[Stonez]

I started off way long ago. I was given a 16k ZX Spectrum for Xmas 1982, and one of the games was Melbourne House's "The Hobbit". The writing was awful, the graphics were terrible and I was thoroughly entranced. I was Bilbo freaking Baggins!!! I was there with Gandalf and Thorin (who did a great deal of nothing apart from sing about gold) and I was fighting goblins, meeting elves and seeking a dragons treasure! Epic stuff to a 9 year old.

Since then the adventure game genre has sucked me in the same way that the Death Star did to the Millenium Falcon; no breaking away!



EDIT: I just found this site: http://www.zxspectrum.net/

It seems to let you play those games of yesteryear such as The Hobbit, Lords of Midnight, Colossal Adventure etc in a flash window. Hope this doesn't break any rules.

[ADan]

I never had a computer as a kid so initially I joined a friend with a C64 to play (or rather attempt to play) Maniac Mansion, Hitchhikers Guide through the Galaxy, Leisure Suit Larry and such (probably Space Quest, too). There was a tough language barrier to overcome so the main quest for most of the time was finding the exact commands to get things done.

In or around '87 I got an Atari 130XE and one of the two games I ever bought was 'HACKER' which in some ways qualifies as an AG. I don't think I finished it, though. The satellite always got me when I was 'invisible'. But at least I managed to decipher the message (together with the friend I mentioned earlier) by piecing together different parts that I had gathered in different runs of the game.

(My other game was Ghostbusters which was extremely boring).

I did try to program an AG in Basic on the Atari with graphics, sound and all but I only got as far as the intro and two locations that could be exited in the four directions of a compass. The thing was called (translated): The Mystery of the Maginot Line.

Ah, sweet days of innocent hubris ...

[Jon_wachter]

A text adventure called "The Cottage".

[MakeMonroe]

My first real adventure game was perhaps if i remember right leisure suit larry. Back then i didn't even understood that it was "adventure" game or some genre that i was not familiar with. Of course back then the biggest reason to try it was that "hey it is somekind of a sex game". Some of my friends had already tried it and recommended me to try it too. Yeah it was not very rosy start but still, it was my first time when i tried adventure game. Thanks to Al Lowe i got interested to adventure games in general and after leisure suit larry games i bought monkey island 1-2 and so on. Nowadays it is my favorite genre and now that i got brand new computer i can play some new adventure games too. Yay.

[rayvio]

I had The Hobbit too but as a kid I didn't have the patience for text adventures (to be honest even as an adult they have to be really, really good to hold my attention and not irritate me with trying a dozen variations on the same word) and after a few minutes of serious attempts I ended up trying silly things before getting tired of that as well. so the first adventure game I really had a proper play with was on the Amiga, Secret of Monkey Island. after that I jumped through every hoop I could to get Loom, Zak McKraken, Indy, Maniac Mansion and any other Lucas Film adventure game. then of course I discovered Sierra, and the few Microprose games (Dragonsphere is still one of my favourites) and of course Revolution showed up with Lure of the Temptress followed by the amazing Beneath A Steel Sky... I picked a good time to discover the genre

[Weare6]

mmm.... well long long time ago in a galaxy far..... Sorry... in a suburb far far away I had access to 2 rather archaic machines, the classic C64 and a neighbours Apple 2E.
Both where at the time equally awesome. I have vague memories on playing my very first Adventure game but I am pretty sure it was a text adventure,
either the original Zork or Wishbringer. (before all the likes of sierra & LucasArts)
But there are two games that really stood out in the beginning and that was 'Labyrinth' and 'Maniac Mansion' (good Times). I was also playing Ultima 1& 2 on Apple 2E.
Ahhh There are so many I can recall....I'll leave that for another time.

[jhetfield21]

Broken Sword 1 that i happened to borrow from an uncle back when i was in middle or high school.

[Stonez]

Originally Posted by jhetfield21

Broken Sword 1 that i happened to borrow from an uncle back when i was in middle or high school.

Good start there.

[Pyke]

Space Quest 5...but then I want back and played every AG i could get my hands on. Day Of The Tentacle sucked up most of my time tho.

[River]

Cozumel and Future Wars. Both played on my Atari ST.

[millenia]

I think mine was Leisure Suit Larry too. A bit later I played Loom, which had a bigger impact on actually hooking me into the genre, whereas LSL was just an introduction.

I think I played Future Wars, some King's Quest games and Quest for Glory games but I hardly finished them back then. Rather hard games especially when you haven't even started learning English in school.

