1996-1997 really was a great time for adventure games... Just after the FMV debacle and just before the mandatory 3D apocalypse...

I saw this photo of the art team vacuuming the TNG set, and thought that I had to share.

-E “rather clean the bridge than the holodeck”

Thought it might be fun to start an 'introduce yourself' thread for members. I know I love getting to know other Space Quest fans from around the world. Might be a nice place for new members to come as well to perhaps get to know others. Could sticky it if the thread takes off? Anyway, might as well kick things off.

I'm a 25 year old male history teacher from a rural town in Australia and absolutely love video games, music, film, history and just geeky things in general. Basically I live out in the middle of nowhere in a mining town because our government here encourages new teachers to work rurally for a few years to gain permanent employment. Not so great for a city guy like me but meh, half way through my country service now.

I started playing Space Quest when I was quite young and actually my first memory of any computer game was seeing Space Quest 1 being played by a cousin of mine at her house. She was on the Arcada and putting her spacesuit on ready for escape! Ever since that moment, I became absolutely addicted to games but particularly adventure/role playing games. It wasn't long after that until my Dad bought the family an old 486 with Windows 3.11 loaded on to it, or wait, was our operating system still 3D Menu at that stage. Hrmmm, anyway, the games I enjoyed most while growing up were Space Quest titles, naturally! Anyway, I look forward to talking with everyone and getting to know more people, but I'd love to hear about you guys as well!

StellarSoul

I grew up on Sierra games (you will see thumbnails with me in it, so you can see my greybeard! lol)

And I've been replaying the games (some of them I've replayed plenty of times)...

But on top of playing it, also doing commentary, as separate videos.

So if you wanna see the video game play without me babbling, there's that option.

I've knocked out King's Quest, Space Quest, Leisure Suit Larry, Laura Bow, Phantasmagoria, etc. Still got plenty of games to go.

Also took a break from Sierra and did all three Legend of Kyrandia and also did Blue Force.

If you want to check it out - and throw down a subscribe - that'd be awesome!

https://www.youtube.com/letsplaysierragames

Aftera long hiatus, I happen to have stumbled upon the videos of the Space Quest Historian during my YouTube travels. So I got thinking of the good old times... And I'll be busting out the Space Quest series for another run soon! What's everyone else been up to?

Brian

If you're ever bored and finding yourself with a lot of time on your hands... I introduce to you a project I started back in 2004 with a friend...

It's 64 Episodes of Machinima.

http://neverendingnights.com/

If you're wondering what Machinima is, we talk about it here: http://neverendingnights.com/about (along with some of the things we've accomplished!)

One of the great things was having Al Lowe (who I think everyone recognizes?) and Greg Johnson (maybe not recognized by people - but you should know about the two funkiest aliens besides the Two Guys - being none other than Toejam and Earl) - Greg was one of the writers (and the voice of Earl, among others, in TJ&EIII).

All the videos are available for download here (in various formats)...

http://neverendingnights.com/nenvideos

(If you hit the videos menu you will also get additional options).

If you don't want to download, you can watch them on Youtube:

http://www.youtube.c...verendingnights

Or even on our FB page:

http://www.facebook....ngNights/videos

We parody several things and make all kinds of references to other shows, movies, etc.

On this project, I've been doing almost everything (story, writing dialogs, art, music,...).

You can support the project on Kickstarter now: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/282648360/asylopole-sci-fi-adventure-game

Overview:

Asylopole is a satirical old-school adventure game set in a dystopian future. You play the role of Adam Murdock, a psychiatrist working in a gigantic asylum. Get inside your patients’ heads to find out what’s gone wrong. Experience totally new universes and fight your patients’ worst nightmares...

Features:

- Large universe

- Non-linear

- 2D hand drawn graphics, rotoscoping, stop-motion

- 90's feeling

- Varied gameplay: exploration, puzzles, fights,...
- Rich content: quests, mini-games, network (Ultranet),...
- Adjustable difficulty

- Controllers support

- Gain EXP and increase your stats

- Eat nice Fastbouf burgers ( look at that sauce dripping down ! )

You can follow Asylopole on

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Asylopole-128966467219167/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/asylopole

Thanks for your time. :y:

https://www.starcontrol.com/media

If you played much Star Control 2 in the '90s, that brief teaser video might make you giddy.

This is the most excited I've been about an upcoming game in a long time (frankly since some of my hopes for SpaceVenture began to wane) and I've become a "Founder" (basically a pre-order backer). Their dev team is sharp and well-engaged with the community, and I'm really looking forward to it.

Anyone else a Star Control nerd?

http://www.icefallgames.com/CascadeQuest/

The early Space Quest series was probably my biggest inspiration in terms of humor and gameplay for this game. I'm using SCI Companion to develop it, and it runs inside the Unity engine.

Please check it out, and follow @icefallgames on twitter for more information and screenshots!

Mage's Initiation: Reign of the Elements Kickstarter

http-~~-//www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=isHYeocsOj8

As you may have seen elsewhere on social media, several members of the Space Quest/adventure gaming fan community participated in the recent Adventure Jam event and created an original point-and-click adventure in just two short weeks.

The end result is Late Last Nite, an adventure in excess -- available for download now! I'd provide some details on the plot, but I hate to spoil the surprises. Let's just say that things get weird.

As for the familiar faces who worked on the project, there's Akril, Datadog, drdrslashvohaul, Frede, Resulka, Troels, and me.

We invite you to play the game and let us know what you think! Oh, and if you feel inclined, leave a rating for us on Late Last Nite's Game Jolt page.

Take care!

