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What are favorite adventure games that did something unique?
QFG, of course, they dont just count, they are, they have the RPG elements but do not affect the adventuring basics, to an extent that is close to almost* being solvable without, but not the fifth which is a different story
Do the Quest for Glory titles count as adventure games?
They certainly do, and we should thank the limitations of Sierra game engines and Ken Williams who was skeptical about a fully fledged RPG designed by the Coles for that (at least according to the devs themselves). They are very adventure friendly, at least the first and fourth ones (haven’t finished the rest, to be honest). Although the 7th Ultima games are also very adventure friendly, you can finish them without a single fight, but people still tend to call them RPGs (and some of the best out there). There’s a fine line between those two genres, although game devs tend to go to extremes to avoid the confusion by either simplifying puzzles in role playing games or completely avoiding RPG elements in adventures - including open worlds, which is a shame.
PC means personal computer
Gabriel Knight 3: Not my favorite GK overall but the independent camera totally changed the experience, making exploration way more fun and interesting than it would have been with any other control scheme. At the time I thought it was a game-changer and if I’d known in 2022 that no other games had adopted it I’d have been shocked.
I second this. I didn’t really appreciate GK3 when it shipped, but it has grown on me. To freely move the camera in Jane Jensen’s rich world is simply priceless in retrospect.
In my opinion VR is the best thing since hardware accelerated 3D gfx. (In a traditional 3D gfx sense affordable realtime raytracing with reasonable power consumption will be another big step.)
I strongly disagree. VR has grown immensly the last decade with oculus, but it’s not really immersive and unless some *really* strong VR-only titles are released it’s just not worth the investment.
Do the Quest for Glory titles count as adventure games?
Most certainly! QFG 1,4 and 5 are incredible games! And they deserve a lot more attention than they got.
Message #43
It’s immersive enough for me and I had and still have fun with VR.
The Quest2 is a reasonable basis if you optimize for the platform and go with the right design - the Quest wasn’t enough (resolution, weight, frame rate). It’s affordable and there are a number of good games around. Let’s say two dozens. On top of that you can use it as a headset for PCVR too - which quite some people do, if you take a look at the Steam stats and which easily adds another dozen. You can add another dozen on PSVR. Altogether about 50 good VR games if you start with VR today. There are games with high replay ability as well as games which last shorter than a typical non VR game, so, it might feel less than 50 but it’s still enough if you start today and don’t play like a maniac.
Of course it’s not Ready Player One yet. There is room for improvements but the next wave is about to arrive (Quest3, PSVR2 etc.) in the not so distant future, if the idiots & psychopaths don’t screw it up.
It seems more valid to criticize Meta for their data mining, their compulsion to facebook and greedy ideas about monetization of a Metaverse.
Fair enough, I certainly see your point.
My problem with VR stems from the fact that it cannot really pause action like a cutscene would. The last game I played was a Star Wars game. Early in the game Darth Vader appears to make a grand speech, and as the speech was *really* long I spent most of the time poking mr. Vader’s head with my light saber. At this point I lost the immersion, started poking the saber into allies, locks and whatever. None of these actions mattered whatsoever, as only prescripted actions ever will.
There is also the problem with movement. Simply running along the plains of Skyrim makes me literally sick. This is a biolocigal problem and cannot be fixed, your eyes see the wast plains, rocks and grass. But your inner ear tells you that no, you’re sitting still in a comfy chair. The brain immidiately concludes that this must be a case of acute poisoning—Better empty the stomach as soon as possible.
But from a purely graphical standpoint, current VR is awesome.
Message #43
*its own
If you’re interested in finishing King’s Quest III, I’d recommend one of the two quality remakes:
https://infamousadventures.itch.io/kings-quest-iii-vga-remake
http://www.agdinteractive.com/games/kq3/about/overview.html
There’s also a third fan remake of that game, called King’s Quest III+ by Crystal Shard.
http://crystalshard.net/index.php?p=8&s=80
It was actually abandoned and not finished the way they intended, but it is playable and should run in ScummVM these days.
@fiksdal
The are a couple of interesting moments in the Vader Immortal trilogy but overall I don’t consider them being good VR games. Being unable to skip such inactive scenes isn’t a problem of VR, it is problem of such specific games.
