[Chasuk]

I'm 49. I've been playing adventure games for approximately 30 years. I started with Zork I: The Great Underground Empire. I hated the intrusion of pictures to my favorite gaming genre, at first. Then came The Secret of Monkey Island, and I loved it, almost grudgingly.A few years later came Myst, which I felt like a physical assault. For my tastes, the genre was forever degraded from that moment. Now we have FMV games and “hidden object” games and I'm now too afraid to buy any new titles.

Please, reviewers, add tags to your reviews."WARNING: Contains 'hidden object' elements" would be perfect.

I really don't want to waste any more money.

[seanparkerfilms]

I suppose it might be nice if the tag were there to see at-a-glance (although only very few of the games on here are in the Hidden Object genre), but the reviews themselves make it quite apparent if such elements are there.

[Luther10]

I only agree with you on hidden object games. Companies now want less budget and fast return, and hidden object games are the way to go. But FMV games have been with us for a long long time, started with 7Th Guest and Return to Zork, and this day and age they are very rare and are no longer popular.

Even though there are/were lots of Myst style games on the market, they only made up part of the adventure genre. The rest still fills with 3rd style point-n-click games, so you still have a lot to choose from...

[Chasuk]

@Luther10 & @seanparkerfilms:

You are both right, of course, as I realized after perusing this site more carefully. I think I'd confused it with that horrid justadventure.com (my apologies to any fans).

I'd fled the genre for several years. When I returned, I guess I expected to find that the casual game craze had spread to adventure games, but all I could find were “hidden object” games.

Thank you for your input.

[Warthur]

It strikes me as odd, now that I'm coming back to the scene, that FMV seems to still be comparatively widespread in adventure games these days, whereas most other genres have all but abandoned it - you still get a few FMV scenes here and there (I believe Command & Conquer 3 uses them, but that might partly be out of nostalgia for the great FMV scenes in the earlier games), but most games seem to use 3D engines for the cut scenes these days. And I've got to say, most of the time 3D engines just seem to work better for that sort of thing. I'm playing Mass Effect at the moment and I love the fact that you don't get that jarring leap you used to get in graphics quality between the action parts and the exploration parts and the conversations and the cut scenes - it all looks like a smooth, seamless whole. Plus the characters all look like they're inhabiting a real, vibrant world, rather than walking around on a stage - I remember lots of FMV games where the moving characters looked like they were walking around in front of a painted backdrop or something, because the moving character were all done in FMV whereas the backgrounds were handdrawn or pre-rendered.

I know cutting-edge graphics aren't really what the adventure game genre is about, but the way a game is presented *does* make a difference. (If anything, Chasuk's experience is proof of that - the very fact that to him text adventures feel so very different to 2D adventures, which to him also feel very different to 3D adventures, shows that the way you present a game's graphics makes a huge difference to people's experience of it.)

Chasuk, you say you're into text adventures - I can heartily recommend Baf's Guide to the Interactive Fiction Archives. It's not always completely up to date - the homebrew text adventure scene is active enough that maintaining a complete review archive would be a real challenge - but Baf tries to make sure that the major releases are included. People have done some really fantastic things with the Inform engine and other text adventure authoring systems - I think some of the 5-star and 4-star games on Baf's Guide are even better than Infocom's own output.

[nonax]

Originally Posted by Warthur

It strikes me as odd, now that I'm coming back to the scene, that FMV seems to still be comparatively widespread in adventure games these days

I don't agree, if you look at the adventures that were released last year only the casebook files uses FMV. And that series isn't even a real adventure in the traditional way.

Originally Posted by Warthur

I know cutting-edge graphics aren't really what the adventure game genre is about

AG's have often been at the cutting edge, and still are both in 3D (Dreamfall, Secret Files, Heavy rain) and 2D (Whispered World, Machinarium)

[Warthur]

Originally Posted by nonax

I don't agree, if you look at the adventures that were released last year only the casebook files uses FMV. And that series isn't even a real adventure in the traditional way.

OK, that's a good sign. I do get the impression that FMV seems to have hung on in the genre for longer than it did in other genres though...

[vivasawadee]

An FMV adventure game discussion in 2010? Have I stumbled into a time hole?

I agree FMV died from too much crap being made but there are some gems, the Tex Murphy series and Gabriel Knight 2 which can be bought at GOG. The Tex games had cheesy acting (in a good way) and GK2 is worth playing just for the performance of the one and only Baron Friedrich Von Glower.

[Ascovel]

Originally Posted by nonax

I don't agree, if you look at the adventures that were released last year only the casebook files uses FMV. And that series isn't even a real adventure in the traditional way.

Not last year, but from recent prominent titles there were also Yoomurjak's Ring and Evidence: The Last Ritual.

Well done FMV actually looks much better than 3D and I'd like to see more of it, but it is quite expensive to do, and when amateur crews are doing on them (which is very often the case) they turn out mediocre at best.

[Warthur]

I think part of the problem with FMV is that you're more or less limited to the footage you actually capture a lot of the time, whereas with realtime rendering 3D engines the characters are basically your puppets - you can do anything you like with them. In a good, high-quality 3D engine, you can (for example) make Alyx Vance kneel down and pick something up off the floor if you need her to do that for the game - whereas if you use FMV, if you didn't record Alyx's actor doing something like that, you're kind of stuck.

