The Snowman on PC CD-ROM! | Nostalgia Nerd
Head to www.squarespac... to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain using code NOSTALGIANERD.... So then, the festive period is upon us. Christmas. The Holiday Season. Which for many of us will mean mandatory viewing of The Snowman, by Raymond Briggs. Originally brought to TV in 1982, it made its way to PC CD-ROM some twenty years later. So what does it have in store?....
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Пікірлер: 287
Have an excellent period of seasonality folks. Thanks for being here throughout 2020.
@joeyvanostrand3655
3 жыл бұрын
That is the single most assholish way I have ever heard "Merry Christmas" phrased. Bravo.
@HarlotEffect
3 жыл бұрын
@@joeyvanostrand3655 Well your comment is the most assholish I've seen today.
@TheRivieraKid
3 жыл бұрын
@@joeyvanostrand3655 Damn that was harsh.
@joeyvanostrand3655
3 жыл бұрын
@@HarlotEffect opinion from the hepatitis factory duly noted.
@HarlotEffect
3 жыл бұрын
@@joeyvanostrand3655 I'm glad you noticed I worked extra hard at the factory today.
I was the lead programmer on the pc version - my first paid job! Thank you, this was an incredible bit of nostalgia, aside from reliving 6 months of the General MIDI version of Walking in the Air. The “dress your snowman” section seemed to produce profoundly disturbing results more times than not and I discovered that the dance section fits perfectly to Dr. Dre’s The Day the ****** Took Over. Happy times.
Clearly the lesson of The Snowman: don't grow emotional attachments, the universe will snuff them out and leave you all by your lonesome. Yeah! Bright and Cheery!
@Nostalgianerd
3 жыл бұрын
It's formed the basis of my character ever since. Now I only bond with abandoned technology.
@AllahDoesNotExist
3 жыл бұрын
Ey bb u have onlyfans?
@Christopher-N
3 жыл бұрын
Toned down macabre humour-nice. :)
@TheHoldenmcgroin
3 жыл бұрын
@@Nostalgianerd hold on, does that mean Octavius is....... a robot?....
@Chase_Reynolds
3 жыл бұрын
@@TheHoldenmcgroin An old, abandoned robot?
He's not dead, he just passed into the water life.
@Christopher-N
3 жыл бұрын
He's not dead, he's just resting [until next year].
@BerrymanMovies
3 жыл бұрын
And he has to come back for the sequel with his snowdog
@madkirk7431
3 жыл бұрын
Lol
@daltonharmon1018
3 жыл бұрын
Don't worry he lives on inside of us and all around us. Quite literally
Ahh The Snowman, the perennial favourite of depressed parents, depressed animators, and depressed broadcasters all over Europe. Now with MIDI for depressed multimedia Pentiums!
@negirno
3 жыл бұрын
Dunno, nothing can top "The Plague Dogs" for me in the depression department. This multimedia CD-ROM and the original animation looks exceptional, though...
@kilwala2242
3 жыл бұрын
@@negirno The plague dogs... Let's make an animated snuff film with cute looking talking dogs and leave zero survivors. The main purpose of the movie and book was to be animal rights propaganda so any kind of happy ending would ruin the misanthropic message.
That's the best description of Snowman. It's still really popular here in Finland being a yearly tradition for as long as I remember. Always airing the same time every year. And it breaks hearts every single time
@Kalvinjj
3 жыл бұрын
I do kind of remember watching that in VHS in Finnish indeed (given I've lived there 2~3 years when I was little)... ...Tho the only version of the song that feels correct for me is the Nightwish one...
@KimSjopi
3 жыл бұрын
@@Kalvinjj it's a genuine christmas classic and it plays every christmas morning at the end of show called "Joulupukin kuumalinja" where children call Santa on TV and sing christmas songs to him - usually treadfully. Snowman is always followed by the declaration of christmas peace that happens live at the former capital citys market square so it sits really comfily in between with no need to change it in any way and it has been like this since like the mid to late 80's
"Ooh -- What if we take Frosty the Snowman, but lean super hard on the melty parts." - Snowman writer.
"We're walking in the air And Scrooge is looking rather glum 'Cause people everywhere Can see right up his bum!"