I only sit down in games where it’s the only reasonable thing to do, like with flight simulators, but not in games where you could, like the ‘I expect you to die’ series or where there is no need to and I can enjoy room scale movement instead. The more you move, the less you suffer from motion sickness. Some people said, that they enhanced their issues with a breeze from a vent.
Also, the more you play, the less you feel sick. The first time I tried to fly a plane in VR, I felt so sick and thought that I’ve reached my limit. Today it’s gone and I can have fun with all sorts of maneuvers in flight. But my experiences aren’t valid for everyone. You have to find this out on your own. Last but not least, the better the technology, the less you suffer too.
Forgive me for digging up an old thread 
for I have no idea how I ended up here but now that I have, I would like to share.
I recently played a free, short, mobile adventure game called: Hair of the dog (from the same developer as Lucy Dreaming). The game has a “real time” element: scenes change depending on the time of day (day/night cycle) and if you don’t use the manual time skip you’ll be forced to wait a couple of hours and ponder how to move on.
I actually hope this is not a unique feature, because I really want to play more games like this 
The game has a “real time” element: scenes change depending on the time of day (day/night cycle) and if you don’t use the manual time skip you’ll be forced to wait a couple of hours and ponder how to move on.
I actually hope this is not a unique feature, because I really want to play more games like this
It is not a unique feature.
Shenmue is one of the most famous examples, it has an artificial day-night cycle and NPCs minding their own things accordingly.
Not only that, but you can stand in one place “for a day” and see how everything around you changes, shops open and close, sun rises and sets, shadows move, and so on.
You can’t even skip time*, so you are forced to live in that cycle, so if a shop that you need to visit happens to be closed, you must wait for the next day to visit it.
(* = There actually is a cheat program that allows you to speed up time by manipulating memory.)
Of course there are very few games which have something like that, but in any case so many that no game can be called absolutely unique in that regard.
The Secret of Monkey Island: the sword fighting system based on dialogue is such an incredibly creative idea it blows my mind to this day.
Indy and the fate of Atlantis: 1) randomized Atlantis (I didn’t like it though), 2) wits / fists / team option.
The last express: 1) voice actors of particular background to capture their accents, 2) characters talking in native language between themselves and english with you (if they are supposed to know english of course), 3) savepoint system
The Secret of Monkey Island: the sword fighting system based on dialogue is such an incredibly creative idea it blows my mind to this day.
I wish it somehow evolved through the series though, cause you don’t actually outsmart your enemies — you wait for them to make a mistake which always happen at one random point. I replayed Escape from MI recently, and they went the same route with Monkey Kombat: first you learn moves by failing a lot, then you use them in the final battle, waiting for the “boss” to make one — just one — randomised mistake to get a little bit ahead. I think this is where a parser, or a system similar to The Case of the Golden Idol (“insert key words from a list” ) might’ve worked.
PC means personal computer
I think this is where a parser, or a system similar to The Case of the Golden Idol (“insert key words from a list” ) might’ve worked.
I did not know about “The Case of the Golden Idol”. Just watched the trailer and read a little bit on it. The keyword system looks very good, indeed. I think it fits the detective aspect nicely. The whole game seems like something I should play :)
Just adding to “The last express”: I realized I did not mention the time going independently of the players actions. You can replay the same part of the game and have almost a completely different experience.
I did not know about “The Case of the Golden Idol”. Just watched the trailer and read a little bit on it. The keyword system looks very good, indeed. I think it fits the detective aspect nicely. The whole game seems like something I should play
Yes, it’s a very charming and creative game. Hardly unique though, even the developers admit they were heavily inspired by Return of the Obra Dinn 
PC means personal computer
The Gobliiins games. Very charming and very unique puzzle design. Man…I’m soooo old, I can even remember the time when these games were released.
The most unique things the Goblins series did (in my opinion):
- multiple-character timing puzzles (e.g. Fingus can pick up the bottle only when the old guys are lauging at Winkle being hit with the sausage),
- the game is designed so that the player cannot lose (if you break an egg, there will be a way to get another egg) - this aspect is more common now, but back then it was very easy to get stuck, because you did something you were not supposed to do (plus you found out about it 1.5 hours later).
I also love the series, it is the main inspiration for my project actually (I only have one character, but kept the “no lose” puzzle design and tried to recreate the silly laid back atmosphere).
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