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The Silver Lining: King's Quest... kind of.

TaramoorTaramoor StorytellerRegistered User regular
edited July 2010 in Games and Technology
It looks like Activision has officially permitted the unofficial spiritual finale to the King's Quest series to continue its production. It is expected to be unleashed onto the internet July 10th, of this year.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YgRUr0HwQVE

From Kotaku:
Fans At Last Will Find The Silver Lining

Fans At Last Will Find The Silver Lining When last heard from, those behind a long-in-development, fan-made King's Quest sequel were on the verge of an agreement with Activision allowing them to finally complete their project. This afternoon, that news came. The Silver Lining will finally be completed.

Phoenix Online, the collection of fan-developers who'd been working on The Silver Lining for upwards of a decade, will release the game on July 10, for free, thanks to a non-commercial license from Activision. In February, the publisher had shut down their development on the graphical adventure game IP, which transferred to Activision in the merger with Vivendi Universal. Phoenix Online had an earlier non-commercial license from Vivendi to continue work, but Activision apparently wanted no part of overseeing or approving pro bono work on a game it had no intention of reviving.

An outpouring of support for Phoenix Online and, perhaps significantly, a lengthy feature by Stephen Totilo explaining the odyssey of this game apparently changed Activision's mind. In early May, the publisher said it had renewed discussions with Phoenix, "given the overwhelming community support for the Silver Lining project."

This afternoon, the Silver Lining website returned with the announcement of a deal with Activision, and a release date of July 10. According to a statement on the site:
Our team is ecstatic about this, and as hard as we've worked for 8 years, it's the tireless belief and support of you, our fans, that has made this possible. We want to give special thanks to the Save The Silver Lining team, who put together and ran an amazing and organized campaign, and rallied our fantastic fans to make a difference. You made it possible once, and now we've done what seemed impossible for a second time! The support we received from all of you was amazing and honestly blew us away. We always knew we had some of the best fans out there, but even so, wow! We will always be grateful for your unending belief in us.

They've released a trailer introducing us to The Silver Lining - their Vivendi agreement required them not to use King's Quest so that may be the case here. In this game: "players will assume the role of King Graham as he sets out on a quest to save his children, Rosella and Alexander, from a mysterious curse."

The Silver Lining [site]

Send an email to the author of this post at owen@kotaku.com.

http://kotaku.com/5573587/fans-at-last-will-find-the-silver-lining


So does anyone here think the project will ever be finished?

I realize that fan-made projects simply don't see the light of day very often, but I know that if this one somehow, magically, manages to coalesce into a tangible, playable THING, then I will download it more than once just to show my support.

I will also donate an amount greater than one dollar to the dev team, because I am not a filthy pirate.

Granted, the King's Quest name hasn't really been the same since the travesty of VII and the less said about Mask of Eternity the better, but we must never forget that King's Quest V and King's Quest VI are two of the finest examples of adventure gaming this side of Grim Fandango.

Who knows, maybe the fervor over this weird King's Quest fanfic-turned-game will get Activision to realize they have a hot property in their archives and they'll retool and re-release it like LucasArts did with Monkey Island for XBLA.

I know it's not going to happen, but I need to dream. The last time I made a hopeless wish for a video game a new Kid Icarus was announced the next day.

C'mon Activision, exploiting existing franchises is what you do! You're sitting on a goldmine here!

Bastards.

Taramoor on
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Posts

  • pyromaniac221pyromaniac221 this just might be an interestin YTRegistered User regular
    edited June 2010
    NOT EXPLOITABLE ON A YEARLY BASIS

    pyromaniac221 on
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  • Hahnsoo1Hahnsoo1 Make Ready. We Hunt.Registered User regular
    edited June 2010
    And Activision further announces The Silver Lining 2: Lining Harder, introducing a dynamic new youthful character into the classic King's Quest saga "Fizz-Awesome the Third", who brings a dark and tough edge to the protagonist. He will be the bastard incestuous son of Rosella and Alexander, in the grand tradition of George R. R. Martin's "A Song of Fire and Ice." He will be wearing a tank top T-shirt, be bald, and smoke cigars. It will also be a "re-imagining" of the genre, being the first 3rd person shooter in the long-running adventure series.

