Choose my next adventure

[notbobsmith]

So I will close out this little exercise with Heart of China next and concluding with Gold Rush, assuming GOG doesn't put something new out in the meantime. I honestly know next to nothing about Heart of China. I remember seeing it in catalogs and the Sierra magazine, but nothing about it really piqued my interest.

[Tawmis]

Ever watch the show Tales of the Gold Monkey? Reminds me of a (bad) version of that. (Which, to be fair, was trying to capitalize in a way on Indiana Jones for TV).

[notbobsmith]

Ever watch the show Tales of the Gold Monkey? Reminds me of a (bad) version of that. (Which, to be fair, was trying to capitalize in a way on Indiana Jones for TV).

I've heard of it, but I've never seen it.

[Tawmis]

Ever watch the show Tales of the Gold Monkey? Reminds me of a (bad) version of that. (Which, to be fair, was trying to capitalize in a way on Indiana Jones for TV).

I've heard of it, but I've never seen it.

It was a super campy but fun show...

[notbobsmith]

And with the completion of Gold Rush, thus ends my little exercise. Thank you all for participating. It was a great way to motivate me to clear through my backlog of Sierra titles. I still have a few more that I am missing. The Ecoquest games. Shivers 2. There might be a few others that I am missing. I'm not fully versed in some of the '90s games or if they fall into the "adventure" genre. (Inca?) Here's hoping GOG makes these available. Anyway, in the coming days I'll post a list of how I would rank them. I just need to get my thoughts in order. I have a pretty good idea of the top ones and bottom ones. I just need to sort out the middle. Thanks again!

[Collector]

Shivers 2 - https://www.ebay.com/itm/Shivers-Two-II ... :rk:1:pf:0
Ecoquest - https://www.ebay.com/itm/Ecoquest-The-S ... :rk:1:pf:0

[Tawmis]

And with the completion of Gold Rush, thus ends my little exercise. Thank you all for participating. It was a great way to motivate me to clear through my backlog of Sierra titles. I still have a few more that I am missing. The Ecoquest games. Shivers 2. There might be a few others that I am missing. I'm not fully versed in some of the '90s games or if they fall into the "adventure" genre. (Inca?) Here's hoping GOG makes these available. Anyway, in the coming days I'll post a list of how I would rank them. I just need to get my thoughts in order. I have a pretty good idea of the top ones and bottom ones. I just need to sort out the middle. Thanks again!

I think I am going to miss voting on games!

Also I commend your dedication - you powered through all of those games. My brain is so freaking scattered I can never sit down and finish. (I did manage to get through KQ1-7). I started LSL1EGA (easiest for me), but got side tracked and not gone back to it in weeks.

[notbobsmith]

Shivers 2 - https://www.ebay.com/itm/Shivers-Two-II ... :rk:1:pf:0
Ecoquest - https://www.ebay.com/itm/Ecoquest-The-S ... :rk:1:pf:0

They are certainly cheap enough. And at least they are on CD-ROMs. I have the Kryoflux for floppies, but I always worry about bad media. Ecoquest 2 seems to be a bit more rare.

And with the completion of Gold Rush, thus ends my little exercise. Thank you all for participating. It was a great way to motivate me to clear through my backlog of Sierra titles. I still have a few more that I am missing. The Ecoquest games. Shivers 2. There might be a few others that I am missing. I'm not fully versed in some of the '90s games or if they fall into the "adventure" genre. (Inca?) Here's hoping GOG makes these available. Anyway, in the coming days I'll post a list of how I would rank them. I just need to get my thoughts in order. I have a pretty good idea of the top ones and bottom ones. I just need to sort out the middle. Thanks again!

I think I am going to miss voting on games!

Also I commend your dedication - you powered through all of those games. My brain is so freaking scattered I can never sit down and finish. (I did manage to get through KQ1-7). I started LSL1EGA (easiest for me), but got side tracked and not gone back to it in weeks.

I can't believe I started this a year and 3 months ago. It did help having a goal. I went through the posts and this is the order that I did them:

Freddy Pharkas
The Colonel's Bequest
The Dagger of Amon Ra
Phantasmagoria
Conquests of Camelot
Torin's Passage
Conquests of the Longbow
Lighthouse
Shivers
The Black Cauldron
Phantasmagoria 2
Willy Beamish
Heart of China
Gold Rush

[Collector]

Yeah, EcoQuest2 is a lot more rare. I was lucky enough to find a reasonably priced copy a several years ago, but even then the normal price was absurdly high.

