even have to talk about it in the article, just the caption of the cover will suffice. Anyway, I added the cover back in (lower in the article). If anyone has issue with it, well, you know what to do. :-) — Frecklefoot | Talk 20:31, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

I added the Mixed Up Mother Goose cover as well, I figured might as well since it's mentioned in the article. Chipmunk01 23:43, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

WikiProject class rating

This article was automatically assessed because at least one article was rated and this bot brought all the other ratings up to at least that level. BetacommandBot 03:54, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:Softporn Adventure (video game).jpg

Image:Softporn Adventure (video game).jpg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Wikipedia:Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to insure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.

If there is other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Note that any fair use images lacking such an explanation can be deleted one week after being tagged, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you.

BetacommandBot (talk) 07:37, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Compilation?

Did Roberta Williams make a compilation of her games at some point? 82.21.53.146 (talk) 10:49, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

There is indeed a Roberta Williams Anthology, which I have gathering dust on a shelf. It came in a 4-CD format, and contained more games than I ever found time to play. If anyone wants more information or anything about it, let me know. -Frozenjakalope (talk) 01:20, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

Heuer vs. Williams

An anon user changed her last name from "Williams" to "Heuer". I did a little research and some sources list her name as "Roberta Williams Heuer", others simply as "Roberta Williams", and some as "Roberta Heuer Williams". Anyone know what she really goes by and can provide a ref for it? If so, it should just be listed as an "a.k.a." since for her game designing career she was known as "Williams". — Frecklefσσt | Talk 12:59, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

Biography link

I'm not sure about the rules here and whether anything would speak against it, but I would like to propose changing the biography link in the web links section. The site it currently points to seems to have simply stolen the content, without even giving credit, from an old King's Quest fan page, The King's Quest Chronicles by Petter Holmberg. That site was hosted on Geocities and as such has been deleted, but the Geocities archive at Oocities.com retained a copy of most pages, including the Roberta Williams biography. Not only is it the original, credited article, but it also contains pictures, of which the currently linked site just copied the "alt" tags. The archived copy of the original biography page is here: https://web.archive.org/web/20090328114514/www.geocities.com/petter_holmberg/robertabio.html 84.226.75.75 (talk) 04:36, 12 August 2010 (UTC)

Personal Life Section

Hi, I altered the personal life to "The Williams family spend their time in Seattle, Mexico and France."
This was based upon the webpage Sierragamers which at the second paragraph which states "In 1996, the company was sold, and my wife, Roberta, and I decided to retire. Currently, we divide our time between Seattle, Mexico and France. Most of my days are spent playing golf, and other than this website I haven't thought about Sierra or computer games for a long time."

User:FJ 1 has removed this on 12 February 2012 citing it as "a sign of vandalism" which I do not believe it was.
could someone please explain why it was vandalism, if indeed it was. Or am I able to go ahead and reinstate the reference and text.

LongRobin79(talk) 12:44, 12 February 2012 (UTC)

• I apologise, if it was confusing. The user Webmanoffesto had signed after your edition. It means that he did a vandalism. BTW: now the source is good. FJ 1 (talk) 17:58, 13 February 2012 (UTC)

NP just new and somewhat confused by things at the minute LongRobin79(talk) 18:07, 13 February 2012 (UTC)

Most Influential

"Roberta Williams, together with Ken Williams, is considered one of the most influential video game designers."

I'm gonna stick a big ol' "citation needed" on top of that. 82.0.16.12 (talk) 23:39, 5 July 2013 (UTC)

I disagree - a hall of fame that only a handful of designers were inducted in more than validates that claim. Its not a direct quote.

(from revision history)

I don't want to get into a total edit war, so I'd rather discuss whether or not the line is legitimate here. Couple of things: first of all, the line is not grammatically sound- Roberta & Ken are considered "one... video game designers". If the line must stay it would make more sense to just remove the reference to Ken, unless they combine like Transformers.

As to the claim itself, I don't think the source justifies it.

a) it's only one source talking about her, contributing the opinion of (as far as I can tell) one columnist. It's not a poll of all designers or gamers to find out who they think the most influential is.

b) the list is somewhat narrow in scope. It only mentions PC game designers, and is focused primarily on those made in the 80s and 90s (with only two games made after the year 2000). If we were to take this list as the most influential game designers it would completely ignore console games, all Japanese designers, and any designers working in the past 12 years. If the claim were that Williams was one of the most influential PC games developers in the 80s and 90s then I think the source would justify such a claim.

c) this is a bit nitpicky, but the wording of the claim implies that Williams is still an active, influential video game designer. She is no longer active and the source emphasizes her past achievements. As I mentioned in the edit log, the source never says "most influential video game designer".

I am going to edit the article again, but I will refrain from doing so in future if I receive a response here on the talk page. As I said, I'd much rather discuss it if given the opportunity. 82.0.16.12 (talk) 17:25, 9 July 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for writing. Perhaps I'm the only one who disagrees with you. If that is the case - go ahead and change it. I won't edit it back again. I'm trying to find a better citation for it (since she basically created the whole genre and I can't imagine anyone would disagree with her influence) but unless anyone else agrees with me (or I can find more citations) go ahead. I'm going to scrounge up some Computer Gaming World & PC Gamer electronic copies I have to see if something is better there. Most of her work was before the Internet was very active so its hard to find more today. Also will have to see if Barton's Dungeons & Desktops mentions her.Caidh (talk) 17:30, 9 July 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for responding! The real reason that I find the claim contentious is that the genre is kind of defunct now. Adventure games were huge during the 80s and 90s, making up a really large part of the PC gaming market. But since then they've been losing ground to shooters and console games, to the point that it's a very fringe genre now. I highly doubt you'd find an adventure game now that had as big a budget (relatively, accounting for inflation) as Space Quest IV. I don't say this with any particular malice towards the genre, it's just an observation that their popularity has declined. Now, if Sierra games had a clear creative influence on a lot of modern games I might agree that Williams is still influential, but I just don't see it. I'm not intimately familiar with the games, though, so maybe I missed it. Glad to discuss it though. (82.0.16.12 (talk) 17:51, 12 July 2013 (UTC))

Image Requested

Hi all - not sure where to get an image that meets the copyright requirements of Wikipedia (images here are not something I have experience with). We definitely could use an image of Roberta Williams for the article though. Caidh (talk) 13:31, 17 July 2013 (UTC)