[Mayboy]

I remember being introduced to adventure games by a school friend. He was half way through Simon the Sorcerer and asked me if I would like to go back to his house and help him complete it after school. We eventually managed to complete it and I have been absolutely hooked on this genre of games since that moment.

The first game I bought after I discovered this new found interest was the first Discworld game, I was up all night the first day trying to complete it. Just great memories.

[Gledster]

Originally Posted by Mayboy

I remember being introduced to adventure games by a school friend. He was half way through Simon the Sorcerer and asked me if I would like to go back to his house and help him complete it after school. We eventually managed to complete it and I have been absolutely hooked on this genre of games since that moment.

The first game I bought after I discovered this new found interest was the first Discworld game, I was up all night the first day trying to complete it. Just great memories.

I couldn't get to grips with Discworld one, it just spun my nut. For me at the time the puzzles just seemed too random. Now I'm older I'd probably get it but I bet it won't run on XP!

[DustyShinigami]

Originally Posted by Gledster

I bet it won't run on XP!

It will with the help of DOSBox and, at some point in the near future, ScummVM.

[inm8#2]

i've delved deeper into this:

- my friend and i stayed up all night once finishing phantasmagoria.
- beating zork nemesis right before i went trick or treating
- playing gk1 late at night, and finishing day 9 (wheel within a wheel). the music, emotion, and excitement were unreal

one deviation i have is shadowgate on NES. it was an adventure role-playing game. we rented it once and played it non stop over a weekend.

[Daventry]

I really liked Phantasmagoria. I miss how game packaging used to make the games feel premium. Phantasmagoria's 7 disc fold out case. King's Quest 6's travellers guide to the green isles. Big box was certainly a logistical nightmare for distributors and retailers but it made the purchases special and helped to draw you in to the game world and amp the consumer excitement and anticipation for the game. At least it did for me. Probably like how my parents must have felt when giant, 2 fold vinyl album packaging with big band art and extensive liner notes were replaced with tiny CD jewel cases. I know it's corny but, sometimes I miss the old days.

Daventry

"The spirit of adventure will never die!"

[Ascovel]

I have so many fond adventure game memories I could write a book about them. Mostly they concern the sense of accomplishment when figuring out a particularly tough and well-designed puzzle or some very impressive, atmospheric storytelling moment.

I must say I played my adventure games pretty much alone and didn't mind that.

[Gledster]

Originally Posted by Daventry

I really liked Phantasmagoria. I miss how game packaging used to make the games feel premium. Phantasmagoria's 7 disc fold out case. King's Quest 6's travellers guide to the green isles. Big box was certainly a logistical nightmare for distributors and retailers but it made the purchases special and helped to draw you in to the game world and amp the consumer excitement and anticipation for the game. At least it did for me. Probably like how my parents must have felt when giant, 2 fold vinyl album packaging with big band art and extensive liner notes were replaced with tiny CD jewel cases. I know it's corny but, sometimes I miss the old days.

Daventry

"The spirit of adventure will never die!"

You've reminded me of something Daventry. I remember having an adventure game collection which contained:

1) Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade
2) Mean Streets
3) Operation Stealth (a really enjoyable adventure made by Delphine Software).

What was awesome about this was the BIG box everything came in, all the floppy disks and all the manuals too.

Wish I still had it really, though all the floppies died eventually from being stored in a cold office, then a warm loft etc.

Thanks for that memory though!

[Trader]

I remember playing ShadowGate [PS1, I think] and I remember thinking what a great game for such basic graphics.

[TiAgUh]

When I was a wee lad, I remember watching my older brother playing Ecstatica many times, getting humiliated and killed everytime by the werewolf-thing, in every kind of way. Good memories...

Watching my brother play the demo of Duckman was cool and funny too.

Few years later when I was 9 or something, I started playing I Have No Mouth, And I Must Scream alone.
Finding out why Ellen was so afraid of the color yellow (the elevator scene) was ...intense (dunno how to explain it).
I also remember saying many times after playing the game "My heart aches like a sonuvabitch!" can't remember why but, I guess, for me, it was cool saying that phrase.

[CrimsonBlue]

Playing one of my first adventures on the Amiga, Operation Stealth. I didn't have extra ram on the A500 yet, so I couldn't get Monkey Island. I also didn't have to listen to the robotic voice in Operation Stealth when I only had 512k ram.

Anyway, I got the extra ram eventually, and one of my first games was Elvira - Mistress of the Dark and Monkey Island 1. Playing through MI1 for the very first time was an exceptional experience, and I've been a hardcore Monkey Island fan ever since.

One of my earliest adventure game memories, however, was playing on the C64, a game called Murder on the Mississipi (spelling?). But I didn't recognize it as an adventure game back then, so I wasn't really properly introduced to the genre until I tried Operation Stealth.

[higgins]

Holy crap TiAgUh, you played I have No Mouth at 9 years old? Yup, that must've been quite shocking!

My best adventure memories probably concern Monkey Island 2 & Day of the Tentacle. Me & my buddy at the time would relentlessly go ask the cool videogame clerk for advice with DOTT. Not the hardest game, but I guess the puzzles were too twisted for our innocent brains.

