Flights of Fantasy

The show's logo used from 2002-2004

### Network

BCTV (May 15, 1993-September 21, 2000)WIAV-CD (July 21, 1994-2000)Channel America (September 25, 1994-1997)Network One (February 1995-1997)PBS (Holiday special only, 1998)

### Distributor

Flights of Fantasy Productions, Inc. (1993-2004)National Academy of Video Game Trade Reviewers (2004-)

### Language

English

***Flights of Fantasy*** was a public access TV show made by George Wood and Tom Allen back in 1993, The show primarily focused on video games, with reviews by George to go with it, The show was cancelled in September 21, 2000 for being too time-consuming to edit and Tom Allen wanting to focus on content that was easier to make, throughout the show's run, the show received strong praise and support from industry professionals, the game reviews from the later show up online as the umbrella title Gaming in The Clinton Years as a gimmicky way to repackage old content.

## History

### Early Beginnings (1993-1995)

Flights of Fantasy Productions, Inc., was founded in 1993 by George Wood, who created the "Flights of Fantasy" television series to bring the world of comic books to the masses Flights of Fantasy first premiered on May 13, 1993. the first 4 episodes of the series was primarily focused on comics with someone next to him, after the 4th episode George brought Tom Allen to the team to develop the show's video game coverage, Episode 5 focused on George and Mike Groves giving the viewer tips on how to cheat on Sonic 1 and 2, shortly after that, the show would be primarily about video games, with occasionally comics and movies will show up, most of the games after Sonic 1 and 2 were all Super Nintendo titles, with a few Game Boy games throw in for good measure, The show performed well, Majel Barrett Roddenberry of Star Trek and executives from Nintendo of America Inc. sent letters expressing a high regard for the quality of their productions.  *Broadway Comics*, a division of Lorne Michaels’ Broadway Video, displayed episodes at many of its comic conventions, and last but not least, a card game was released the following year in 1994, during that same year, It was syndicated and aired on WIAV-CD on July 21, 1994 and Channel American in September 25, 1994, This version of the show continued until late 1995, in which it was rebranded itself to The Video Game Show.

### As The Video Game Show (1995-1996)

The show rebranded as The Video Game Show (TVGS for short) in late 1995, the reason for this is currently unknown, this era has 2 differences from the early FOF era and the later FOF era.

* The focus is exclusively on Video Games (hence the title.)
* George Wood is no longer the host in this era, but rather the host are a bunch of kids.

The rebrand did not last that long, as only 15 episodes was known to have this rebrand and then in 1996, the show then revert back to Flights of Fantasy.

### The Later Years (1996-1999)

The show went back to it's original roots, George hosting the show and reviewing games as he did in 1993-1995 along with talking about comics and movies, however in late 1996, with the introduction of the Nintendo 64, George would then review games for the N64, dropping the SNES focus as a result, in 1996, the show expanded to Internet-related projects.  Initially seen under the Broadway Comics web site, the show was featured as part of the national launch of the RealVideo technology at *iTV.net*.  Programs were webcast at this site beginning in August 1997, and in February 1999, the show launched its first official web site (flightsoffantasy.com) to complement the television series. in late Season 3, another console appeared on selves, the PS1, it was the first time ever since episode 5 that George and his crew was reviewing games not for Nintendo consoles, also in that same season, the show changed its ratings system from evaluating control, difficulty, and design, to evaluating control, difficulty, and quality overall.  The overall score can take into consideration any number of factors not otherwise rated.  A format change for the television show requires that the letter grades no longer be mentioned within the written review to avoid the annoying repetition of stating the rated categories for each review.  The letter grade ratings appear as a graphic on the television show, in 1998, George began talking about the hit movie Titanic, he even referenced the movie in the game reviews, that same year, complaints about the show about their 2 reviews on Final Fantasy VII, so George responded to the complaints with a new review for the angry reviews, in December 1998, a very successful holiday special was broadcast on MPT. at Mid 1999, the show came to a end.

### as FOFTV and the end of the series (1999-2000)

in Mid 1999, the show would rebrand itself again as FOFTV.com, It was hosted on the FOFTV website at the time, the major difference in this show is that the reviews are much shorter, with a bunch of them being crammed in for the majority of the episodes, The website also had every review (expect for the Season 3 reviews since the archive files were lost but still exists in video format, in September 2000, FOFTV came to end for being too time-consuming to edit and Tom Allen wanting to focus on content that was easier to make. ending the entire Flights of Fantasy series, but the website was still up after it's cancellation in 2000 until 2004.

## References

1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 https://web.archive.org/web/20040813001658/http://www.foftv.com/fofgw02.html
2. ↑ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YHBZrEcUIJQ
3. ↑ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kd-oG7CNRS8