    "The only problem is trying to find the right levels of bloom to add to the graphics. Oh, and the addition of gore and realistic bullet physics," states Third Party Developer That You've Never Heard Of. "Yeah, this will be the first King's Quest game with guns."

    The Silver Lining 3: Lining Your Socks Off is rumored to be in development, adding an anthropomorphic Cat as a sidekick with attitude to the mix. It will have co-op.

    Hahnsoo1 on
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  • UncleSporkyUncleSporky Registered User regular
    edited June 2010
    Taramoor wrote: »
    So does anyone here think the project will ever be finished?

    Huh? July 10 is like two weeks away, of course it's already finished.

    UncleSporky on
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  • Jam WarriorJam Warrior Registered User regular
    edited June 2010
    Taramoor wrote: »
    I will also donate an amount greater than one dollar to the dev team, because I am not a filthy pirate.

    What? It's a free fan project how on earth does piracy figure here? Sure you can give them a donation if you want but they didn't do this to make money. In fact I'm fairly sure they've signed licencing agreements specifically forbidding them from doing so!

    Did any of the King's Quest series ever leave the retarded club of Sierra games you can make into an unwinnable state without even being aware of such?

    Jam Warrior on
    MhCw7nZ.gif
  • TaramoorTaramoor Storyteller Registered User regular
    edited June 2010
    Taramoor wrote: »
    I will also donate an amount greater than one dollar to the dev team, because I am not a filthy pirate.

    What? It's a free fan project how on earth does piracy figure here? Sure you can give them a donation if you want but they didn't do this to make money. In fact I'm fairly sure they've signed licencing agreements specifically forbidding them from doing so!

    Did any of the King's Quest series ever leave the retarded club of Sierra games you can make into an unwinnable state without even being aware of such?

    Two things.

    1. It was a joke, mostly about those people who pirated the games that were "Pay whatever you want, it's for charity" thing. I will donate to the dev team though, because it's awesome that they managed to push this through for ten goddamn years.

    2. King's Quest and the rest weren't Gabriel Knight or anything. Yes you could reach an unwinnable state, but if you know everything you have to do the game's only a couple of hours long anyway. Part of the fun is figuring out what's necessary to keep from getting trapped.

    Granted, having to hit the cat with the boot or the stick in 5 was bullshit, but it's not like it's difficult to start over, correct the mistake, and get back to where you were. In fact, I think 5 and 6 (the best of them) were the ones with alot of alternate solutions to help in case you DID forget to do something.

    And King's Quest was never as bad as some adventure games when it came to the solutions being completely illogical. Typically there was a reasoning that could be followed.

    Taramoor on
  • UncleSporkyUncleSporky Registered User regular
    edited June 2010
    Taramoor wrote: »
    And King's Quest was never as bad as some adventure games when it came to the solutions being completely illogical. Typically there was a reasoning that could be followed.

    King's Quest was much worse than most adventure games because the solutions were both illogical and indecipherable. Quite often you would die or worse, get permanently stuck.

    UncleSporky on
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  • korodullinkorodullin What. SCRegistered User regular
    edited June 2010
    King's Quest VI is still one of my favorite adventure games, but you can fuck yourself over at the end of the game by not doing something fairly innocuous at the beginning that you can't do again.

    That is inexcusable.

    korodullin on
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  • TaramoorTaramoor Storyteller Registered User regular
    edited June 2010
    Taramoor wrote: »
    And King's Quest was never as bad as some adventure games when it came to the solutions being completely illogical. Typically there was a reasoning that could be followed.

    King's Quest was much worse than most adventure games because the solutions were both illogical and indecipherable. Quite often you would die or worse, get permanently stuck.

    The candy/disguise/cat rape sequence of events from Gabriel Knight? The fake woodchuck from Roger Rabbit? The Bubble Gum balloon from Curse of Monkey Island?

    Every adventure game has some pretty insane combinations, but I'm having trouble thinking of anything really crazy in King's Quest 5, though there was definitely some difficult timing on some of the events like the previously mentioned Cat/Mouse bit and the Witch sequence in the woods. Even the Harpy Island was explained to you before you got there.

