[Kurufinwe]

Happy new year, everybody! 2005 has ended, 2006 is beginning, and what better way to celebrate this event than having a look at what happened in the wonderful world of adventure games five, ten, fifteen, twenty, even twenty-five years ago? Well, actually, I can think of several better ways, but we’ll have to settle for this for now. So, take a seat, make yourself comfortable, the story is about to get started!

DISCLAIMER: None of this is meant to be taken seriously. Bores will be ignored.



Twenty-five years ago, we were in 1981...

Well, maybe you were, but not me. I wasn’t born yet. So I doubt anything of much importance can have happened that year.



Twenty years ago, we were in 1986...

1986 was a year of great scientific progress. Much of that was made in the ‘Evil Empire’ (yes, twenty years ago, the Americans had a president who liked dumb slogans – I guess history sometimes repeats itself). In Ukraine, the ultimate fireworks were invented and demonstrated during a great celebration in the city of Chernobyl; of course, if you were born on that year, you’re probably rolling your eyes (all three of them) at the mention of that event. Also in the Evil Empire that year, the Death Star a space station named after a washing powder was launched.

After the fireworks, space Lego and some B-movie actor that was popular back then

But in the West, it was even better! True? True: human cloning! But of course, capitalism being capitalism, it’s not poets or philosophers that were cloned first, but rather farm-hands and serving boys. For instance, you had Sierraboy#1: useful and always ready, able to cook, tend farm animals, walk for long distances, climb cliffs, and even rescue blonde, annoying princesses (especially model Sierragirl#2). Genetic defects: poor balance and direction, tendency to fall and then sit on the ground, shaking his head and repeating ‘tidup-tidup’ for an annoyingly long time; can also die as a consequence of a fall, but Sierraboy#1 comes with with the ability to restore, restart, or purchase a hintbook.

Sierraboy#1 in action

By the way, the ‘weird births’ phenomenon of that year seems to have applied to games as well. Take King’s Quest III: To Heir is Human, for instance: a King’s Quest game without King Graham or anybody related to him, isn’t that weird? Of course, by the time players reached the end of the game, it was revealed that there actually was a connection with Daventry, but, by that time, it wasn’t 1986 anymore, so that is out of the scope of this post. But there was even weirder: The Black Cauldron. That was a kids’ game that was designed by Al Lowe and . . . What? Yes, you did read that sentence right. What’s more, it was an adventure game with neither cursor nor parser: pure direct control. Preposterous? But that’s not all – it had action sequences. Now, this is getting ridiculous: everyone knows that the good adventure games of old had no action sequences, and that those are only a corruption of our decadent times. Well, what can I say? 1986 was a weird year.

A much-belated revelation, the king who says ‘Ni’, and evil should-be-handbags

But let’s return to scientific progress. That year, Sierra also sent people into space, enabling them to meet droids, buy spaceships, use dehydrated water and blow up star generators. And all that as a janitor! Isn’t that cool?

Two evil monsters, an ugly alien, a cool bar and a landing problem

And so that was 1986. Around the end of the year, America discovered Gordon Shumway (a.k.a. Alf Tanner), a philosophically-inclined Alien Life Form and former bouillabaisseball player. Surprising though it may seem, his adventures would become extremely popular throughout the world; in Germany, he even became bigger than Inspector Derrick! Oh, yes, a weird year indeed...

[Kurufinwe]

Fifteen years ago, we were in 1991...

1991 is widely considered as the political end of the 20th century – and what a finale it was! Two years after the fall of the Berlin wall, the perestroika set in motion by Mikhail Gorbachyov uncontrollably accelerated and precipitated the crumbling of the Soviet Union. The old world, frozen under the pressure of the Cold War, was gone and a new system was yet to appear. The Gulf War gave a taste of the many regional conflicts that would come, now that the two superpowers were not polarizing everything anymore. And, as a perfect symbol of the closure of an era, August 6th saw the birth of the World Wide Web, foreshadowing new uses for what had been the old military ARPANET network.

Gorby, Lenin toppled and oil wells ablaze

Adventureland, though, remained largely oblivious to the somersaults of history, following its own rhythms. Rather than a finale, 1991 was, there, an overture, the first of the three golden years of the Sierra–LucasArts era. But, before coming to those two companies, let’s see what others did. Detective games to begin with. Everyone’s favourite PI, Tex Murphy, returned for a second adventure, this time headed for Mars. Despite its many qualities, this game also showed how relying too much on conversation (for narrative and puzzles) can become a bad idea. This over-reliance on conversation was also a problem that Cruise for a Corpse had; unfortunately, lacking any redeeming quality, that game disappointed and was the last adventure from French developper Delphine Software.

