First you better stop waving it like a feather-duster.
In responding to Profgrrrrl’s post about Leisure Suit Larry, I started thinking about the games I played in high school (that I can think of offhand). I played all the King’s Quest games — the last one I played was 6, but I don’t know what number they’re up to now. Those were my favourites of the “games where you can fuck yourself into an unwinnable situation several hours of game play later” genre. Perhaps because I knew enough of fairy tales and mythology that the puzzles made sense. I believe King’s Quest 4 — the one about the daughter, Rosella — was the first I played, but eventually I played them all in some order or another.
I played Police Quest 3 (I think? His wife died, or — something). I played most or all of the Space Quest games, in random orders. I wasn’t very good at them and didn’t like them as much. In other Sierra games, I played two of the Dr Brain games (love! nerd!), The Incredible Machine, and Jones in the Fast Lane. And yes, I can still do the tune for it.
And then there was the incredibly difficult (to get perfect — I could never win the archery contest) Conquest of the Longbow and, later, the far-too-easy Conquest of Camelot.
In grade — 9? 10? — when we first learned programming (other than Logo), some of us already knew how to program (in BASIC. Ahh, line numbering when you didn’t leave enough numbers), so we got to do whatever we wanted to in class. I played KQ5 a great deal in school that year. That was weird.
I preferred Lucasarts games. The Monkey Island series were just brilliant — though there were the occasional puzzles that were a little too ridiculous — and I keep intending to buy the pack of them all. Plus, you COULDN’T die. (Well, you could, if you stayed underwater for 10 or 20 minutes, but it was a pretty deliberate choice.) And you couldn’t get yourself into an unwinnable position.
I adored Loom, another game I want to get access to again (only with the music — the deluxe version), but they don’t seem to sell that one anymore. Also I’m unsure it would work on XP, so I’m leery of ebaying it.
And Tetris. There’s always Tetris.
November 1st, 2004 at 1:42 pm
Aha — No One Lives Forever is the best — both One and Two, although two is too short. Syberia I & II– fun but way too easy. Longest Journey — good stuff. Indiana Jones games also generally good, but if anyone can get through the tank maze in Emperor’s Tomb, please tell me how!