    Hell, Laura Bow & The Dagger of Amon Ra was impossible if you didn't go to a specific room at exactly 10:05 pm (game time) and pick up a shoe that otherwise wouldn't be there. There were no hints that it was necessary and no way of knowing what you were missing once you got to the end of the game.

    Taramoor on
  • TaramoorTaramoor Storyteller Registered User regular
    edited June 2010
    korodullin wrote: »
    King's Quest VI is still one of my favorite adventure games, but you can fuck yourself over at the end of the game by not doing something fairly innocuous at the beginning that you can't do again.

    That is inexcusable.

    The only thing like that I can think of is the fake lamp thing, but you can beat that just by having a mint leaf on hand because the genie's crazy addicted.

    Taramoor on
  • CouscousCouscous Registered User regular
    edited June 2010
    Taramoor wrote: »
    And King's Quest was never as bad as some adventure games when it came to the solutions being completely illogical. Typically there was a reasoning that could be followed.

    King's Quest was much worse than most adventure games because the solutions were both illogical and indecipherable. Quite often you would die or worse, get permanently stuck.

    Monkey Island had more logical solutions.

    Ifnkovhgroghprm

    Couscous on
  • jothkijothki Registered User regular
    edited June 2010
    Taramoor wrote: »
    korodullin wrote: »
    King's Quest VI is still one of my favorite adventure games, but you can fuck yourself over at the end of the game by not doing something fairly innocuous at the beginning that you can't do again.

    That is inexcusable.

    The only thing like that I can think of is the fake lamp thing, but you can beat that just by having a mint leaf on hand because the genie's crazy addicted.

    There's showing the ring to the guy early on, and it's easy to miss things from the labyrinth (I never found the coin it turns out I needed when I was already trapped in the Underworld).

    Both of those are for the harder ending, though.

    jothki on
  • FantasyrogueFantasyrogue Registered User regular
    edited June 2010
    Taramoor wrote: »
    Taramoor wrote: »
    And King's Quest was never as bad as some adventure games when it came to the solutions being completely illogical. Typically there was a reasoning that could be followed.

    King's Quest was much worse than most adventure games because the solutions were both illogical and indecipherable. Quite often you would die or worse, get permanently stuck.

    The candy/disguise/cat rape sequence of events from Gabriel Knight? The fake woodchuck from Roger Rabbit? The Bubble Gum balloon from Curse of Monkey Island?

    Every adventure game has some pretty insane combinations, but I'm having trouble thinking of anything really crazy in King's Quest 5, though there was definitely some difficult timing on some of the events like the previously mentioned Cat/Mouse bit and the Witch sequence in the woods. Even the Harpy Island was explained to you before you got there.

    Hell, Laura Bow & The Dagger of Amon Ra was impossible if you didn't go to a specific room at exactly 10:05 pm (game time) and pick up a shoe that otherwise wouldn't be there. There were no hints that it was necessary and no way of knowing what you were missing once you got to the end of the game.

    The pie. The rat as you mentioned (maybe also the emeralds and the honey?). Plenty of oppertunities in that game to really screw yourself over (or get yourself killed). Gabriel Knight 3 had the silly moustache cat hair thing, but overall the Gabriel Knight games were pretty logical, more logical than King's Quest I've always felt.

    Not to say I don't love King's Quest games (because I do, I have fond memories of 4, as it was the first one I ever played, and 6 which is my favorite), but those games could really be a pain in the ass from time to time. I will, however, be waiting to see what the Silver Lining will be like (funny this post shows up now, I was just talking about the game series earlier in the week).

    Fantasyrogue on
  • UncleSporkyUncleSporky Registered User regular
    edited June 2010
    King's Quest 5 was a nightmare. It required lots of deaths in the desert as you mapped it out, 5 screens at a time. Heck, when I was young I assumed it was just endlessly repeating and exploration was pointless. Plus that instant death scorpion below the main map...

    Hitting the yeti with a pie? The leg of lamb? Accidentally walking into a building where you simply get killed? Yeah.