Blah, blah, blah, and blah again

Now, let’s move on to the big two! Or, rather, almost. The previous year, Sierra had acquired Dynamix, and that company produced two adventures in 1991, which, despite not being overly good or successful, managed to gain a certain popularity among those who’ve played them, if only for their delightful soundtracks: Heart of China and The Adventures of Willy Beamish.

Cute Dynamix games

But, before we reach Sierra proper, let’s have a look at LucasArts. Well, basically, they discovered the merits of sequels and returning characters, with Monkey Island 2: LeChuck’s revenge. Guybrush, Elaine, LeChuck, the Voodoo Lady, Stan, Herman Toothrot and the three men of low moral fiber returned, while new characters and jokes were introduced. The infamous ‘monkey wrench’ puzzle and the unexpected ending still divide players, but everyone will tell you that MI2 is a game every adventurer should have played.

Monkeying around some more

Of course, LucasArts were still very far behind Ken Williams in terms of milking their franchises. That year, Sierra released new games in three series, together with remakes of the first game in two of those series. Ten years after Softporn (OK, so something did happen in 1981), four after his EGA introduction, Leisure Suit Larry explored Lost Wages again, this time in VGA. And, following Al Lowe’s promise not to make an LSL4, the fourth instalment of his adventures was called Leisure Suit Larry 5: Passionate Patty does a little undercover work. Roger Wilco too re-explored several games in the series: the first one, in a VGA remake, as well as the fourth, the twelfth, the third, the tenth, and again the first (no, those are not winning lottery numbers) in The Time Rippers. And did I mention Police Quest 3: The Kindred?

The evolution of a bar


Our heroes, and lots of flying


Two evil monsters, an ugly alien, a cool bar and a landing problem (déjÃ* vu, anyone?)


Space Quests I, IV, X and XII... all in one!

How original, uh? ‘Anything else by Sierra?’, I hear you ask. Why, of course! King’s Quest V went multimedia, with a CD-ROM version that featured famous Hollywood actors, such as Josh Mandel (as Graham), Lori Ann Cole (as Queen Icebella), Mark Seibert (as the genie) and Roberta Williams (as the rat). And Richard Aronson as Cedric. You’d rather we forgot about that version? Good idea... Let’s rather talk about the best game of the year, Christy Marx’s masterpiece, a game that built upon the qualities of her previous game without having its flaws, a small glowing gem that unfortunately went mostly unnoticed when all the spotlights were focused on the more famous Sierra series: Conquests of the Longbow.

Engaging, enchanting, intriguing, thrilling: Conquests of the Longbow is the one

And so that was 1991. On December 31st, the Soviet Union was officially ended, and a bright future could be expected everywhere. Disappointment would eventually ensue, but, for some time, things would look good. Especially in Adventureland, where 1992 would . . . But no: it is not yet time to tell that story...

[Kurufinwe]

Ten years ago, we were in 1996...

1996 will go down in history as the year of the British sexual liberation. Finally recovering from the twelve-year-long reign of the scary and inhibiting Margaret Thatcher, the Brits suddenly found themselves caught in a sex frenzy, all the stronger for having been long-delayed. It started in May, when the country was represented in the Eurovision Song Contest by one Gina G, who sang, in a short metallic dress: ‘Ooh ahh, just a little bit, ooh ahh, a little bit more, ooh ahh, just a little bit, you know what I’m looking for.’ But the real explosion was for July, with those five girls telling the world that they were looking for a ‘Zig-A-Zig Ah’. All this sex craze would naturally culminate in the landslide victory of the super-h0t Tony Blair over the super-dull John Major the following year. Now, it should be mentioned, though, that boring politico-sociologists preferred arguing that this sudden sexual outburst should be explained as a need to while away the time, in that odd transition period between the political end of the 20th century five years before and the beginning of the next one five years later – but who cares, really?

Britain’s long road to trashiness

Enough exposition, what about Adventureland? Well, same thing: a world in transition, and some extra sexiness. The previous year, Bill Gates had told people that PCs had suddenly become powerful multimedia machines – a blatant lie, but one which led to the widespread use of the CD-ROM to develop new games that would fully use the additional storage capacity and technical improvements the new technologies brought. But the transition did not go very smoothly for the ‘big two’ of adventure gaming: the Williamses sold Sierra in July after releasing a final testament, The Roberta Williams Anthology, and LucasArts, still recovering from the traumatic development of The Dig, did not release any adventure that year. Others embraced the new world opening before them better. Zork, one of the oldest series in adventure gaming, came to the CD; so did Christopher Lloyd, in a funny, cartoony adventure. Sherlock Holmes and Rincewind returned for solid sequels to much-loved games. And Revolution mixed together conspiracy theories, two of the dullest heroes in history, a new incarnation of Mrs Piermont, and Barrington Pheloung (of Inspector Morse fame) in a game that showed that BS did not always necessarily stand for ‘bullshit’.

