[fov]

I'm working on a "behind the scenes" article for GamesTM magazine about Police Quest. I actually got the idea for it when people here started comparing L.A. Noire to the original PQ. Got a nice interview with Jim Walls and everything.

One of the things GamesTM includes in these articles is a "from the forum" sidebar where they print quotes from forum members reminiscing about the game. Problem is, no one from their forum seems to have played Police Quest.

So... if anyone from AG feels like posting a few Police Quest memories, there's a good chance your quotes will end up in the article! Plus, I'll be your friend for life. Feel free to post them here, or you can check out the GamesTM thread about it.

As for me, I played the first PQ game when I was around 10 or 11. Hearing that I liked them, my sister's boyfriend had loaned us a bunch of Sierra games for the Apple IIGS and that was one of them. I remember initially having issues because he didn't also loan us the manual so I didn't know any of the police procedures. I remember very tense moments trying to type commands during the face-off with the guy in the Cadillac (is it Jason Taselli?)

The second PQ game, I played a few months later, and I think I bought the hint book, which my dad then hid from me so I couldn't spoil the game for myself. If I wanted a hint I had to ask him. I was in 6th grade and my class went on a week-long camping trip in the fall (it was 1989, the same week as the Oakland/San Francisco earthquake during the world series!) Anyway I had gotten very close to finishing the game just before we left and had been thinking about it all week, and I remember when we got back from the camping trip I ran to the computer so I could get through the end of it. I loved the scenes with Sonny and Marie in that one... I used to replay the dinner date over and over, ordering the different meals, giving her different gifts...

[SamandMax]

I absolutely love the Police Quest games so this is pretty much the best idea for an article ever and I'd be more than happy to share my memories of the series.

I started playing the first two Police Quest games when I was really young - probably only 5 or 6 - so they've always held a special place in my heart. Obviously, someone still coming to grips with the english language can't get very far in games that use a text parser but I stuck with them and I can say without a doubt they played a huge part in my early education. While other kids were reading Dr. Seuss, I was reading about drug kingpins and miranda rights.

I played the first game so much, my own personal walkthrough for it has been permanently etched into my brain. I know what to type to finish it without even playing it: get radio, get key, open locker, get towel, turn on, open locker, get uniform, get ammo, get gun, get briefcase, etc. I have trouble remembering people's birthdays but every single verb and noun needed to finish Police Quest can be brought up by my brain in a second.

We got a new computer on Christmas Day '96 although that didn't excite me as much as the copy of Police Quest: Open Season that came along with it. It may not be designed by Jim Walls but Open Season has always been an important part of the series for me and a worthy successor to the first two games (unlike PQ3, a game I've never been that fond of). I have a feeling I was the only 10-year old playing a game in which you find the corpse of a child in a dumpster within the first five minutes that Christmas.

[Monolith]

Excellent subject! So many fond memories with Police Quest, especially since Sierra offered my childhood so much to learn. The one funny thing is that I never played any of the "All Ages" or "Children" games from the company besides the first Eco Quest.

I got my first taste of Police Quest when I was 6 years old. My dad brought home a copy of Police Quest 2. I remember seeing the box art and the awesome manual with the copy protection mug shots of various criminals. Whenever Sierra released a game, it was always like Christmas. A new story, a new world.

The one scene in the game that has always stuck into my head was the Motel scene. Ignored all procedures and got my self a nice hot load of shotgun glory. Despite the subject matter of the game, it taught me about procedure, consequences for your actions, and my soon to be love for game development.

Huh, I just realized I played this game around the same time I played Codename: Iceman. My taste in games were like reading War & Peace while still in the womb. Then again, I was quite anti-social until high school.

[fov]

Thanks! It's funny how many of us played Police Quest as kids. My mom was nervous about me playing Leisure Suit Larry (under Dad's supervision! He sent me out of the room at certain points...) But I don't remember her having an issue with Police Quest. In fact I think she even helped me apprehend one of the criminals when I couldn't type fast enough. I guess the concerns about violent video games didn't really exist back then, so it was easier to identify LSL as "mature in a way that's bad for children" than PQ.