Jess

I've spent much of the last year working on version 3 of SCI Companion, which now provides full support for creating and modding VGA Sierra games. It even includes a decompiler to reconstruct source code from old games!

blurb from my website:

-----------------------------

SCI Companion is a completely free IDE (integrated development environment) that lets you create games that run on Sierra’s SCI engine. SCI Companion 3 is now available, which offers support for SCI1.1+, which includes VGA graphics and digital audio.

Create 16-color EGA graphical adventures with a text parser interface (in the style of King’s Quest 4, Space Quest 3 or Leisure Suit Larry 3).

Create 256-color VGA graphical adventures with a point-and-click interface (in the style of Space Quest 5, Gabriel Knight, or Quest For Glory 3).

Comes with a complete well-documented class system and template game.

Lets you browse, extract or modify graphics, text and sounds from nearly any SCI game that you own.

Decompile the code behind these classic games to see how they work (or find Easter eggs). Scripting in SCI is accomplished via a language similar to LISP and SmallTalk.

Includes streamlined editors for graphic assets.

And other game resources like text and audio.

 

This review/retrospective tackles why we loved Sierra games against the backdrop of King’s Quest 2015. It tries to provide tangible game design reasons about what made classic Sierra games special, with a particular focus on the special relationship between storytelling and puzzles. And of course a look at how KQ2015 measures up.

Even if you don’t ultimately agree with my opinions, it should be a fun, nostalgic romp through Sierra games as it also tries to celebrate Sierra games and their creators. It contains clips from almost all the Sierra games (yes, lot's of Space Quest), interview excerpts from most of the original designers (yes, Mark Crowe & Scott Murphy), lots of classic Sierra music, and a tribute to Gary Owens.

Why We Loved Sierra Games: 

King’s Quest 2015: An Opinionated Review by a crotchety Sierra fan who remembers 1984

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wua96SI6SBE&list=PLPAVYgFfeddJzax1X4VUj69Z1Vs4PqGlA&index=1

I really appreciate all help in spreading the word. I’m a social media dummy.

Thanks,

Eric

Even though King's Quest is in the title, there is quite a lot of Space Quest in it (as well as other Sierra games). I'm fairly confident classic Sierra fans will enjoy it.

TEASERS for:

Why We Loved Sierra Games:

King's Quest MMXV: An Opinionated Review 

by a crotchety Sierra fan who remembers 1984

YouTube PlayList for all 3 teasers

The full review is coming soon, possibly this week.

I really appreciate all help in spreading the word on this. Sierra fans are hard to reach, and I don't have a useful social media presence.

Thanks,

Eric

I’m a dormant Sierra fan…I used to hang out at Quest Studios maybe 15 years ago. I’m planning to resurface briefly due to the new King’s Quest.

I’m working on an unorthodox video review of King’s Quest 2015 from the perspective of a Sierra fan who remembers 1984. It’s actually turned into a stroll down memory lane of Sierra games and a tear down of how Sierra games actually worked, particularly the relationship between story and puzzles. So there are a lot of clips from many Sierra games. I expect(hope) Sierra fans will find it interesting, and unlike anything that has been done before.

After about 3 months on this, I’m nearing completion and maybe it’s already too late to ask for input, but kind of as a sanity check, and in case I need more clips (I don’t put myself on camera, so I end up needing lots of clips, which is a ton of work but keeps things more relevant), I would appreciate your input on the following questions. (Don’t feel compelled to answer all of them if you don’t have an answer.)

I’m focusing on the positive things in Sierra games. Enough has been said about the negative things that the world doesn’t need another Sierra rant, nor do I think these can advance things forward at this point.

- What was your favorite Sierra puzzle? (Both text parser and point-and-click)

- What Sierra puzzle did you feel pushed you to step up and rise to the occasion? (Note, this doesn’t have to be a hard puzzle, but can also be one that just required you to be attentive because it may not have been explicit, or maybe just had something really creative about it, or just something about it that was special to you)

- What was your favorite text parser moment? (Favorite input or favorite response or could be a puzzle)

- What was your favorite Sierra game moment?

- What was your favorite Sierra death?

- If you liked Sierra “consequences” (e.g. killing the goat in KQ1 means you need to do something else for the bridge troll), what was your favorite consequence?

- Favorite multiple solution puzzle?

- Favorite (Space Quest) Gary Owens line?

- Favorite Sierra song?

- Favorite King’s Quest song?

- How did you feel about Sierra arcade sequences? 

- What do you think of modern QTEs (and their use in KQ2015)?

For clips, I’m finding things with very little or no text work best because of my very fast cuts. Also, I’m finding text parser works better for actions because you can more clearly see what’s being attempted by reading the text entry than inferring that somebody clicked something and what is happening.

- Right now, I think I need some generic Sierra (game) clips for the conclusion. Things that denote legacy, wrapping up, the future, etc. (I’ve already used a lot of clips in other places and I’m trying to not repeat which makes it more challenging.)

Also, since I’ve been out of the communities so long, what other communities would you recommend reaching out to? (I think I had an AGDI account, but long forgot it.)

Thanks!

I myself recently (last month...) finished being disappointed with Mass Effect 3 and have been lapsing into SSB Brawl matches. Is there anything else interesting out there?

Why?

Gamespot - Defunct Publisher Reveals New Website

At the moment, nothing else has been announced. More will be revealed at Gamescom 2014.

It's a phenomenally low-effort kind of affair, so you may have to get used to the audio quality. It is quite literally produced by me calling up Fred, recording the call on my phone (using the Record My Call app) and then throwing the whole thing online without any editing.

It does, however, boast a pretty kick-ass chiptune intro theme by MusicallyInspired.

Check it out: http://backseatdesigners.podbean.com

RSS feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/BackSeatDesigners

It's on Stitcher, too: http://www.stitcher.com/podcast/back-seat-designers

(Sorry, no iTunes yet. Because I suck.)

Please, feel free to comment on episodes here, or suggest new topics for us to cover!