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Police Quest behind the scenes in GamesTM 115

Continuing my grand tradition of pimping Sierra games in GamesTM, this month I’ve written a behind the scenes article about Jim Walls’ Police Quest. The issue number is 115, and it should be on newsstands in the UK right now (probably also some US stores, but with Borders out of business I can’t confirm this). Jim gave a great interview and I learned many interesting tidbits I never knew about Police Quest… most notably that many of the events in the games are based on real-life events that happened to him during his days on the California Highway Patrol. I guess I should have realized that, it just never occurred to me.

I played the first two Police Quest games in 1989ish and loved them both. The first I actually solved all on my own without a hint book, which was no small feat at age eleven. (I also got pretty good at poker!) It’s funny how perceptions change… I distinctly remember my mother objecting to me playing Leisure Suit Larry at around the same time (and who could blame her?) but apprehending criminals and/or being shot by them after failing to follow proper procedure was no biggie. Also, dressing up as a pimp to go undercover was okay. (I didn’t know what a pimp was, mind you. In fact, I didn’t realize until working on this article is that Sonny’s undercover persona, “Whitey,” was supposed to be Marie’s pimp. Again, just never occurred to me.)


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Half scale scratch-built dresser

Last week when I saw this tutorial from Antique Daisy for making a dresser with fake drawers, it inspired me to make one for the Rosedale. I’ve been looking for a tall skinny dresser that sort of matches the bed and nightstand I’d built from kits for the bedroom. The corner where I wanted to put it is only about an inch wide and so far I haven’t been able to find anything that works in that space, so making my own seemed like the best move. And I hate building drawers, so a dresser with nonworking drawers is even better!

Daisy built hers from a block of wood, but since I didn’t have a piece that was the right size handy, I cobbled my dresser together from strip wood that was lying around. First, on the front edge, I glued on narrow pieces of wood to create “frame” to hold in the drawer fronts. (I used the drawer fronts as spacers to glue the trim pieces on, then pried them out so they could be painted separately.)

Next I glued the fronts and sides together to form a box. I also glued a thin shim just above the top trim piece, since the crown molding I planned to use at the top was slightly shallower than the trim and I wanted them to line up.

Since I was using spare pieces of wood, I didn’t think ahead of time about how thick the dresser would be. (We’ll revisit this later!)

Here it is from the side. You’ll notice that the side piece on the right is a bit too short, I didn’t have enough wood. That’s okay, since the top edge will be covered with crown molding (and I’d planned for that side to face the wall, anyway!)

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