Monolith, did you actually finish Codename: Iceman? I hear it's quite hard.

As far as PQ4 goes, I did play it, but long after I played PQ1 and PQ2. PQ3 never released for Mac (in spite of Sierra saying that it would... I think I even preordered it, but I may be confusing it with the first Gabriel Knight), so I didn't play that one. More recently I've played some of it but the driving is a huge deterrent for me. But back to PQ4, I played about half of it until encountering a bug during the press conference at City Hall. I went back and forth with Sierra for months trying to get it resolved (some hilarious, and kind of embarrassing, reminiscences on this experience are recorded for posterity on my blog here, here, and here). I did finally finish the game years later but it wasn't a favorite like the earlier ones.

[Monolith]

I'm guessing we turned out alright despite such violence and sex in our childhood.

Yeah, I actually finished CI the same month we got it. I recall the horrible Submarine part of the game before you reach Tunisia. I had my brother get me through that scene just because it was way to hard! Though I did appreciate the difficulty in such a serious game. It brought espionage to the adventure genre.

[inm8#2]

PQ3 is one of the earliest adventure games (or PC games in general) that I remember playing. I may be biased from nostalgia but I've always enjoyed that game. As a seven- or eight-year-old kid I loved feeling like I had a real responsibility of being a police officer. That game and the others genuinely attracted me to law enforcement as a career, although I didn't follow that path (I started college when CSI was very popular in the early 2000s and at that point everyone wanted to be a detective).

Sometime after PQ3 I was able to play PQ1 (EGA). It's amazing how those older games feel more authentic in what they're trying to portray. I mean, not walking around your squad car to check the tires resulted in your death! It was those little touches that made that game so cool. The VGA remake is equally impressive and both versions still feel like different games to me, in a good way. You can play them both without making you think about which one is better. They're both great in their design.

I played PQ4 around the time it came out with a friend. It was different but still enjoyable. I missed Sonny Bonds, though. That game had some exciting moments, such as a downtown shootout. I think Daryl Gates did a nice job upping the ante on the realism of detective work and the story was quite dark and intense. I feel that theme carried over from PQ3's cult story.

PQ2 is a classic in its own right. I didn't play that game until a few years ago. The cat and mouse story was very gripping, and when I replayed PQ3 after that game the emotional weight of Marie's attack increased. PQ2 has some very nice puzzles. The bomb on the plane might seem like a detraction from the main story, but it's an enjoyable sequence.

I bought PQ:SWAT when it came out in 1995. I'm not sure what I expected. I knew it would be quite different and focus on action/strategy rather than adventure aspects. As a tactical simulation I think the game did a decent job, but looking back it's a little bittersweet. The shift of the PQ series from adventure/detective gameplay to action/strategy/simulation signals the larger trend in mainstream gaming away from adventures. But, I'll always look back fondly on series such as Police Quest.

[stepurhan]

If you forgot to do the walkaround check in the original version of Police Quest 1, the car simply failed on you as you left the station. In the VGA version, missing out the walkaround check resulted in a hide speed car smashing into your side when you drove out. I guess some citizens get really offended by your failure to follow proper procedure.

I sucked at sniping in Police Quest SWAT ("That's a miss, miss and a miss. Do you want to try that exercise again?"), but the thing that made me laugh out loud was the opening. You are welcomed to SWAT by the commanding officer in an opening cutscene. If you tried to skip the cutscene he bawled you out for being impatient.

[aaroncarney]

Originally Posted by fov

My mom was nervous about me playing Leisure Suit Larry (under Dad's supervision! He sent me out of the room at certain points...)

You played LSL with your dad? hehe ...Awkward

[fov]

Originally Posted by stepurhan

If you forgot to do the walkaround check in the original version of Police Quest 1, the car simply failed on you as you left the station. In the VGA version, missing out the walkaround check resulted in a hide speed car smashing into your side when you drove out. I guess some citizens get really offended by your failure to follow proper procedure.

Thanks for pointing this out, I didn't realize that the walkaround was required in the VGA version. You kept me from making a mistake in print!

