Leisuire Suit Larry in the Land of the Lounge Lizards
 

Here's my second shot at doing a review for this message board (I did a review of GK 1 a month or so ago... I've been busy with college since then, especially finals). With the recent release of the trailer for the new Leisure Suit Larry game online, I thought it might be interesting to take a look back in the original game in the series: Leisure Suit Larry in the Land of the Lounge Lizards.

STORY
In the first game of the long-running series, you play the part of Larry Laffer, a guy so out of date he thinks that leisure suits are still in style. Having just turned 40, Larry decides to visit the seedy gambling city of Lost Wages to see if his love life will improve. Al Lowe wrote this game with Mark Crowe of Space Quest fame doing most of the graphics. A lot of the puzzles and structure of the game is actually based on an older Sierra text adventure called Softporn, but Al Lowe's sense of humor and the character of Larry make it a lot funnier than the game it's inspired by. The dialogue is pretty funny and the narration has a real smart-ass tone to it that works well.

GRAPHICS
Released in 1987, this game has graphics similar to King's Quest II: they still have a blocky look to them, but are detailed enough to make most objects recognizable. Some parts in the game have graphics that really stand out, notably the disco and the close-ups of various women's faces. It has a bit of a cartoony look to it, which is fitting since the game is humorous to begin with.

MUSIC
Al Lowe also composed the music for the game. There isn't a lot of music here, but most of it consists of PC speaker variations on various popular tunes. The Leisure Suit Larry music theme has a wonderful jazzy feel to it that fits the swanky personality of Larry.

PUZZLES
Most of the gameplay takes place in various locations throughout the city of Lost Wages. It's pretty easy to move from place to place (you just take a taxi), although a lot of the puzzles make it easy to get stuck at certain spots. Your main goal in the game is to have sex with three different girls, although it is not as straightforward as it sounds. The text parser works pretty well, although sometimes you have to fish around for the right word. There are also points in the game where you can die for no real good reasons. The deaths themselves are pretty funny, but ultimately make the game a bit more frustrating than it should be. Still, the game isn't too long once you know what to do.

Although dated in terms of graphics in sound, Leisure Suit Larry in the Land of the Lounge Lizards still holds up as a good adventure game. Although it's not the best in the series and is a bit too short, it still is an enjoyable way to spend an evening or two. For those who don't like using the text parser, in 1991, Sierra released a VGA remake of this game with a MIDI soundtrack; the puzzles remain the same, but it uses an icon interface similar to King's Quest V.

Great Review!

Larry 1 was a great game. I remember playing it at my friend Tim's house back in high school. I think I must have spent an hour typing profane things into the parser just to see what it would spit back at me.

My absolute favourite Larry game by far was Leisure Suit Larry 3 : Passionate Patti In Pursuit of the Pulsating Pectorals. What a brilliant game. There were so many great puzzles and hilarious scenes in that Larry adventure. But the best part was being able to play Patti. Her half of the game was completely different, taking place in the jungle with really sexxy midi music playing throughout her quest for Larry. I went back to play the game years later when I had a good midi board and it was totally a different experience. I forgot how amazing those SCI Sierra games sounded. Yes, Larry 3 was just a great game.

I also liked all the Larry games that came later. Those adventures took the whole "cartoon" feel even further with the whole skewed buildings and big headed characters. Even Larry 2 was excellent.

Hopefully this new Larry will be somewhat memorable... though I doubt it since "Sierra isn't interested in making adventure games any longer." WHATEVER! someone needs to fire that PR peanut and a half.

I agree with you on Larry 3. The switching between Larry and Patti gave the two characters a real emotional resonance that the other games lacked. Although Larry 6 was also great; it returned to the "formula" of the original game and had lots of good jokes throughout.

Unfortunately, I have yet to play Larry 7. Also, I happened to lose my CDs with Larry 1-6 on them, which is annoying considering how much those games are going for on E-Bay now.

From the trailer, I'm sort of impressed with Leisure Suit Larry: Magna Cum Laude. The gameplay looks in the same spirit as the other games and apparently Sierra is trying to get Al Lowe involved in it somewhat. Hopefully that will go well.

im glad you were impressed with larry 8, i think it is going to bomb, it looks really really stupid, and the graphics really really suck.. sorry but i have no other words to describe it. I thought larry 7 was a great game, the gameplay had issues but it was good. It looks like it will be kind of like broken sword with watered down graphics, which is bad since broken sword3 was mainly good graphics.

i dont know im an avid larry fan and it looks really dumb to me, and im usually right about these kind of things.

Ahhh, Davez.

you're....refreshing. ;)

...ly pessimistic. ;)

I actually like the remake better than the original. It's more swanky.

I found Larry three kind of corny at some points.

The last one they made was my favorite. It would have been a great way to end the series if they hadn't started a new one.

I share your opinions davez, it's strange to have so strong negative feelings over screenshots (and a teaser trailer) of an upcoming game...

but it just is so.


And yeah, Deshrill, that's a good review. :)