@Nostalgianerd
3 жыл бұрын
That's beautiful Eddie.
@nicholasgawler-collins5754
3 жыл бұрын
This is art.
@mikeall7012
3 жыл бұрын
Sounds a lot like the opening melody to that Lord song, Royals.
@TeraunceFoaloke
3 жыл бұрын
That's great.
@hhhharis622
3 жыл бұрын
Very british indeed
Raymond Briggs has a knack for writing stories with soul-crushingly depressing endings. I cried my eyes out at the end of Ethel and Ernest when they die and suddenly go from being his mum and dad like he'd always remembered them, to being these withered old dead husks.
@braidena1633
3 жыл бұрын
I remembered the art style of this cartoon and that it left me feeling terrible but had forgotten why. Thankfully Nostalgia nerd had us covered
I remember seeing this on the local PBS affiliate when I was a kid. That moment when he finds his dearest friend dead on his front lawn was when I came to understand the inherent cruelty of mortality.
"Walking In The Air" is a creepy ass song.
@tvaccount2253
3 жыл бұрын
Bloke with his balls in a vice
@fallingwater
3 жыл бұрын
Depends on which version... kzread.info/dash/bejne/i2ymtKqRacWumc4.html
@JohnnnyJohn
3 жыл бұрын
@@fallingwater Nope, still creeps me out.
I once played this CD Rom at my old primary school back when I was 8. I liked it a lot so I asked the teachers if I could have a copy of it at home and they agreed! The games were stupidly simple to beat for me back then but the story and the music kept me interested. 🎄🎄🎄Merry Christmas and a happy new year!🎄🎄🎄
I show my kids the cartoon at least once a year at Christmas. they love it.
Im 36 and watching the snowman with my kids today still hits a chord that takes me back to my childhood that only another handful of shows/songs do.
Considering the other thing I know Briggs for is a horribly dark and depressing film about an elderly couple dying during a nuclear holocaust..... this is gonna be fun...
@Nostalgianerd
3 жыл бұрын
I do love how Briggs tells stories without sugar coating. Like life.
@jezz2k
3 жыл бұрын
When the Wind Blows, another Briggs' adaptation that involved Bowie. I read that and Fungus in my last years at school back in the late 80s.
I thought this was going to be the SkiFree snowman.
@Nostalgianerd
3 жыл бұрын
A really deep dive on the SkiFree Snowman would be incredible, to be fair.
@Le_Petomane
3 жыл бұрын
@@Nostalgianerd We called it the abominable snow man but perhaps it was a Yeti. Both traumatic in their own ways, if you are of a certain age. Although i am local to THIS snowman's location and that made it even more painful.
i always saw it as a happy ending, as in the snow man and santa are real and that boy got to experience a journey no one would believe! and the scarf proves it was real.
@SeekingTheLoveThatGodMeans7648
Ай бұрын
It's something about the poignant essence of the thing remaining even after the physical part of it has melted away. The leading character at the North Pole is not Santa Claus here, but Father Christmas, who can be viewed as ranking above Santa Claus.
He had thoughts, expressed emotions, and now he's dead.
Ahh, how festive. A reminder that your friends will die, leaving you cold and alone.
@SeekingTheLoveThatGodMeans7648
Ай бұрын
The snowman died by becoming warmed up. There has to be an allegory in there somehow.
I had that snowman as a kid. My Dad did a funny voice with it. You actually brought back a good memory.
Watching this (the system, not the snowman) makes me yearn to own a PC like that again.
I still chock up when I hear walking in the air. The movie ruined me as a child 😂
here for the Packard Bell
The Snowman was mildly traumatic. GRANPA however... I just can't... 100x worse
@ihateevilbill
3 жыл бұрын
Granpa we love you, granpa we do. Even though your far away, we think of yoooouuu...
Had this on VHS somewhere, with the intro by David Bowie.
@jhbadger
3 жыл бұрын
And now Bowie's dead, just like the snowman.
@MichalKobuszewski
3 жыл бұрын
I sure still do! My dad pirated it off the TV.. and we played it back yearly ever since in my childhood. Awesome, pre-torrent times!