    Of course I have great hope for this game because it was not designed by Roberta Williams or Jane Jensen.

    UncleSporky on
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  • KrathoonKrathoon Registered User regular
    edited June 2010
    I wish someone would make an open source engine to run KQ8 right, but that will never happen.

    Krathoon on
  • VeganVegan Registered User regular
    edited June 2010
    It's bad enough when you do something that creates an unwinnable state and it tells you by giving a Game Over. But when it DOESN'T tell you, and you don't find out until hours later...

    Vegan on
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  • korodullinkorodullin What. SCRegistered User regular
    edited June 2010
    King's Quest 8? I'm sorry, I don't think there was ever such a thing as King's Quest 8.

    You must be very mistaken, Krathoon.

    korodullin on
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  • Jam WarriorJam Warrior Registered User regular
    edited June 2010
    Gabriel Knight has unwinnable game conditions? That goes straight off my 'to one day play' list then.

    Jam Warrior on
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  • DritzDritz CanadaRegistered User regular
    edited June 2010
    What's with the OP being mean to KQVII? It certainly wasn't the best of the series by any means but it was interesting a had a nice style. The single cursor was a bit odd but not much different then V or VI's implementation.

    Dritz on
    There I was, 3DS: 2621-2671-9899 (Ekera), Wii U: LostCrescendo
  • Captain TragedyCaptain Tragedy Registered User regular
    edited June 2010
    Gabriel Knight has unwinnable game conditions? That goes straight off my 'to one day play' list then.

    I'm pretty it doesn't, if my memory serves correct (at least the 1st one doesn't, don't know about the other 2). In order to move to the next "day", you need to accomplish everything necessary. I don't think you can even die or get a game over in the game until the final 2 days.

    Captain Tragedy on
  • psycojesterpsycojester Registered User regular
    edited June 2010
    The Sierra offices must have been a very dark and disturbing place to have generated as much hatred of mankind as their adventure games seem to imply.

    psycojester on
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  • korodullinkorodullin What. SCRegistered User regular
    edited June 2010
    Well a thing to keep in mind with the early King's Quest games is that by and large the King's Quest franchise reached its heyday twenty years ago. The games were pretty cruel and unforgiving, but then again damn near everything made for the various flavors of home computers back then was.

    korodullin on
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  • PolloDiabloPolloDiablo Registered User regular
    edited June 2010
    King's Quest 5 was the first and only one I played.

    Fuck the honey, fuck the desert, fuck a lot about that game. But for whatever reason, I have really positive memories of that game. I was a kid, so it seemed so cool to be walking around and talking to people. I loved adventure games. It was (in a backwards, retarded way) kind of fun to fuck up, learn from my mistake, and get past each problem. It made me feel like a badass.

    If I tried to play it now, I'd give up after ten minutes and come here to bitch about it. I miss the old days.

    PolloDiablo on
  • EntriechEntriech ? ? ? ? ? Ontario, CanadaRegistered User regular
    edited June 2010
    Gabriel Knight has unwinnable game conditions? That goes straight off my 'to one day play' list then.

    I'm pretty it doesn't, if my memory serves correct (at least the 1st one doesn't, don't know about the other 2). In order to move to the next "day", you need to accomplish everything necessary. I don't think you can even die or get a game over in the game until the final 2 days.
    The first one most definitely does! In the final area:
    If you find and wake up Grace without first acquiring two costumes from the storage room, there's no way for you to avoid being murdered by Dr. John. You have to go back to an earlier save. It's a short unwinnable scenario, but it's there, as I ran into it

    Entriech on
  • FantasyrogueFantasyrogue Registered User regular
    edited June 2010
    Entriech wrote: »
    Gabriel Knight has unwinnable game conditions? That goes straight off my 'to one day play' list then.

