THE PLAYER AND THE DOODLER ARE CURRENTLY INACTIVE! We decided to more-or-less end this channel in February 2018, and while videos of our backlog of streams continued to post here until close to the end of 2018, we currently have no plans for new projects. This is not a decision we came to lightly, as we always had a great time streaming and interacting with all you fans, but we feel that we need to move on to other projects. There still remains the possibility that we might do a stream or two in the future for fun, but it won’t be edited or posted here (the best place to find any of those streams will be our Twitch channel in the highlights if any end up happening).
Thank you all for your years of support! Below is the original FAQ which stood on this site for years, preserved for historical reasons:
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Q: So what is this site?
A: This is the home/archive for the Player and the Doodler!
Q: And they are…?
A: The Player (Jeff) and the Doodler (Johnathan) is a duo that produces Let’s Play videos with (hopefully) humorous and (occasionally) informative commentary, but with a twist! While the Player is playing a game, the Doodler is drawing things based on it, and at the end we post both the gameplay videos and the doodles. We also have some guest stars on occasions.
Q: So what, are these doodles just, like, drawings of screens from the game or something?
A: Some of them are, but sometimes they’re based on jokes that pop up during the stream, or scenes inspired by the game without being directly lifted from it. They run the gamut!
Q: What kind of games do you guys cover? Endless Minecraft videos, like most other Let’s Players?
A: Bah! We scoff at Minecraft! (Well, not really, but it’s not our scene.) Potentially we could cover any game, though our main focus has been on games published before the mid-90’s, particularly from Sierra Online’s adventure game series such as King’s Quest or Quest for Glory. We also open many of our streams with a short playthrough of a multiplayer Atari 800 game that most people under 33 (and many over) have never heard of (including the Doodler; the Player grew up with an Atari 800XL), and have done a smattering of NES and SNES games.
Q: What, so they’re, like, videos of games that are decades-old that nobody knows? Why would I want to watch those?
A: They’re fun! We grew up with a lot of these, but even the ones that have no nostalgia filter are still fun to play (and make fun of). The Atari videos, in particular, end up being pretty madcap and fun to watch, as half of the fun is figuring out just what’s going on back when graphics and good game design were in their infancy. Besides, they’re unique! You can see thousands of people online streaming Fallout 4 or League of Legends or whatever, but how many videos have you seen with people playing Wizard of Wor or Ballblazer? I’d reckon not a whole lot!
Q: Are you ever going to do some modern games?
A: We’ve started doing some, like Dokapon Kingdom, Costume Quest, and King’s Quest (2015). Beyond that, possibly, some day, if we find the right game. We tried doing some more modern games like Mass Effect 2 during our first stream, but found that we didn’t have nearly as much fun or inspiration with them as we did with the older games, so we didn’t save the footage.
Q: What is your update schedule?
A: A new video goes up every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday on our Youtube channel, with a Dokapon Kingdom video posting every Saturday. At the end of a series, a compilation post of all the videos will appear on this website, with a companion post showcasing the doodles made for that game. These also get uploaded to our Tumblr site.
Q: What about your livestreams? Can I get in on some of that sweet action?
A: You betcha! We stream on twitch.tv, and we love to have an active chat. We interact a lot with our chatters, so the more the merrier!
Q: What’s the schedule for those?
A: That’s a bit trickier, as we have to squeeze those in around our ever-changing real-life schedules. Lately our average has been about two livestreams per month. They normally get announced on our Facebook page a few days in advance as well as on twitch.
Q: Whoa, hey, you’re throwing a lot of sites at me. Can I get all your social media stuff in one list?
A: Sure thing! You can find us at:
Q: There are, like, a kajillion videos! Where would be a good place to start?
A: Well, you could start chronologically with King’s Quest I and go forward. But if you don’t have the time to go through everything I’d suggest at least watching some of our middle King’s Quest videos (III, IV, and especially V are all pretty good). If you just want to watch one video, you could start with one of the shorter Atari or NES videos, from the frenetic like Ballblazer or Race in Space to the calmer-but-still-fun like Bruce Lee or Micro Machines.
Q: Your videos are super-long! How can I watch them but still have a life?
A: They’re normally about 20 minutes long, but if it helps, try watching them at 1.25 speed. YouTube lets you change the speed in the settings for each video. For our normal projects it helps since the games are usually slower-paced, though I wouldn’t recommend it for our faster-paced shorts.
Q: Can I make requests for future games? Or just tell you exactly what I think of you?
A: Sure thing! You can contact us using any of the social media links above, or directly by email (our Gmail address is theplayerandthedoodler at gmail . com). We can’t promise we will do every game sent in, but we do listen to your requests (the Dr. Brain series, for example, was due to a request).
Q: What’s with this Dokapon Kingdom game? I’ve never heard of it! Why are you doing so much of it? And why aren’t you livestreaming it?
A: Dokapon Kingdom‘s story mode is something that takes a very long time to complete, but we thought it was an enjoyable enough experience to watch that we decided to make a long project out of it, especially since nobody knows how it will end. Plus, the Mystic and the Krazy Kat are fun to watch, too! We’re not livestreaming it to keep up the suspense and keep you coming back every week to see what happens next!
Q: Who wrote your little theme ditty? It sounds pretty good!
A: That would be the Player, who is also a musician. You can check out some other stuff he’s done on his music blog and his Soundcloud page.
Q: Where can I find more artwork by that Doodler guy?
A: Several places! You can find a lot of his work on his deviantart page, his general art blog, or his Facebook page. You can also buy his book ABC Monsters: The A Is For AAAAAAHH!!! The Z Is For Zither… He is currently working on a webcomic entitled Zoe and Beans, which you can find on Twitter.
Q: You guys are seven kinds of great! I’d like to compensate you for your many hours of work bringing me some great entertainment!
A: Hey, thanks! If you wish to support us financially, support our Patreon by either clicking this link or the picture of Lucky Dan on the right. If you’d like to make a one-time donation instead, you can donate whatever you want through Paypal using this button:
But the best way to really support us is to spread the word! Like and subscribe, so that we can grow our audience, and soon dozens, nay, hundreds of people will be loving Gray Chang as much as we do!
Q: OK, you keep mentioning this Gray Chang fellow; who is he?
A: Gray Chang was a game developer in the early 1980’s. We happened to notice his name in the credits for both Claim Jumper and Dog Daze along with a big spiel including his P.O. Box in Dog Daze Deluxe, so we looked him up online and found a picture of him with a giant cardboard pinhole camera the size of his torso. Since then he’s become a bit of a running gag, especially in our Atari videos. He seems like a nice guy, though we’ve never actually been in contact. You can visit his website if you want.
Q: Why do people keep mentioning square castles?
A: In our first stream (King’s Quest I), the Doodler saw Castle Daventry and remarked that he really liked the design. Unfortunately, it was a view of the castle from far away and was little more than a rectangle with bumps on it:
The chatters kept making fun of him for it as he tried to defend his position. He’s never been able to live it down since.
Q: What about that troll drawing of Valanice that keeps popping up? That weird song about Gavroche? The squeaky Patrick Stewart mouse voice? “But sometimes when you walk in…”? Hot pixel action? “All the knowledge in the universe!”? TIM?!? Limericks? What does the 1992 USA Men’s Olympic Basketball Team have to do with Chrono Trigger?
A: Look, I’m not going to explain all of our running gags here. Someday we may get popular enough to earn a tvtropes page, and then you can look them all up. In fact, somebody get on that!
Some of these origins are included in our Top 20 Moments from 2015 video.
Q: Are you guys racist?
A: No, we’re just terrible with accents.
The Player and the Doodler 