When I got my hands of Monkey Islands, first Gabriel Knight, SamnMax & DoTT there was no going back. I only wish I'd known better English back then to enjoy the plots and humour more. But at least they were more fun to replay.

[M-E]

I actually started out with Myst, but it was way too hard for me, as I was only 7 back then. The first one I really could play through was Atlantis, still one of my favorite games, although a lot of people hate it due to the many death scenes. The great worlds, atmosphere, characters, music and graphics (back in the days of course) made it such a nice game to start with.

So after that I was addicted to Cryo Adventures. Too bad they're gone now.

Heck, I even want to play the game again, but i'm just not able to get it to run properly on a modern pc.

[gray pierce]

Broken Sword 2 back in 2003. I hadn't really ever played a game before and I was looking for something nice to do while spending my holiday. I found it on sale in some toystore and immediately bought it. I got stuck halfway through(at the top of zombie island with the theodolite) but despite that I kept looking for games without violence and a story. Three months later I got internet and discovered not only the existence of walkthroughs but also that there were a lot more of those games like Broken Sword and that they were called adventuregames. So then I finished BS2, bought BS 1 & 3 and thus I started my adventurin days.

[thejobloshow]

Sam and Max Hit the Road
I first saw this game on television on some early nineties video game show that was on during Saturday mornings. I was lured over by the cartoon style and the dry sense of humour and fell in love after playing the demo at my friend's house that he got from a PC Format Gold disc that had heaps of shareware and demo games on it. Still the best Sam and Max adventure in my opinion and I just love the characters and the world - it's like Raising Arizona meets Duckman.

My second adventure (following the theme of this thread) was the CD-Rom version of Leisure Suit Larry 6 and that series became a huge obsession of mine. I still have a boatload of related paraphernalia to that franchise. My only gripe was that I wasn't old enough to buy an old cardboard cutout of Larry I saw in a computer store promoting the seventh game. (Come to think of it, I am impressed I was able to talk my mother into buying me Larry 7... I was 14/5 at the time.)

EDIT: This reminds me... My younger brother who was 5/6 at the time actually recognized Larry's Greatest Hits and MIsses in a electronics store having seen me play Larry 6 briefly, before I had to remove him from the room, and had my father buy me the collection who was none the wiser. Best brother ever.

[Stonez]

Originally Posted by rayvio

and of course Revolution showed up with Lure of the Temptress followed by the amazing Beneath A Steel Sky... I picked a good time to discover the genre

Great days. You sure did. LotT and BASS are still totally worth playing today as are most adventure games. I think the beauty of this genre is that it's not about how flashy something looks, it's about the gameplay and how the story envelopes you. I still tell people to give games like Loom and DotT a go because they are seminal works. They helped build the genre of what we have today.

[terhardp]

In the late 80's, when I was 6-7 years old, I had ZX Spectrum. Back then, I've mostly played "action" games. Then, one day, a friend of the family brought me "Maniac Mansion". I don't remember did I've even finished the game (was too childish), but technically, this was my first adventure game.

I've got my first PC many years later (in 1997, I think). But the first PC adventure I've played is "Broken Sword: The Smoking Mirror". I've first played the demo version I've found on a CD-ROM supplied with one of the Croatian IT magazines, and was so thrilled that I just had to get my hands on the full version. And this is it - I'm hooked on adventure games ever since.

[alcoatjez]

Leisure Suit Larry 1. I got it from one of my classmates at the time.
I was instantly hooked and it took me ages to finally complete the game!

[Isak]

Indy and the fate of atlantis. My step dad got the demo it for his Mac in 1992 I think, I was only 5 years old. Didn't understand a thing, but I liked the fights with the nazi guys.. I think it was the part in the sewers, (there is a sewer part, right? - it was a long time since I played the game).
The first adventure game I played from start - end was Broken Sword: The Shadow of the Templars for Playstation in 1999 or something like that.

[SamandMax]

We had a bunch of Sierra games for our Tandy 1000 but Police Quest is the one I distinctly remember playing the most. It taught me how to spell important words like frisk and nightstick.

[Fantasysci5]

I started off with "Kings Quest 5" when I was in middle school, even though I was horrible with puzzles and never got past the first town. I also started playing "Riven" around that time, and couldn't even get past the first island.

On a non-adventure related note, I played "Oregon Trail" and "Rags to Riches"-a Commodore 64 game!!!