    I'm pretty it doesn't, if my memory serves correct (at least the 1st one doesn't, don't know about the other 2). In order to move to the next "day", you need to accomplish everything necessary. I don't think you can even die or get a game over in the game until the final 2 days.
    The first one most definitely does! In the final area:
    If you find and wake up Grace without first acquiring two costumes from the storage room, there's no way for you to avoid being murdered by Dr. John. You have to go back to an earlier save. It's a short unwinnable scenario, but it's there, as I ran into it

    Although in the game's defense, that is (as you said) in the last bit of the game so it's not a big disaster (assuming one atleast saves before doing the endgame). You can die before the final 2 days, btw
    the snake in the museum and also in various ways at St John's Eve in the Bayou
    but in the first case the death is not instant and the answers are relatively obvious in the second case.

    I heartily recommend Gabriel Knight 1 though, it's got a great story.

    Fantasyrogue on
  • Sir CarcassSir Carcass I have been shown the end of my world Round Rock, TXRegistered User regular
    edited June 2010
    I heartily recommend Gabriel Knight 1 though, it's got Tim Curry.

    Fixed.

    I love the KQ series, but it definitely had its problems. Still, I remember playing a demo of TSL years ago and it was looking pretty good. Glad it's finally seeing release. I'll definitely be playing it.

    Sir Carcass on
  • FantasyrogueFantasyrogue Registered User regular
    edited June 2010
    Touché. Tim Curry is all you need.

    I actually liked KQ7 too, albeit the fact that I was a girl in her early teens when I played it may have helped (it is rather Disney-like). It's definitely not as good as some of the earlier King's Quest games, but it's not horrible.

    Fantasyrogue on
  • MerculoreMerculore Registered User regular
    edited June 2010
    Taramoor wrote: »
    The only thing like that I can think of is the fake lamp thing, but you can beat that just by having a mint leaf on hand because the genie's crazy addicted.
    I loved this series and every other 'quest' series, at the time everybody I knew was into part KQ5. So when someone failed at a certain area it was fun talking it out with friends to see what exactly they may have missed.
    These games did not have much re-playability after the fact, so going back and doing things the RIGHT way was part of the challenge. The satisfaction from conquering & shelving these games is unmatched.

    Also
    Kobayashi Maruhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kobayashi_Maru:
    "The objective of the test is not for the cadet to outfight the opponent but rather to test the cadet's reaction to a no win situation."
    I feel enriched by this now lost game mechanic. Gaming vets all agree yes? Or is Prince of Persia what we do now?

    Merculore on
  • schmadsschmads Registered User regular
    edited June 2010
    Merculore wrote: »
    I feel enriched by this now lost game mechanic. Gaming vets all agree yes? Or is Prince of Persia what we do now?

    I think that the audience is much larger and more diverse than it used to be. I have also found that with less time (i.e. I'm no longer a kid playing video games all the time), I have less tolerance for the try-fail-try-fail-try-fail-try-WOO-FINALLY-WIN style of gaming. I'm not saying there's anything wrong with it, but I have a feeling it's more niche, and game companies in general are trying to create easier games that appeal to a larger audience.

    For instance, I grew up playing the original Prince of Persia, and I had a heck of a time playing the re-done PoP Classic, but I also really enjoyed the new Prince of Persia (the one before this latest Sands one), since it was a less tense and more flowing gaming experience. So, it's just that there are more styles of gaming now than there used to be. There are still games like Demon's Souls (if I got the name wrong, I apologize) which I understand appeal to the hard core audience that appreciates learning through failure :)

    Edit: That's completely off-topic, though. I recently surprised my girlfriend by getting the old KQ games running on DOSBox on her Mac, something she had just assumed was impossible, and we had some fun playing them, so I'm looking forward to this, just to see how well it is done.

    schmads on
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  • PolloDiabloPolloDiablo Registered User regular
    edited June 2010
    I don't like that style anymore because I don't have as much free time. It used to be I could get home from school and spend an afternoon flailing away at a hard puzzle. These days I have much less free time, so it pisses me off to waste it on a puzzle I could look up the answer to in a second. But that defeats the entire point of the game, so why bother playing at all? So I don't.