@MrMortull
3 жыл бұрын
@@MichalKobuszewski Ah yes... those halcyon days of watching the same broadcast from1989 every year without fail until the quality degraded and the sound turned all weird because the tape had started to stretch.
They should've done a When The Wind Blows version too.
@CrazyChiv
3 жыл бұрын
Is that the nuclear shelter one? Because I can't make it through that.
@PooperScooperTrooper
3 жыл бұрын
@@CrazyChiv yup, that's the one. It was really good I thought.
@CrazyChiv
3 жыл бұрын
@@PooperScooperTrooper Oh yeah. I'm not saying it's poor quality. Just a bit too bleak for me.
Nostalgia sounds!!!!! Omg Encarta just swamped my brain area! Those were the days! 1 pc in the school library, looking up Egyptians and playing shite Encarta games! Amazing
Ah the warm glowing, warming glow of a new Nostalgia Nerd video!
My first contact with "The Snowman" was with the Atari ST demo, I was mesmerised
The animation is and has been part of my Christmas pretty much my entire life. Still love it! Seasons greetings from Finland
Just gonna file this along with The Little Match Girl.
Happy new year to you too mate! From France with love.
great product placement mate...i just bought your book from amazon (finally!!!!)! Merry Christmas good man.
5 minutes in another top one my man
Wow! my little brother got one of those for Christmas! Being the only one with a PC at the time I was forced to give him a go! Pretty sure the beany snowman is still knocking about the rents house. Ahhh I am indeed a nostalgic nerd :)
Omg, the snow man. I loved the song and the music. I loved the Santa Clause book too. Omg, I haven't thought about that since I was a kid and I loved the grumpy Santa Clause books too. I use to go to the public library to find the books
Lovely job. Here's to a better 2021!
What was it with animated films in the 70s and 80s? They seemed purpose-made to leave deep psychological scars! Watership Down was my "childhood trauma" moment personally, for some reason when I saw the end scene of The Snowman it just made logical sense to me instead of being depressing.
0:30 Best sponsorship segue ever.
The Snowman, it's not Christmas without it. It captures that childhood imagination and magic so well then squashes it with reality like life does.
Very entertaining. Have an excellent Christmas.
That Packard Bell wing speaker monitor does its own job to bring back memories of horrors fixing IRQ conflicts when I installed a SCSI card in a PB machine, in 1994.
@SeekingTheLoveThatGodMeans7648
Ай бұрын
Oh boy, wasn't it a miracle when PC hardware and Windows finally got their act combined. Will this CD run under Wine on Linux? Just curious.
I don't think I'll ever hear the name Briggs without thinking about limbo of the lost
Wow, as someone HEAVILY involved in the modding scene for Creature Labs' flagship "Creatures" series of artificial life games in the late 90s and early 2000s, I had NO IDEA they randomly did a side project like this! I wonder if it was a quick contract to make some money during their period of financial difficulties.
Thanks for that , it reminded me of a whole genre of "interactive games" I used to get for my kids to get them to use computers. Loved the snowman, but preferred Father Christmas. Your trauma should end , as the boy is at the party with his re-made snowman.
Didn't know a CD-ROM of The Snowman existed :o The animation has been shown in Finland every year from 1992 onwards, on Christmas Eve around 11:30am. You cannot find a Finn who's not familiar with it.
They made a sequel to the snowman. Less than a few minutes in the boy's dog dies. They didn't even wait for the end to make you depressed.
@SeekingTheLoveThatGodMeans7648
Ай бұрын
The story has its denouement in the creation of a new dog from an enchanted realm.
Ah yes just what I always wanted seasonal depression for Christmas. Thanks for reminding me about this book.
The Snowman, will always be important to me, as it was my Uncle's favourite thing to have on at Christmas and everyone had to be quiet whilst it was on. I loved this video.
5:35 - Mmmm... As crispy as fresh snow.
I’m 40 years old today. And it still hurts. Will the hole in my heart ever be mended?
@dallesamllhals9161
3 жыл бұрын
Nope ;-)
If the Censors removed the ending scene this film wouldn't be a problem.
