suejak

Random thought, but reading your preferences, I think you'll hate King's Quest 3. Many of us did at first. I tried to play KQ3 sooo many times over the years, but the first sequence with the wizard drove me nuts. But then someone told me to stick with it. Take to heart Josh's comments in the other thread about hiding stuff under the bed and eventually being able to beat the wizard. Also, just wait -- be obedient at first and don't try to rush it. You may have to restart a few times, and it'll seem annoying because the wizard just ambushes you and resets your progress over and over. Stick with it, though, and try not to let the first few minutes spoil you on the whole game. It's worth playing. No Space Quest, but it's worth it.

I think KQ7 is the easiest to like. It's very Torin's Passage-y in that it's too "modern" and slick, but it's pretty good. After that, I think 3 and 4 are worth playing in their original form. KQ 1 and 2 are of interest for historical value only. KQ 1 SCI is very pretty, and the VGA remakes are worth playing if you enjoy beautiful adventure games.

I find most of Space Quest 4's mall sequence to be pretty awful, although I also really enjoy it every time as well. The way the game inexplicably forces you to fix your pants, rip off the ATM, buy the hintbook, work, NOT buy an adapter part, and finally walk to the top-right portion of the arcade before the sequel police show up -- that was always a head-scratcher as they failed to give an overall goal or motivation except maybe "leave eventually," and none of the activities but buying the hintbook actively supports that goal. But really, I'm mostly only annoyed by interface issues, not puzzles. GK2's various pixel-hunting puzzles, for example, are pretty terrible. Everything around the one pixel you need to click gives a "nothing to see there" response, but mysteriously one clump of pixels in a nondescript corner gives a whole new screen.

lol, oh god. "Toleman Awakens" is up and online... Terrifying. I'll have to listen to it sometime this week :blink:

I haven't played the remake yet, btw. :D

Parser 3D is a cool concept. I also like the art, though it seems more primitive than stylized. I have this weird soft spot for bad 3D lately. I used to hate it, but now I look back on the 1995-2002 era of 3D games with a fondness I never thought I would. Even Escape from Monkey Island suddenly seems pretty. Anyway, the world needs more games set in the 19th century. Outside of the Victoria series, I can't even think of any games set in the 19th-century Africa, for example -- wtf?

Ok... Don't be afraid to set up a donation system just for your regular podcasts, though! I guess that could get complicated due to the number of volunteer contributors, lol. Plus I'm sure you want to do it because you love it, not because you feel obligated to or whatever. But I work at home and the SQH podcasts are probably my #1 background noise. I personally would be willing to pay something like 20 buckazoids/mo for them...

Ok, donation drive time.

Ahhhhh Desktop Adventures! I miss those!

Happy 1-year anniversary to the SQH podcast!

I think it's amazing how I went my entire childhood without especially enjoying these games, and now they have such amazing nostalgic punch! Goofing around in Secret Agent for 10 minutes really took me back... No need for more than 10 minutes though, lol.

Yeah, it's kind of hard to distinguish between "creepy" and "scary". No scene in DOTT, Full Throttle, Monkey, or Grim Fandango is especially scary. Creepy? Definitely. But not scary. I remember games like Gobliiins and Woodruff having some very unsettling scenes, and you can't die in those games either. The scene in Goblins 3 where you're dead, and you have to walk around in total darkness until you can paint the scene in various shades of red, purple, green, etc., each colour revealing a new twist on the scene -- very creepy. There's also strong demonic imagery in various other scenes... definitely very disturbing to me even today. In Woodruff, the drug abuse metaphors in particular, combined with the weird ambient music of the game, also still creep me out. The whole Red Light District -- ostensibly a fun place but overrun with an intensely sad vibe -- is easily one of the creepiest areas I've experienced in a game. (Then there's the Tax Collector waiting around every corner...) But scary? Nah... Scary is Police Quest 2 and 3, as you poke around areas where you know a killer lies in wait... The pentagram shit in PQ3 was terrifying to me. The final scene where you bust into the crack house? Wow. So yeah, death is a necessary but not sufficient condition for genuine scariness in a game for me. KQ1 isn't scary; it's silly. But poking around the murder scene for Jesse Bains in PQ2 is scary precisely because you know he can kill you.