    PolloDiablo on
  • jothkijothki Registered User regular
    edited June 2010
    It's interesting to compare Sierra's adventure games to Sierra's RPGs, Shadow of Yserbius and Fates of Twinion. In those games, the chance of dying without being able to do anything about it was incredibly high, but all death did was kick you out of the dungeon. You spend most of the game bumbling around until you inevitably find something that kills you, slowly grinding up experience and learning more about the areas that you're exploring until you can safely navigate them.

    The games were designed as a sort of MMORPG, though, which is a different paradigm. It's still interesting to go through them in single-player, though Shadow of Yserbius kind of breaks down eventually once your spells cap and your enemies don't. The sequel handles that better, though.

    jothki on
  • VeganVegan Registered User regular
    edited June 2010
    Entriech wrote: »
    Gabriel Knight has unwinnable game conditions? That goes straight off my 'to one day play' list then.

    I'm pretty it doesn't, if my memory serves correct (at least the 1st one doesn't, don't know about the other 2). In order to move to the next "day", you need to accomplish everything necessary. I don't think you can even die or get a game over in the game until the final 2 days.
    The first one most definitely does! In the final area:
    If you find and wake up Grace without first acquiring two costumes from the storage room, there's no way for you to avoid being murdered by Dr. John. You have to go back to an earlier save. It's a short unwinnable scenario, but it's there, as I ran into it

    Although in the game's defense, that is (as you said) in the last bit of the game so it's not a big disaster (assuming one atleast saves before doing the endgame). You can die before the final 2 days, btw
    the snake in the museum and also in various ways at St John's Eve in the Bayou
    but in the first case the death is not instant and the answers are relatively obvious in the second case.

    I heartily recommend Gabriel Knight 1 though, it's got a great story.

    Being able to die isn't the same as being stuck and not finding out until hours later. GK1 is split up into self-contained chapters. The absolute worst-case scenario is having to start the day over.

    Vegan on
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  • ZedarZedar Registered User regular
    edited June 2010
    Ah, fond memories of KQ5 completely screwing me over.
    I ate the pie and wasn't wise enough back then to keep multiple saves. I eventually read a spoiler for the yeti fight and had to start over again

    These games were brutally unforgiving yet somehow still awesome.

    Zedar on
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  • FantasyrogueFantasyrogue Registered User regular
    edited June 2010
    Vegan wrote: »

    Being able to die isn't the same as being stuck and not finding out until hours later. GK1 is split up into self-contained chapters. The absolute worst-case scenario is having to start the day over.

    I never said it was. I was correcting the statement that you can't die before the final 2 days (you can, although not a lot). Gabriel Knight 1 (probably 2 and 3 as well, barring one or two well known puzzles, although I really need to replay these as my memory is letting me down on them) is a very logical game with very few ways to get screwed over really especially compared to several of the King's Quest games.

    Man, I still have that newest King's Quest collection rerelease (the one with no extras or anything) sitting here shrinkwrapped. I should really break it out and replay the games. And I still wish I hadn't given away my original King's Quest collection to some younger kids all those many years ago.

    Fantasyrogue on
  • psycojesterpsycojester Registered User regular
    edited June 2010
    Vegan wrote: »
    Being able to die isn't the same as being stuck and not finding out until hours later. GK1 is split up into self-contained chapters. The absolute worst-case scenario is having to start the day over.

    This is the problem with Sierra games, they genuinely hated their players and loved throwing crap like this in "better bring along every piece of arbitrary piece of crap from act 1 or else you'll be screwed over in the finale! and have to start the game over" Because everybody knows Adventure game puzzles are twice as fun the second time around.

    Sometimes they liked to mix it up and have items that would result in your death if you took them. There's no skill in having to save every single scene because Sierra were bastards, its just needless time wasting and fuckery.

    Take Space Quest V, there's a puzzle in the game where you need to pick the right adapter plug for a device, the thing is you don't find out which plug you need until the end of the game and the plug is randomly generated, so the only way to solve the puzzle is to save it and then reload and play through again from that point once you've found out what the plug will be.

    psycojester on
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  • MerculoreMerculore Registered User regular
    edited June 2010
    There's no skill in having to save every single scene because Sierra were bastards, its just needless time wasting and fuckery.

