05-24-2007, 11:54 AM | #1 |
Member
Join Date: Apr 2005
Posts: 76
|
Good Full Motion Video (FMV) adventure games
Lately I've been getting into FMV games. They unfairly have a bad reputation - sure there are some real stinkers, but there are some gems if you look hard enough. I can think of two games that I found to be quite excellent:
Gabriel Knight 2: The Beast Within. The storyline is solid, the acting is solid as well, the integration of prerendered graphics against FMV is done very well considering the game was released at a time when the best video compression available was the original Windows AVI. That said, the video is presented in a less-than-letterbox format that allows the video to look good even considering the faults of the compression format. Ripper. Excellent storyline, well thought out puzzles, great music (more games should use Don't Fear the Reaper), decent although not great acting. Though it does have Christopher Walken, even if it's not his best perfomance. Anyone else know of any other good FMV adventure games? |
05-24-2007, 12:06 PM | #2 |
Playing character
Join Date: Oct 2005
Location: Netherlands
Posts: 7,472
|
I found the last 3 Tex Murphy games excellent. Good acting, immersing atmosphere. They were way ahead of their time.
|
05-24-2007, 12:12 PM | #3 | |
Junior Member
Join Date: Apr 2007
Posts: 18
|
Quote:
Best FMV adventures are Tex Murphy games, they have everything: great music, puzzles , story and acting is not bad as in other FMV adventures. |
|
05-24-2007, 12:15 PM | #4 |
Lazy Bee
Join Date: Jan 2006
Location: Sweden
Posts: 7,518
|
Do they work on Win XP?
__________________
Temporary guest in your life |
05-24-2007, 12:41 PM | #5 |
Rattenmonster
Join Date: Sep 2003
Location: San Francisco
Posts: 10,404
|
I really enjoyed Tender Loving Care, but I know many people think it's too gameplay-lite.
|
05-24-2007, 02:19 PM | #6 |
Senior Member
Join Date: Aug 2005
Location: Santa Barbara, CA
Posts: 3,038
|
You'll find many suggestions in this thread.
__________________
Currently reading: Dune (F. Herbert) Recently finished: Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (J. K. Rowling) [++], La Nuit des Temps (R. Barjavel) [+++] Currently playing: Skyrim Recently finished: MCF: Escape from Ravenhearst [+], The Walking Dead, ep. 1 [+++], Gray Matter [++] |
05-24-2007, 05:22 PM | #7 |
Senior Member
Join Date: Nov 2003
Location: near Yosemite in California
Posts: 245
|
I recently installed and began playing The Dame Was Loaded. Some info about the game can be found here:
http://www.mobygames.com/game/dos/dame-was-loaded It didn't get uniformly favorable reviews (but then again, very few games do), but I am finding it quite entertaining. It runs in DOSBox after performing a strange little maneuver, the details of which can be found here: http://dosbox.sourceforge.net/comp_l...=2000&letter=T It was worth the bother. The game designers, I believe, were all in Melbourne, Australia, but the game takes place in the United States. |
05-24-2007, 07:09 PM | #8 |
Dr Uberman
Join Date: Sep 2003
Location: Perth, Western Australia
Posts: 298
|
Get some Tex Murphy into you. The only FPA I'd play again.
|
05-24-2007, 07:10 PM | #9 |
Senior Member
|
I just finished The Beast Within for the first time and was incredibly disappointed. The more emotionally demanding the scene the more hokey it got; this was, I think, due to sub-par acting... or poor directing (I can't really decide). Making matters worse, I totally lost interest in the story during Chapter 4 with all that tedious "research" (which really boiled down to clicking on absolutely everything and everything and everything but always managing to miss at least something which meant that every screen in every area of that whole blasted chapter had to be pixel-hunted to infinity in order to progress the story).
By the end my total lack of interest in the story and my inability to even emotionally connect to Gabriel (who I really couldn't bring myself to respect), left me with little idea of what was even going on. By the second half of Chapter 6 I was so utterly lost and confused as to the plot that I never even figured out what the opera had to do with anything. I was watching an opera in an opera house, but had no idea why! Nice music, sure, but "...huh?" Worse, the game never seemed to explain itself when everything finally played out. Eh. Sorry for complaining so much. I just worked for hours and hours to get through that game, and then felt so cheated. The first half of the game was actually pretty good, but everything went completely downhill after that (and fast).