Zork Nemesis, Toonstruck


Scenic Ankh-Morpork, Rincewind, Holmes being himself, and the infamous darts game


George, Nicole, Khan, Lady Piermont. And Morse. Because I like him.

But the most impressive . . . What? You want to get to the sexy parts now? Oh, all right... Well... I’ve told you about Nico, haven’t I? Not good enough for you? OK, well, let’s see what Sierra released this year, then! So you had Love for Sail, the dirtiest Larry game to date; this time, there really were naughty Easter eggs, and Larry actually got the girls – well, most of them anyway. Then you had Phantasmagoria: A puzzle of flesh, an FMV horror adventure with lots of sexual tension. Happy? What do you mean, those are only cheap thrills? Well, the comparison was with the Spice Girls, remember? And, had you not interrupted me, I’d have told you about Tanya Roberts as Regan Madsen. So there.

Pixellated hotness

Now, where was I? Oh, yes: but the most impressive endeavours of that year were three games, three stunning masterpieces, that pushed known boundaries and, to this day, remain essentially unique. I’m talking about The Pandora Directive, possibly the only game with excellent FMV acting and an actually interactive story, The Neverhood, a sweet and lovable claymation game, and Obsidian, a lush, surrealistic gem. Despite some flaws, those three works of art showed that adventure gaming could be brought to another level, given enough talent and determination.

Tex, Chelsee, Fitzpatrick, Malloy


Everybody loves Klaymen


Four mesmerizing worlds


And some extra pictures of Regan, the greatest character ever

Unfortunately, those were not the most important events of the year in Adventureland; indeed, those three games were hardly noticed. The most important event was the release of a game that would start redefining the word ‘adventure’, causing endless confusion. You know what I’m referring to... Yup, Polygonal Spice!

The Iron-titted Lady

And so that was 1996. In November, Bill Clinton was re-elected as president of the world, and people could hope for more of the same goodness for the years to come. Unknown to most, over there as in Adventureland, a couple of cheap girls were already at work to ruin it all...

[Kurufinwe]

Five years ago, we were in 2001...

2001... The first year of the third millennium of the Christian era. Despite that unique event, the new year’s celebrations were rather quiet, the stocks of tacky fireworks having been depleted by the celebrations for the last year of the millennium, a year before. And indeed, there was little cause to party in 2001: that year was marked by tragedy. In March, the AdventureGamer server was hacked; what could have been a minor annoyance degenerated in a year-long series of trouble, during which our beloved site would gain an s and lose its network of hosted sites – some of which never reappeared, including Sidney, the best source of information on Gabriel Knight 3 ever to have been, and End of Journey, a nice TLJ fan site.

That was in August... They were optimistic back then.

In other news, French astrologer Élizabeth Teissier foretold a booming year for aeronautics in the US. This probably prompted the invention the infamous :shifty: smiley.

The seeress amidst the Shifty Way

The disappearance of AG.com couldn’t have happened at a better moment, though, for it interrupted all the sterile discussions that were going on on its forums about the supposed death of the genre. And, indeed, there was little point in discussing that, or anything. Not long after the great but commercially-disappointing Gabriel Knight 3 and The Longest Journey (as well as the altogether disappointing Escape from Monkey Island), big companies were little-interested in making more adventures, and games were becoming scarce. The genre also continued its movement across the Atlantic: as Jazz & Faust, Stupid Invaders and Mystery of the Druids showed, making awful games was no longer an American privilege.

Jazz, Faust, stupid aliens and some radioactive druids

And to close the coffin with a bang, Spanish developer Péndulo Studios released Runaway: A road adventure, a sad and nostalgic project that fondly compiled all the possible flaws adventure games had had over the years and which had caused their current demise. Unfortunately, most of the world was unable to discover this great elegy for quite a while – two years in the United States, and it’s still quarantined at the British border to this day – by which time the general mood had changed, and Péndulo’s aim in making Runaway therefore remained largely misunderstood.

A maze, peanuts and everybody’s favourite bimbo

But the mood was not melancholic for everyone. Eight years after the release of their great ancestor, Myst-clones were thriving with renewed strength. All the taliban of inventory puzzles cringed, but even they had to admit that Myst III: Exile was the best adventure of this year (although ’pataphysicians are rumoured to have favoured Schizm: Mysterious Journey instead).

Schizm: pretty pictures, nerve-wracking puzzles, weak acting


Exile: pretty pictures, weak puzzles, nerve-wracking acting

And so that was 2001, a bleak year by all accounts. And as it ended, the entire world remained glued before CNN, wondering in fear if good adventure games would forever remain as hopelessly impossible to find as terrorists in the caves of Tora Bora...