    These games werent about skill, they were about patience and storytelling. We knew that situations like that could happen. Navigating the map, the item list, the dialogues, the seemingly random ETCS., was part of the maze, the yarn to unravel.

    Could learning patience and trial & error techniques (in a form other then memorizing boss patterns) against seemingly illogical situations possibly be a useful ability for anybody to develop?

    Will anybody play The Silver Lining without alt-tabbing to google stuff?
    I ate the pie too.... and the honey.....

    Merculore on
  • Sir CarcassSir Carcass I have been shown the end of my world Round Rock, TXRegistered User regular
    edited June 2010
    These days I have much less free time, so it pisses me off to waste it on a puzzle I could look up the answer to in a second. But that defeats the entire point of the game, so why bother playing at all? So I don't.

    I personally have pretty much always played adventure games with hint books (remember those?) or walkthroughs handy because I enjoy the setting, characters, and story more than solving the puzzles.

    Sir Carcass on
  • walnutmonwalnutmon Registered User regular
    edited June 2010
    5 was awesome, there was only one part in it that my father and I couldn't figure out on our own, we had to use some call for help tip-line, and that was where you left gold in honey so that a leprechaun would get stuck in it... but people living in this modern age of gaming where many games require a "strategy guide" to play, or at the least some help from others on a forum, having one thing that can't be figured out by a 10 year old kid is really not that bad... the desert wasn't bad, and it was fairly obvious what you needed to do, and if you just got out a piece of paper it didn't take too long, but the reward for progressing in that game was kind of inexplicable, it was just such a great feeling to get past an area you'd spent several days in

    it was a different time for games though

    6 was great too, and robin hood, I wish I could play those games again, but to the best of my knowledge without a dos emulator (or some speicial software) none of them are playable anymore

    edit: playing an adventure game (at least the KQ5/6 since those are the only ones I played) with a hint guide is like playing a FPS with a bot, I can see doing it just to kind of get a feeling for what the games were about, but the reason they exist is to excercise critical reasoning and the payoff is solving problems that had up til then eluded you, but I don't think I have the patience for that kind of thing anymore either, because so many games are such a constant stream of stimulus

    walnutmon on
    xbox: jmbizzo | ps3: walnutmon | steam: walnutmon | SC2: walnutmon.591
  • Sir CarcassSir Carcass I have been shown the end of my world Round Rock, TXRegistered User regular
    edited June 2010
    Didn't the desert in 5 have some part where you had to navigate the screens in a certain order or be stuck in an infinite loop?

    And DOSBox works great for the old Sierra games. I even have the Windows version of KQ6 running under Windows 3.11 through DOSBox.

    Sir Carcass on
  • UncleSporkyUncleSporky Registered User regular
    edited June 2010
    Didn't the desert in 5 have some part where you had to navigate the screens in a certain order or be stuck in an infinite loop?

    And DOSBox works great for the old Sierra games. I even have the Windows version of KQ6 running under Windows 3.11 through DOSBox.

    Nah. It was just massive, and you died every 5 or 6 screens without finding an oasis. You had to chance upon one specific screen with a skeleton who had some item (a boot?), visit a temple by a cliff without getting spotted by bandits, then find the bandits' camp in the far corner of the desert (which i never found without a guide). If you went too far west or south, it was nothing but desert forever. Too far east, death by scorpion.

    UncleSporky on
    Switch Friend Code: SW - 5443 - 2358 - 9118 || 3DS Friend Code: 0989 - 1731 - 9504 || NNID: unclesporky
  • joshofalltradesjoshofalltrades Class Traitor Smoke-filled roomRegistered User regular
    edited June 2010
    Take Space Quest V, there's a puzzle in the game where you need to pick the right adapter plug for a device, the thing is you don't find out which plug you need until the end of the game and the plug is randomly generated, so the only way to solve the puzzle is to save it and then reload and play through again from that point once you've found out what the plug will be.

    What

    I always just held off on buying the plug, went to Space Quest XII, entered the maze and looked at the plug before the death droid came, snuck back into the time pod, went to the mall again and bought the part I needed

    I never had to save the game and keep playing only to have to replay a big chunk of the game

    joshofalltrades on
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