Anyway, I never really thought about the reasoning behind this (just seemed like an annoying copy protection thing) until I mentioned it in the interview with Jim. The actual reason this is important is so the officer isn't later held responsible for damage they didn't do (just like when you rent a car and check for damage before driving it off the lot). So the sideswipe thing in the VGA version doesn't really make sense as a consequence.

Anyway, the article's off to the editor and out of my hands. Thanks everyone for the memories.

Originally Posted by aaroncarney

You played LSL with your dad? hehe ...Awkward

He managed to shield me from the most awkward moments. Still, it's thanks to Leisure Suit Larry that I learned about STDs and the importance of wearing a condom. (Especially when having sex with a hooker! )

[Burge]

Can't remember if it was PQ1 or LSL1 I played first around the age of 5 or 6 but both were definitely my first Adventure games. I WAS HOOKED.

20+ years on I'm still coming to an AG site

[LeftHandedGuitarist]

I must have been somewhere between the ages of 10 and 12 when I first discovered Police Quest. My one of my friend's owned the first two games, and when Police Quest 3 came out, another of my friends got it. I don't think I actually owned any of them myself until the collection came out on CD.

I remember Police Quest 1 was very hard. I was really into Space Quest and quite enjoyed the fact that the graphic styles matched up. I got stuck a lot, because my friend didn't have the manual (or wouldn't lend it to me). I recall having a lot of fun with the driving sections and trying to master it.

The second game really clicked with me, I loved the plot and I like Keith as your partner. I remember actually writing a story for a school project which involved me being in the game (I possibly even illustrated it).

The third game was a revelation in terms of graphics, and my friend who owned it would not lend it out to anyone so we always had to go over to his house to play it. I remember the pentagon carved into the murder victim's chest felt pretty gruesome at that age.

The main thing I take away from these games is the sense of atmosphere that surrounds my playing of them, and they each evoke a very different feeling due to having very different styles.

I have no idea how I ever finished any of them... possibly walkthroughs from magazines? I hadn't become obsessed with buying hint books by that point.

[Lagomorph]

One day, when I was like five or so, my dad brought home a bootleg copy of the first game. I remember the first thing we did was to grab the gun from the locker and shoot ourself in the foot. My dad then said the game was stupid and quit. I've never played the game since.

[fov]

Thank you again to everyone who chimed in on this. The issue with the article is now available, if you're interested - it's GamesTM issue 115 and should be on sale in lots of places in the UK, and select bookstores etc. in the US.

[Tiocfaidh]

Posting my PQ memories now won´t help fov anymore, but I still want to share my story.

The first game in the series I had the chance to play was Police Quest 2 - The Venegance on the mighty Amiga 500. Must have been the early 90´s. I just had started to learn English so it was very hard for me to play the game w/o a walkthrough. To be honest: it would have been impossible to make it through certain passages.

Nevertheless I was captivated, I loved the interaction with all the colleagues (Keith !), combing through ALL the files in the cabinets, adjusting my gun @ the shooting range, driving from A to B (love that music) etc.
I was on the edge of my seat every time I had to

Spoiler:

confront/was about to arrest Bains

After several attempts to get as far as I could by myself, I finally got myself an official strategy guide. Still have it somewhere ...

I made tons of notes, wrote down every single piece of information.
For a long time I couldn´t make it past the

Spoiler:

plane hijacking

and a software error wouldn´t allow me to enter the

Spoiler:

Steelton sewers

, hence I couldn´t finish the game.

I only played Puirsuit of the Death Angel later on PC.
At first the EGA original then I bought the VGA remake.
I prefer the classic...
Couldn´t

Spoiler:

call the backup to shoot Bains

in the VGA version.
So this is another one I didn´t finish.

Again the story and police procedures fascinated me.
Granted this isn´t the most sophisticated storyline ever written but it served it´s purpose.
Funny enough I never got around playing The Kindred nor Open Season yet.

I forced myself to finish Blue Force which wasn´t as good as the first two PQ´s.
Not by a long shot !

To this day Police Quest 2 remains one of the best adventure gaming experiences I´ve ever had
Thanks Jim !