[notbobsmith]

So here is my ranking of the games I played:

1. Conquests of Camelot: The Search for the Grail
2. Conquests of the Longbow: The Legend of Robin Hood
I really liked both of these games. They both had very good stories. Good work on designing the settings. Puzzles that were challenging without being frustrating. These were easily my favorites from my list. I’m placing Camelot a bit higher since I think it was more challenging-in-a-good-way. I also have to give it bonus points for having a smart text interface.

3. Gold Rush
Very good game. The three routes does add some replayability. There’s some educational value. Solid adventuring and puzzle solving.

4. Freddy Pharkas: Frontier Pharmacist
A lot of fun. A lot of humor playing with old Western tropes. Clever characters. I had a good time

5. The Black Cauldron
I liked this a lot more than I expected. What could have been a poorly thrown together movie tie-in is actually a pretty solid AGI era game. It is a bit short and pretty easy, but they managed to include several ways for the story to progress or for puzzles to be solved. I’m pretty sure there aren’t any ways to “break” the game, which wasn’t always the case for games from this era.

6. Phantasmagoria
Another one I liked more than I thought I would. It could be cheesy at times, but it is otherwise a solid adventure. In hindsight, the final chapter is actually pretty well done.

7. Torin’s Passage
A perfectly fine adventure game. Boogle was cute and added a few gameplay elements. Humor could be hit or miss though, and there were some details to the world that could be expanded upon.

8. The Dagger of Amon Ra
I think the addition of more puzzle solving versus The Colonel’s Bequest helped. It still has the problem where the evidence you gather doesn’t really solve the mystery. And there’s the issue of being trapped in a museum in the middle of New York. Break a window. At least a mansion in the middle of a bayou makes sense.

9. Shivers
This game was… fine. I don’t really have anything bad to say about it. It’s a puzzle game like The 7th Guest. The puzzles were interesting and challenging and that’s about it.

10. The Colonel’s Bequest
I really wanted to like this more than I did. The set up and mood are great, but it just doesn’t feel like a game to me. I could have just meandered around the house until the end and still ended up with the same conclusion.

11. Lighthouse: The Dark Being
Basically Sierra’s attempt at Myst. The problem is that by combining inventory puzzles with abstract “what does this thing do” puzzles, you complicate Myst’s straightforward gameplay. The setting also just looks drab in comparison to Myst.

12. Heart of China
Not a terrible game, just sort of dull. I couldn’t really get involved with the characters or the story. I’m not a fan of Dynamix’s interface either.

13. Phantasmagoria: A Puzzle of Flesh
I think the plot had potential, but it really went off the rails at the end. My biggest complaint was that it didn’t even feel like an adventure game. Most of it was just wandering around making sure you triggered all of the cutscenes.

14. The Adventures of Willy Beamish
I really couldn’t get into this game. Everything about it just falls flat. The characters are uninteresting. The humor doesn’t work. The plot seems to think it’s funnier than it is. All this combined with a clumsy interface and not very good puzzles, and you get the reason why it’s at the bottom of my list.

Lower on the list doesn't necessarily mean that I think it's bad, just not as good as some of the others. I really had a hard time sorting out the ones in the middle. But I guess the take home message here is that I prefer the more conventional Sierra adventure games.

[Tawmis]

So here is my ranking of the games I played:

1. Conquests of Camelot: The Search for the Grail
2. Conquests of the Longbow: The Legend of Robin Hood
I really liked both of these games. They both had very good stories. Good work on designing the settings. Puzzles that were challenging without being frustrating. These were easily my favorites from my list. I’m placing Camelot a bit higher since I think it was more challenging-in-a-good-way. I also have to give it bonus points for having a smart text interface.

Christy Marx has a very extensive and impressive writing history - from animated cartoons, to TV shows, to video games, to comics!

3. Gold Rush
Very good game. The three routes does add some replayability. There’s some educational value. Solid adventuring and puzzle solving.

I really do love this game!

4. Freddy Pharkas: Frontier Pharmacist
A lot of fun. A lot of humor playing with old Western tropes. Clever characters. I had a good time

I feel like you can't go wrong with Al Lowe.

5. The Black Cauldron
I liked this a lot more than I expected. What could have been a poorly thrown together movie tie-in is actually a pretty solid AGI era game. It is a bit short and pretty easy, but they managed to include several ways for the story to progress or for puzzles to be solved. I’m pretty sure there aren’t any ways to “break” the game, which wasn’t always the case for games from this era.

I think the multiple puzzle solution and shortness were because the target age of the game, was a much younger audience (Sierra's partnership with Disney to get people into Sierra games)

6. Phantasmagoria
Another one I liked more than I thought I would. It could be cheesy at times, but it is otherwise a solid adventure. In hindsight, the final chapter is actually pretty well done.

Love this game!