[Austruck]

I was a single mom in the mid-90s when my parents got us the first Myst game. I told the kids one Friday night that I'd install it that night and we'd play it the next day.

So after they were in bed I installed it ... and decided to just take a peek at the game to be sure it was working right, etc. Next thing I knew it was 3 a.m. and I was hooked!

The next day I was so excited to get to share this with the kids (ages 11 down to 2). We'd sit huddled around my computer (toddler on my knee, two older boys ages 11 and 9 taking turns with the clicking) and would eagerly shout instructions at whomever had the mouse at the time. "Go left!" "Click on that wheel!"

Those were special times playing that game together, all five of us fascinated by the scenes on the screen. We still have the spiralbound notebook where we were scribbling hints and strategies as we tried to figure out this unique game.

We've shared bits and pieces of all the Myst games since, but nothing quite like those early episodes playing Myst when it was new. Definitely highlights of an otherwise sometimes lonely time period for me.

[dorkboy56]

I've long been a reader of these forums, but haven't posted anything. This thread brought up such great memories however, that I had to put them up here.

-Getting The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy for our Apple II and digging through all of the extra stuff that came in the box.

-Playing King's Quest II (first graphical adventure I ever saw) on an old PC at a friends house (I believe everything was in shades of green on his computer if I remember correctly)

-Getting King's Quest IV and playing it for hours and hours with my brother

-Finally, one Christmas we recieved King's Quest V, Police Quest III, and Willy Beamish. I remember being in awe of VGA graphics.

-There are dozens of others, I've been an Adventure junkie for a long time.

[Gamegirl]

I remember many, many years ago my folks rented a Mattel Intellivision system for the weekend from our local video club and my brother and I picked out a bunch of games to go with it. On the Saturday afternoon I put a Dungeon and Dragons cartridge in and played for hours. It was a game where you walked down corridor after corridor in the first person and I'd never seen anything like it before. I felt like I was a part of the game and when I defeated the monster at the end I felt such an accomplishment. After that, I was hooked.

Gaming wasn't so popular in the mid eighties but in 1989 I bought an NES. I owned many games for that system and fondly remember Maniac Mansion. I think that was my first "adventure game", I loved that nutty story.

Such fond memories of times gone by. Thanks for this thread.

[Lee in Limbo]

Playing Atari games with my family.

Playing Colecovision games with my old school chum, Dawn.

Playing Nintendo games with my buddy Derrick.

Playing Space Quest IV with Eric and Debbie watching.

Playing Shivers, Shivers II and Temujin with Wendy watching.

Watching Wendy play Harvester of Souls and Blackstone Chronicles (Wendy preferred horror/survival AGs).

Playing Buried In Time, Myst, Riven and Exile with Gary and Wendy watching.

Playing The Longest Journey and Uru with my wife Dawn watching.

I like playing AGs on my own too, but somehow, my favourite experiences have all been with friends/family around. I keep hoping someone will finally make a captivating MMOAG (sorry, MOUL), so I can get them all playing with me.

[DustyShinigami]

Me and my brother watching a friend play Simon the Sorcerer round his house in the early/middle of the 90s.

Me and my brother playing Simon the Sorcerer seperately and giving each other help/puzzle solutions.

Me trying to get a couple of friends into Simon the Sorcerer but failed miserably. Still, all good fun.

Me, as a kid, making my own Simon the Sorcerer hat (out of cardboard with the help of my mum), collecting random objects and pretending to solve puzzles around the house. What can i say? I just loved Simon the Sorcerer a lot back then.

Me and my brother playing Titanic: Adventure Out of Time seperately and giving each other help/puzzle solutions.

Me playing a *ahem* dodgy copy of Broken Sword 1 on my PS1 back in 97-99. Was expecting a 3D platformer/action adventure game or something. Wasn't expecting a 2D point 'n' click adventure game (even though back then i didn't know they had their own specific genre). Got completely sucked into the story and couldn't stop playing. Got stuck a fair few times but pretty much solved it all myself. Thoroughly enjoyed it.

[Austintatious]

I consider Space Quest IV the crux of positive adventure game memories as a child.

Maybe it's because I didn't have anyone to share the games with, and Space Quest IV felt the most personable -- it was my private, witty little friend.

[Daventry]

The more memories shared, the better! I think it's awesome that so many people remember falling in love with the genre so vividly, and have so much in common even while coming from such unique and different backgrounds.

[Daventry]

Austruck, your post was especially poignant. My memories of adventure games typically involved me as the kid playing with his dad or the older brother playing with his siblings. It was moving to read your recollection of how an adventure game helped to create lasting family memories from a parents perspective. Thank you for sharing that memory with us.

[tsa]

I just loved walking around in Until Uru and Myst online, sitting on the tent with my online friends. We had such great evenings there.

As for real adventures, I never played them together with other people. I do have fond memories of playing many adventures on the Commodore 64 though, sitting alone in my room. I often like being alone, and a good adventure game is great company then. The latest AG that I thorougly enjoyed was Dreamfall. I played a few good AGs after that, but DF is something really special.