I agree with most of the Space Quest scenes mentioned. Quest for Glory has some scary stuff, whether you're wandering around at night, sneaking into a house for a burglary, visiting graveyards or tombs, or getting embraced by naked ladies who pull you down and drown you. There's another argument for death in an adventure game: Is it possible to be scary without death? Can anybody think of any scary LucasArts scenes?

Really enjoyed this episode, as always. I'm a little confused by the huge interviews with the Westwood music guy. He's got a lot of exposure already (TV shows, etc.), apparently, and he doesn't have anything to do with Space Quest or Sierra... I skip over his interviews without hesitation, and I'm always disappointed to see that they command such a large proportion of the content. Anyway, can't complain about a 2-hour SQH episode!

Does that imply that novels are "more intimate" than movies because they take place within your head?

This was a good thread idea. ...UNTIL SUEJAK ARRIVED.

Unrelated, but on the topic of the zombie: I don't know how I got this into my head, but I've always just assumed everybody knew that the zombie was actually future-Roger in the SQXII timeline. Did I just make that up? Did anybody else think that?

I dunno, Troels... I was BORN when SQ1 EGA was released...

I'd roll a male WD-40 with suitably eroticized penile cannons and pursue Gippazoid Novelty Co. hit contracts across the galaxy... I can foresee Gippazoid Novelty Co. being a cruel underworld-style organization in this universe.

I distinctly remember starting to wash my hands religiously before every meal due to learning about tape worms in SQ 6... Continues to this day...

I loved all the meta stuff (file system and all) in SQ6... That one always crashes on me on Polysorbate LX, making a replay difficult, but I really want to get back to the Information Superhighway and whatnot. SQ as a series doesn't often deal with cool metaphors like that, so I'm curious to see if SQ6's metaphors hold up as being as cool to my adult brain. I thought it was pretty deep when I was 10, haha -- probably the last time I played. Random side-topic, but I enjoy classic adventure games that have metaphors like that. This includes my favourite Sierra (family) game, Woodruff, which was full of metaphors / themes on real-world topics like war, racism, environmentalism, youth, rebellion, capitalism, power, etc. I'd sorta like to replay the Space Quest series again with a mind for looking past the basic entertainment aspect to find the Scott Murphy angst underneath it all... ;)

Enjoyed the show! PCJ never ceases to amaze... 15 minutes, holy crap. Next time, the rules should be: Everybody else speed runs SQ x, PCJ speed runs entire series. Who finishes first?

Sorry for the vewwy-first-forum style of poll questions. :D I went back to 2012 or so, and I didn't see a post on this topic... I'm genuinely curious! Note that this isn't necessarily your FAVOURITE game, per se. I probably prefer SQ1-2 and 4, but I always find myself returning to 5... I think probably because it comes out of my favourite era in Sierra history, when they hit the perfect mix of graphical style/technology, audio, interface, genre savviness, etc. I'm definitely a no-voiceover VGA kinda guy. However, contradicting myself immediately, I also find myself really enjoying the SCI0 engine recently. Oddly, if I had to pick a favourite Sierra engine, it would probably be SCI0 -- SQ3, QfG 1-2, PQ2, LSL 2-3... Hmm... But I guess I don't enjoy those games themselves as much as the 93-94 VGA titles? I seem confused myself. :wub:

The Pete Toleman bits are so damn funny... I enjoyed the LP of his "previous work."

Yes, it's very strange to me that Phoenix Online would choose to do an almost purely aesthetic remake when their games are always criticized for bad visuals and poor animation. Their one comparative advantage is the writing talents of Jane Jensen, yet they aren't even using that here. Very odd, but ultimately probably just an attempt to get a shot at GK 4.