__________________
Robert Aronson |
05-24-2007, 08:14 PM | #10 | ||
Senior *female* member
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: Holland
Posts: 3,706
|
Quote:
Bad acting can be great fun too but when it isn't, it is never as awful as bad voiceacting, which can ruin an entire game. Quote:
My favorite FMV adventures (combination of prerendered graphics and cut scenes with real people) are: Zork Grand Inquisitor... one of the funniest games ever made Bad Mojo... lovely, cheesy acting which adds a lot to the fun The Journeyman Project 2 + 3 Spycraft Dark Side of the Moon Temujin... nothing prerendered about it but not everybody's cup of tea. |
||
05-24-2007, 08:22 PM | #11 |
Senior Member
|
Yeah, instead of just complaining about GK2 I ought to be a bit more helpful:
I always really liked the Journeyman Project games. The second and third are FMV-based. Yeah, the acting is even more hokey in those than in GK2, but I'm a sucker for time travel stories. I just now got JP1 up and running in Windows 3.11 in DOSBox. There's something immensely satisfying about getting a game to run perfectly by running it within Windows within DOS within Windows. I've forgotten how immersive these games really are...
__________________
Robert Aronson |
05-25-2007, 12:50 AM | #12 |
Junior Member
Join Date: Sep 2006
Posts: 5
|
Yes....They can be made to work with a little ( or sometimes a lot! ) of fiddling about.
Steve's XP Corner on quandaryland.com shows in detail how to run each of the Tex Murphy titles ( and many other DOS/pre XP Windows releases). Another fine source of help on the TM series is The unofficial Tex Murphy site. Last edited by BenBeynon; 05-25-2007 at 01:13 AM. Reason: Further info |
05-25-2007, 03:32 AM | #13 |
Junior Member
Join Date: Jan 2007
Posts: 21
|
Is there a taboo regarding mentioning DOSBox on this board? Granted, some FMV games don't run on it from the get-go, but its support just keeps getting better and better.
Personally I use Virtual PC 2007 to play the Tex Murphy games. And Ripper. |
05-25-2007, 04:31 AM | #14 |
Chicken with a bite
Join Date: Feb 2004
Posts: 355
|
This one's only released in Hungary so far, but there are plans for an English version and they have a trailer in English.
http://www.yoomurjak.com/?menu=media&page=trailer# |
05-25-2007, 09:37 AM | #15 |
Senior Member
|
Don't know where you might've gotten that idea, I mention it all the time. I couldn't imagine a computer without DOSBox on it.
__________________
Robert Aronson |
05-26-2007, 12:40 AM | #16 | |
Playing character
Join Date: Oct 2005
Location: Netherlands
Posts: 7,472
|
Quote:
|
|
05-26-2007, 12:51 AM | #17 |
Passion Adventurist
|
I adore FMV too!
Is Missing: Since January or In Memoriam a FMV? Oo
__________________
Playing: *Nothing* On Hold: Myst V, Treasure Island. Recently Finished: In Memoriam, Sherlock Holmes: The case of the Silver Earring, Sherlock Holmes - Case of the Rose tattoo, Ni bi ru Age of secrets, Missing: the 13th victim Wishlist: Belief & Betrayal, Gabriel Knight Series, Black Dahlia ... |
05-26-2007, 02:57 AM | #18 |
Captain No Fun
|
One of my old favorites is a fairly uncommon game, Urban Runner. The acting isn't always the greatest, but it kept me intrigued for weeks.
|
05-26-2007, 06:40 AM | #19 | |
Under pressure.
Join Date: Sep 2003
Location: Apeldoorn, The Netherlands
Posts: 3,773
|
Quote:
I suddenly remember that I borrowed this game to my sister over a year ago! I'll have to get it back! --Erwin
__________________
> Learn more about my forthcoming point & click adventure: Bad Timing! > Or... Visit Adventure Developers: Everything about developing adventure games. |
|
05-26-2007, 10:47 PM | #20 | |
Senior Member
Join Date: Jan 2004
Posts: 948
|
Quote:
|
|
|