This movie traumatized me as a child and nobody at my school knew what I was talking about when I mentioned this movie. Everyone thought I was being super morbid when I told the plot and due to the fact that my parents had NO idea what my grandmother had got my little sister and I for VHS that Christmas in the late 90s until AFTER we told them, it was too late. I am pretty sure this is what triggered alot of my early childhood depression and mental crisis surrounding the holiday seasons. I now suffer from really intense seasonal depression as an adult and snow triggers something deeply sad in me.
@SeekingTheLoveThatGodMeans7648
Ай бұрын
Some things -- all things that are earth bound, in fact -- come only to later depart. I think there are sensitive persons who are particularly haunted by the spectre of death, even though it is a thing, a kind of bitter baptism, through which every mortal must pass. Learning and accepting what a God of good will has to present here and now (and in future on earth, and ultimately forever) is the ultimate solution to the paradox and the cure for the gloom about it. My mind reached to things of greater profundity -- of the death of the stars themselves.
Well, it's safe to say that someone was scarred a young boy.
@SeekingTheLoveThatGodMeans7648
Ай бұрын
These poignant experiences are perhaps more common than we might think, though kept private in most cases. Briggs managed to speak symbolically of it through this movie. For some reason The Snowman wasn't big in the outwardly jollier American Christmassy scene. Our Frosty the Snowman just walked off, with a merry bumpety bump bump and a mere pause for a traffic cop, without a word about the ultimate fate of snowmen. The facts that first scar us on earth become the setting of the scene in which the healing comes to us from God. If we did not think about the trans-mortal, we would not think about what is by far the most important aspect of our existence as the lone animal on earth into whose spirit God breathed in the special way that carries the impartation of His likeness.
Ugh... this video. My four-year-old likes to watch this daily, as four-year-olds do, and each time it gets me down. For some reason it doesn't seem to affect my kids. Meanwhile I'm sitting in the corner thinking, "Why does everything we love have to die?"
@Nostalgianerd
3 жыл бұрын
My son cries every single time. Then he watches it again. Then he cries. The circle of life.
@allongur
3 жыл бұрын
We tend not to cherish the things that do not perish. Ephemerality imparts value in our eyes, we must enjoy it to its fullest before it dies. As for things there are not fleeting, over our attention they're not competing.
i liked this and it did bring a festive cosy feel to christmas like it was the 90s
If you think _that's_ traumatic, you clearly haven't seen _Watership Down_...
@Nostalgianerd
3 жыл бұрын
OH, I have.
I do remember watching a story just like this back when I was in elementary school like as far back as 1989 or 1990 was when I first heard of this story of the boy and snowman and in the end, he melted and was a little sad.
Happy we didn’t have this in germany. Remember the last unicorn? That was weird enough.
Nice Packard Bell Club 30? It was my fist PC and multimedia monitor (with those speakers)! Had it apart within days, to the dismay of my parents ;-)
@Nostalgianerd
3 жыл бұрын
Yes, it's a pretty nice "late multimedia era" PC
Wow. Glad I missed _this_ particular trauma as a kid.
If you say it played in the US, OK, but it was nothing I ever saw on TV and no one I know is aware of it. BUT, I did stumble across it on VHS in the 90s and have always like the show. Love that music.
I grew up with this movie and I love it! I've honestly never met anyone in real life or online that has even heard of this movie, so I was pretty excited when I saw this uploaded.
I had that Packard Bell PC! Or a very close approximation anyways. Ah. Double the memories. 🙂
How many book adaptations of the films are there? I have one of the sequel where the dog wot turns real is called "Socks" when there's no dialogue in the movie. I'm also a Brit whose DVD copy of The Snowman has David Bowie in it. (Thanks for making subtitles so I didn't have to guess the spelling!)
I had that Packard Bell with the speakers on the side. They were quite good. 5 watts each rms I think they were.
Snowman on a motorbike with a hot engine.......bad idea!
@Nostalgianerd
3 жыл бұрын
Balls of steel.
3:50 i remember when the CD-ROM was so advance. burning at 4x was a great leap to save backup time
So anyway yes... The Snowman. Born in '78 so I do remember this being on the telly but I must admit it's the version with David Bowie I remember seeing first, and then every version after that had Paul McCartney in it - unless I'm hallucinating that!