7. Torin’s Passage
A perfectly fine adventure game. Boogle was cute and added a few gameplay elements. Humor could be hit or miss though, and there were some details to the world that could be expanded upon.

I may be mistaken, but I believe it's said somewhere, that Al Lowe did plan other Torin's Passage games, which would have probably dove deeper into it.

8. The Dagger of Amon Ra
I think the addition of more puzzle solving versus The Colonel’s Bequest helped. It still has the problem where the evidence you gather doesn’t really solve the mystery. And there’s the issue of being trapped in a museum in the middle of New York. Break a window. At least a mansion in the middle of a bayou makes sense.

10. The Colonel’s Bequest
I really wanted to like this more than I did. The set up and mood are great, but it just doesn’t feel like a game to me. I could have just meandered around the house until the end and still ended up with the same conclusion.

Interesting, I prefer Colonel's Bequest over Dagger of Amon Ra.

11. Lighthouse: The Dark Being
Basically Sierra’s attempt at Myst. The problem is that by combining inventory puzzles with abstract “what does this thing do” puzzles, you complicate Myst’s straightforward gameplay. The setting also just looks drab in comparison to Myst.

Yes.

12. Heart of China
Not a terrible game, just sort of dull. I couldn’t really get involved with the characters or the story. I’m not a fan of Dynamix’s interface either.

Agreed. I remember being SUPER into this game when it first came out... but when I tried to replay it not long ago, I was like, "WTF?"

13. Phantasmagoria: A Puzzle of Flesh
I think the plot had potential, but it really went off the rails at the end. My biggest complaint was that it didn’t even feel like an adventure game. Most of it was just wandering around making sure you triggered all of the cutscenes.

Couldn't stand this game. Felt like it suffered what just about every Hollywood success does - take everything that was great about the first and crank it to 11.

14. The Adventures of Willy Beamish
I really couldn’t get into this game. Everything about it just falls flat. The characters are uninteresting. The humor doesn’t work. The plot seems to think it’s funnier than it is. All this combined with a clumsy interface and not very good puzzles, and you get the reason why it’s at the bottom of my list.

Agreed.

[BBP]

Nice list, thank you!

Interesting you're such a fan of the Conquest games. I only played Camelot of those and never got past the boar. Mind you, Camelot has the best Easter egg.

Although my list would look very different on the top end (Shivers being much higher and Freddy being much lower) I can agree with pretty much all your statements. Freddy was even painful to me since I so wanted to play that as a Larry fan, but without manual and no subtitles whatsoever I couldn't understand very much and the jokes I did get fell flat. Plus too much scatological humour. When I made the script though I laughed out loud quite a number of times!

[Tawmis]

Nice list, thank you!

Interesting you're such a fan of the Conquest games. I only played Camelot of those and never got past the boar. Mind you, Camelot has the best Easter egg.

Although my list would look very different on the top end (Shivers being much higher and Freddy being much lower) I can agree with pretty much all your statements. Freddy was even painful to me since I so wanted to play that as a Larry fan, but without manual and no subtitles whatsoever I couldn't understand very much and the jokes I did get fell flat. Plus too much scatological humour. When I made the script though I laughed out loud quite a number of times!

For Freddy, do you think also it's a location thing?

Like in the US, "Cowboys and Indians" is a very, very, very big thing (back when I was a kid).

So I wonder if there's somewhat of a disconnect?

[BBP]

Oh we do/did do cowboys and indians here (unfortunately last year a cowboy/indian celebration was sadly cancelled because of perceived racism in the theme). French comic Lucky Luke's always been big, for instance. I like to read those and enjoyed the cartoon as a kid. Yakari too.

It's a bit like Clandestiny that way, I have to do so much trouble to understand the text that the jokes fall flat. But the scatology is also definitely a hurdle, the diarrhoea being a hurdle too many (there's only the snails between that and the horse farts).

[Tawmis]

Oh we do/did do cowboys and indians here (unfortunately last year a cowboy/indian celebration was sadly cancelled because of perceived racism in the theme). French comic Lucky Luke's always been big, for instance. I like to read those and enjoyed the cartoon as a kid. Yakari too.

It's a bit like Clandestiny that way, I have to do so much trouble to understand the text that the jokes fall flat. But the scatology is also definitely a hurdle, the diarrhoea being a hurdle too many (there's only the snails between that and the horse farts).

Interesting! I honestly didn't think Cowboys & Indians was "a thing" beyond the US. (I mean, I get everyone is well aware of Cowboys and Indians, if they know American history). Just didn't think anyone else outside of the US would play Cowboys and Indians, let alone have a celebration.

A shame that it was found as racist, as it's a perfect chance to show the historical value of both the cowboys as well as the many, diverse, and powerful history of the American Indians.