But today, we’re in 2006! Woohoo!

And so now a new year begins. May it be good for all of you, and may you get all that you wish for and deserve – in adventures and otherwise. Thanks to all who took the time to read this long post on this special day, and see you in 2007 for another instalment of Anniversaries in Adventureland!

Happy new year!

[Dale Baldwin]

My word, how long did it take you to put all that together?

[samIamsad]

AWESOME! What Dale Baldwin said. And: Are you going to address the years in between?

[Kolzig]

That is just simply something wonderful.

[Lucien21]

Originally Posted by Kurufinwe

Twenty-five years ago, we were in 1981...

Well, maybe you were, but not me. I wasn’t born yet. So I doubt anything of much importance can have happened that year.

Unfortunatly I was about then.

Not much happened apart from the first commercial release for home computers of....

[Dasilva]

You missed a few years but that ok. Good job! Viva Iron tits!! lol

[Gonchi]

Hey... I liked Mystery of the Druids and Runaway...

Also, I was expecting "and in five years we'll be in 2011" with a bunch of wacky predictions, including the release of much awaited games such as Monkey Island 5 and Hero 6.

[Dasilva]

Don't be silly Hero6 is in 2014.

[RLacey]

Amusing stuff, Kurufinwe. Many thanks for taking the time to write that .

[Xman]

Yeah, that was a really great read; thanks a bunch for it

[Boneho Chane]

Awesome! 1996 was quite a year for great adventures, wasn't it?

[rtrooney]

Originally Posted by Kurufinwe

Well, maybe you were, but not me. I wasn’t born yet. So I doubt anything of much importance can have happened that year.

Talk about dating onesself. 1981??? In 1979 I had just attended my 10-year college reunion.

[ATMachine]

Well spoken, Kurufinwe, you had me chuckling the whole way through (although I know very little about Eurovision, which is actually more than can be said for most Americans ).

Did you take those screenshots yourself? If you did, I see you haven't done the simple modification to the SQ1VGA datafiles that would allow you to see ZZ Top in the bar as originally intended...

[Toefur]

Very nicely done, and fun too! Must have taken you a while to put together, though.

[Ninth]

That was great... Thanks, Kurufinwe!

[Kurufinwe]

Well thanks for all the positive replies.

Originally Posted by Dale Baldwin

My word, how long did it take you to put all that together?

You don't want to know. Really.
(OK, I've really got no idea. Far too long, probably, as it stopped being fun far too soon.)

Originally Posted by samIamsad

And: Are you going to address the years in between?

Well, next year I'll do '82, '87, '92, '97 and '02, and then the next ones in 2008, etc. (Yeah, right.)

Originally Posted by Lucien21

Not much happened apart from the first commercial release for home computers of.... [Zork]

Wikipedia says 1980. Then again, it also says that Conquests of the Longbow was released in 1992, which is just wrong. I dunno. Anyway, 1986 was hard enough, with three games, none of which I'm overly fond of, so not being born was just a convenient excuse not to do 1981, which just had Softporn, possibly Zork, and a bunch of other IF games I've never heard of...

Originally Posted by Gonchi

Hey... I liked Mystery of the Druids and Runaway...

See the disclaimer. I haven't even played Mystery of the Druids, actually. Runaway, on the other hand...

Originally Posted by Boneho Chane

1996 was quite a year for great adventures, wasn't it?

Yes, I was pleasantly surprised to discover that. For all sorts of reasons, I didn't play most of those games at the time, so I hadn't realised back then that there were so many good things, and coming from lots of smaller companies. Those were crazier days, and I think very few of those games actually managed to be profitable.

Originally Posted by rtrooney

Talk about dating onesself. 1981??? In 1979 I had just attended my 10-year college reunion.

And I was worrying that I was starting to get old...

Originally Posted by ATMachine

I know very little about Eurovision, which is actually more than can be said for most Americans

Yes, I'm afraid this was all a bit Euro-centric, just like the Mir reference (do you have that in America? I know you don't have Haribo, but I'm not sure about Henkel... Something against German industrial chemistry?), Inspector Derrick, possibly even Morse, etc. You don't know what you're missing, really.

Did you take those screenshots yourself? If you did, I see you haven't done the simple modification to the SQ1VGA datafiles that would allow you to see ZZ Top in the bar as originally intended...

No, I only took myself those particular screenshots I really wanted and couldn't find on the Internet (the Regan pictures, the Longbow screenshots, the Atlas statue from Obsidian, Lady Piermont, etc.). I'm not a Space Quest fan (though I've played them), so I just took what I found on Mobygames or someplace else.

[Ninth]

By the way, who's Regan? (the girl, not the actor )