(5:48) Just listen to that powerful CD-ROM drive spin up in the background! ;)
@SeekingTheLoveThatGodMeans7648
Ай бұрын
And that to deliver what, an amazing 4X? But if it weren't for these primitive machines paving the way, we'd never had the far more capable boxes we do now.
Happy Christmas and have a great new year.
This Snowman game was also released for the PS1, only in Japan (with English language option), since it was also shown there. Some of the mini games in the original were redesigned in 3D for the PS1. So not just Westerners, but also the Japanese got to experience it's story. Also, it seems The Snowman is the inspiration for the Spongebob Squarepants episode "Bubble Buddy".
Both this and Quentin Smirhes uploading his take on Walking in the Air at just about the same time? I don't know, the melting snowman never did bother me that much. But that song with the visuals if the boy flying around in colored pencil stutteriness... For some reason it has always freaked me out. And today is no exception.
The sound that played when the kid finished drawing the car in the snow is the same sound that plays in Everquest when you finish a quest.
@Gilby1385
3 жыл бұрын
It also plays in the trailer for M&M's The Lost Formulas.
The snowman was my fav when I was a kid
Looks like you could use a way to capture footage from your Windows 98 machine for Christmas. I saw that Vista-ers circle and chubby arrow...
How amazing it is..
Have you ever played Garry Gadget? If you want some old awesome childrens games, those are definitely up there with the best in my book. The original is called "Mulle Meck" and is Swedish, but I believe one or two got translated to English as Garry Gadget. I thoroughly recommend you have a look at it as I think you'd actually enjoy it.
I wouldn't even know this existed without the Atari ST demo we had when I was younger.
It's on today 17:10 channel 4 ... can't wait !
Click on the snowman with a purple hat, who then takes off into the sky like it's Logan's Run....
The Snowman on VHS was in my family collection back in the day.
@Nostalgianerd
3 жыл бұрын
There's nothing quite like watching it on VHS. That warm fuzzy vision.
🎵we're walking in the air🎵
Thanks for your reviews all things old and sometimes obscure. If you ever find yourself in the states, specifically Minnesota, I'll buy you a pint or several.
Is that a post-Y2K Packard Bell? I don't recognize it since it doesn't have the frog design.
I'm not sure I will watch the snowman the same again. DEAD 😭
Awesome walking in the air midi!
@SeekingTheLoveThatGodMeans7648
Ай бұрын
Does it sound better with modern MIDI libraries, I wonder?
I would have been around 8 when this came out in the states. I do not recall ever seeing it on TV.
That midi sounds a lot like the opening melody to that Lord song, Royals.
I had that same packard bell monitor with speakers attached in 94, well, basically the same. With their weird hallway GUI over the top of Windows 3.1
@the.internet
3 жыл бұрын
Packard Bell Navigator. There were I believe several versions / rooms in the house. I loved it and spent much time clicking on lights and breaking things.
That MIDI track would sound amazing on a Gravis Ultra Sound, Roland MT-32 or SB AWE 64. What sound card is in this old Packard Bell PC?
I'd completly forgotten that this existed!
I was 5 in 1982, and I remember watching the snowman, and I don’t recall being bothered by the end! But then it was 38 years ago 😕😂
@AllahDoesNotExist
3 жыл бұрын
You mean 20 years ago right....oh shit it's 2020 already wtf
Nice! BTW contrary to popular belief, I am not Aled Jones.
If people think that The Snowman was traumatic, then you haven't watched Ringing Bell. Ringing Bell traumatized quite a few American kids in the late '70s.
2:00 Yes! David Bowie was a part of the version we got, therefor ours was better.
It's a bit beside the point, but if you want something really mercilessly absolutely crushingly depressing by Briggs, watch/read When The Wind Blows.
Wasn't exposed to the book, but I saw the animated version as kid
@Nostalgianerd
3 жыл бұрын
You have my sympathies.
Whereas for most people something like Zelda or Mario was the game of their childhood, I can honestly say this was mine. I never in my wildest dreams thought I'd ever see it running again 😂
No, I'm not scared of the Snowman dying. That which is born will necessarily die. We must all accept this.