This freedom 3D engines give you is *extremely* useful for designers - and modders. Tie a 3D engine like that into a good scripting system and it becomes extremely easy for a designer to modify content in a game, or add new content, in response to playtester feedback, without the need to shoot new footage.

Whereas imagine if you were developing an FMV game and the playtesters all came back with the same complaint - "The ending stinks!" - what do you do then?

- If you're *lucky* the footage you currently have might just be editable and manipulable enough for you to cobble together a new ending from existing footage - but unless you're extremely skilled the seams are gonna show.
- Alternately, you can shoot new footage... which is going to rack up your costs.
- You might even be forced to bite the bullet and ship the game as-is... knowing full well that you're going to get some severe criticism for a flaw you were fully aware of when you released it.

On the other hand, if you're using in-game cinematics to do the cut scenes as opposed to FMV or pre-rendered 3D, changing the ending is as simple as manipulating the script accordingly and maybe recording some new dialogue. Presto!

The reason realtime-rendering 3D engines have been so widely adopted in the game industry isn't just because of the visual results (although these days they can get extremely pretty). It's also because the engines available these days are diverse enough and manipulable enough to be fantastic time-saving resources for designers - if you can achieve a great-looking cut scene via scripting and a 3D engine, that's far easier than hard-coding it or going for a really gorgeous pre-render. Because it's faster for designers to come up with such scenes, there's more time available to work on the story and dialogue and all the other things we adventure gamers love; because it's easier for them to implement the scenes via scripting, they can spend less time working on the simple stuff, like two characters talking to each other, and more time perfecting more intricate scenes.

That, and not just the expense, is probably why you see less FMV these days.

[Luther10]

I just started the freeware fmv game Fate by Numbers. So far I think it's great, and it feels like a commercial game to me. Anyone know the history of this game? Why is it free? Where did they get the budget to produce this game?

[Terramax]

Originally Posted by Luther10

Where did they get the budget to produce this game?

Made for just 1500 euros I imagine a few months hard labour at McDonalds.

[MoP]

Originally Posted by Luther10

I just started the freeware fmv game Fate by Numbers. So far I think it's great, and it feels like a commercial game to me. Anyone know the history of this game? Why is it free? Where did they get the budget to produce this game?

Did you check out the official site?

Fate by Numbers was made as a graduation project for Communications and Multimedia Design (CMD, Avans) in Breda, the Netherlands. Revival is the name of the fictional company behind the game, set up by four students. The game was made on a shoestring budget (1500,- euro).

Really enjoyed it myself.

[Warthur]

That'd explain it - presumably they had access to their university department's equipment for filming the scenes.

[Bon]

Originally Posted by Warthur

I know cutting-edge graphics aren't really what the adventure game genre is about, but the way a game is presented *does* make a difference. (If anything, Chasuk's experience is proof of that - the very fact that to him text adventures feel so very different to 2D adventures, which to him also feel very different to 3D adventures, shows that the way you present a game's graphics makes a huge difference to people's experience of it.)

The most important difference between 2D and 3D adventures and text adventures is in interface, it's not just the graphic presentation that's different..

[Warthur]

I would argue that the graphics and the interface aren't entirely divorced; a new style of graphical presentation demands a new style of interface to interact with it. Text-based input atrophied comparatively quickly once animated 2D graphics hit a certain point, because point-and-click simply made better use of the format; likewise, if you've got a realtime-rendered 3D world direct control is often a lot more user-friendly than point-and-click.

[Wizpig]

Can you guys elaborate on "hidden object games"?
Some examples?

[HaroldO]

It's those game where the main focus are looking for a series of hidden objects within a picture. Check the Mystery PI or Samantha Swift series and you'll understand.

[Hannes]

What I find depressing is the current state of this whole genre. I mean, it is dead. There's simply no other way to put it. And it's not going anywhere. It COULD and it SHOULD but the few opportunities that this genre has had to resurrect itself, have been wasted on stuck up developer decisions (David Cage, Ragnar Tørnquist... I'm talking to you two). The guys with big bucks are way too David Lynch to ever make a long-lasting effect on this genre and the smaller developers just simply don't have big enough budget to make the game visually appealing and market it well enough.

[pointandcliklover]

we live in a society where if there is not fancy weapon or big gun and somebody to kill the game is crap and boring. There is the fact for most adventure games you need to be able to read or even worse listen.

This has caused great game to fall prey to idiots who think they know best and put fighting senes in otherwise great adventures.

The whole idea of revealing the story has gone.

adventures are considered boring as there is nothing to fight etc.

Its a shame as companies i had high hopes for are dying all because some guy in a suit says it wont sell so no.

downloads have kept some going as costs on making discs manules boxs shipping are now not worried about but i find them too expensive and believe it or not i like having the game in my hand. i like looking at the artwork and reading the manules.

I will admit all this has shaped the games that are out there but hidden object games are useless in my opinion, i know some of u like them and fair enough all to taste. i prefer the old 2d point and click, the graphics were good the storys were good and even 2.5d and 3d games have there charm. i have been impressed recently by some.

but hidden object games should be considered there own genre and reviewed as such.