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Controversial adventure game preferences and opinions?

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crabapple - 09 August 2020 03:18 PM

Keep in mind that photocopiers in the 1980’s weren’t as good as those today, or maybe they were deliberately crippled so they couldn’t copy certain colors. What you saw with your eyes wasn’t necessarily what would get copied. If you tried to copy something that they didn’t want you to copy, you’d get an all black page, or an all white page, or possibly a page with black rectangles where the text was supposed to be.

I still remember being handed a piece of paper in school (so not game-related, though I have long since forgotten what it was about). It was readable, but the background was all gray and fuzzy. Looking closer, I saw that it said “kopiering förbjuden” (copying forbidden) in tiny letters all over the page. I guess it must have been printed in light yellow on the original, or something like that.

Karlok - 09 August 2020 01:45 PM

PS: I agree with Advie. Most, if not all, hint books couldn’t be copied. Now THAT is a way to make money.

Well, not all of them. Some games came with the hint book included. (Magnetic Scrolls comes to mind, as well as some of the later Infocom games.)

 

     
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eriktorbjorn - 15 August 2020 04:35 AM
Karlok - 09 August 2020 01:45 PM

PS: I agree with Advie. Most, if not all, hint books couldn’t be copied. Now THAT is a way to make money.

Well, not all of them. Some games came with the hint book included. (Magnetic Scrolls comes to mind, as well as some of the later Infocom games.)

Really? My memory may be at fault, wouldn’t be the first time, but I found the Magnetic Scroll games excruciatingly hard and frustrating. Why would I feel frustrated if I had a hint book.

EDIT: You are right! Smile I went to the Magnetic Scrolls Memorial (great site with all the info anybody could want, I once even replayed Corruption partly). The moment I saw the cryptic text I remembered typing lines of nonsense syllables in the game to get a hint. And having to do it more than once when I made spelling mistakes.

     

See you around, wolf. Nerissa

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Magnetic Scrolls was over before hintbooks were really a hype by the early 90s. early sierra didnt sell well at all, and their games didn’t have copyright protection, it wasn’t until after LSL1 when the game was hacked and played thru all wall streets offices that Siera started to push their hintbooks into a new and really profitable market

     
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Advie - 15 August 2020 05:55 AM

early sierra didnt sell well at all

Where do you get that from?
Already Mystery House sold much beyond their expectations, games that followed sold even more.

     
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you call 15K for MH good, “beyond expectations” is only a perspective, i m talking 7figures

anyways, i am taking a long vacation from here, these challenges are getting on my nerve and will lose my temper anytime soon. see ye all.

     
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You seem like you take offense here, but GateKeeper is actually right for once.

You did say that “early sierra didnt sell well at all” which is objectively incorrect. Ken Williams did not dream of being a game developer. He had his sights on more “serious” software. If the early games had not sold “well at all,” that would have been the end of it.

I’m still waiting to sell even close to 15K units of my games. If I sold 15K units, that would almost pay my salary for THREE years!

And Ken and Roberta were making games before the price of games was driven down to absurdly low levels like they are now. They made a good deal of money. Sure, they weren’t filthy rich yet, but there are more options than filthy rich or “didnt sell well at all.”

Early Sierra games sold well. So well that they concentrated solely on games from that point on, which was never the intention of that company in the beginning.

     
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no offense at all and i am really sorry to give that feeling to anyone,

thanks for your info and opinion here hightreason, and not sound childish explaining myself, but it will no way avoiding it, as i am sure now expressed myself wrongly, i was being subjectively looking to their early days from way up there at their most successive point, i wanted it to sound like they didn’t sell ‘that well at all, compared to their late decade 89-99.. but i guess i failed

Anyhow most of those who know me, know how English fails me sometimes. 2ndly i don’t need references to my Sierra information as they are gathered collectively thru long years of admiration with Sierra 1st hand with each of their releases, that turned (the admiration) to an extent of the nativity that when they shut down i was sure* that adventure gaming must be over only to figure out that there were a good number of releases between 99-2002 from other companies.

anyways, just wanted to say this last word before getting back to my long vacation Laughing

     

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Karlok - 15 August 2020 04:59 AM

EDIT: You are right! Smile I went to the Magnetic Scrolls Memorial (great site with all the info anybody could want, I once even replayed Corruption partly). The moment I saw the cryptic text I remembered typing lines of nonsense syllables in the game to get a hint. And having to do it more than once when I made spelling mistakes.

Yup, it was a bit annoying but at least it made it less tempting to decode clues unless you had to.

The ones for Corruption were particularly clever, I thought: Each set of hints had a few different questions, but only one of them actually related to the game. The rest were just red herrings to avoid spoilers. And for some, at least the first answers would be vague enough that they could fit any of the questions.

One non-spoilery example:

Why can’t I park my car on the zebra crossing?
What’s stopping me from killing Mr. Park?
What is insider dealing?

- It’s illegal.
- Ask a lawyer if you don’t believe me.

Were there any other hint books that did it this way?

Though I feel I’m getting off topic here, so controversial game preferences…? It’s been years since I played them so my memory is very fuzzy, but I’m going to say that Space Quest 6 is a much better game than both Space Quest 1 and 2.

Also, Simon the Sorcerer 2 is the perfect ending to that series.

 

     
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eriktorbjorn - 15 August 2020 02:05 PM

Yup, it was a bit annoying but at least it made it less tempting to decode clues unless you had to.

The ones for Corruption were particularly clever, I thought: Each set of hints had a few different questions, but only one of them actually related to the game. The rest were just red herrings to avoid spoilers. And for some, at least the first answers would be vague enough that they could fit any of the questions.

They sure made you work for it. Typing and more typing to finally get something. Even the hints were frustrating. Still, I played all their text adventures. Corruption and Wonderland were my favorites. I hated the Pawn. 

Were there any other hint books that did it this way?

Not to my knowledge. But my memroy is clearly not very reliable.

EDIT: I’m currently playing Endless, Nameless by Adam Cadre. I love his games. This one is in a way a parody of the ancient IF games. He uses hints in a novel way, as part of the gameplay. Fun, although the repetition and backtracking I was complaining about are also present. If you still play text adventures I recommend this one.

     

See you around, wolf. Nerissa

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D - 16 June 2020 05:30 PM

11. Logic puzzles are vastly superior to inventory puzzles.

Unless the inventory puzzles are funny.  It tough to make a logic puzzle funny.  Also good memorable comedy writing is more important than story. 

cyfoyjvx - 18 June 2020 02:10 AM

While we’re talking about Monkey Island: MI4 is incredibly underrated.  At least it doesn’t directly rip off elements of the previous games (insult swordfighting).

Did you forget about insult armwrestling?

     

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