Question about recent adventure games
Ever since TTG revived my interest towards the adventure games I have been trying to look new titles which I could play. Mostly I'm familiar with old LucasArts and Sierra games. Besides that I played for example Adventure Soft's, Westwood's and Legend's adventure games. I haven't really followed the genre after Monkey 4 and Gabriel Knight 3, but it seems that there are some game series which have received generally positive reviews.
I have read about three series which either continued or were entirely made after 2000, The Longest Journey, Syberia and Broken Sword, which I might try. Although I want to hear if our adventure veterans got opinion about those before I make any purchases. Are those really good games or did they get positive comments because there wasn't anything better available during that time.
And feel free to recommend any other recent adventure games.
I have read about three series which either continued or were entirely made after 2000, The Longest Journey, Syberia and Broken Sword, which I might try. Although I want to hear if our adventure veterans got opinion about those before I make any purchases. Are those really good games or did they get positive comments because there wasn't anything better available during that time.
And feel free to recommend any other recent adventure games.
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Comments
Dreamfall (TLJ sequel) - good
Syberia 1 & 2 - brilliant
Broken Sword 1 & 2 - superb
Broken Sword 3 & 4 - good
The two first are true masterpieces. The third and the forth are good but not awesome.
The Longest Journey is a good game, with some very good puzzles, an awesome story, but a lot of kinda boring dialogues. And a virtually imposible (without guide or wild trial-and-error) puzzle: Damn underwater altar!!!
I didn't like the sequel (Dreamfall) at all.
The Syberia saga is nice story, beautiful graphics, but flat gameplay.
Quite nice. The topics raised are still relevant and I've never seen another game even trying to discuss some of them. The only problem I have with the game is that one part of game is so much more interesting than the other. When I was forced to leave it to continue the adventure elsewhere I just lost the initially huge interest I had for the game and its world. Gamewise it's so-so. The puzzles were never amazing. Play it for the story and the rich world.
This is one of the cosiest games I've ever played. Snow is great for the atmosphere and the story unfolds very nice. I also really loved the technical parts of the puzzles that the old man has left behind for you to solve. They all play very good and I never got stuck due to anything being illogical. Not a great epic story, but then, not every game needs that. Play it in autumn/winter or on rainy days with a nice cup of tea or coffee in front of you.
The series start out great but I think most people would agree that the later parts are not close to the first two. Sadly, the move to 3D ruined this for me and especially part three felt unfinished. Part 1 and 2, though, are masterpieces. They are more like regular adventures that would be great cartoons or even movies. The characters are adorable and you'll definitely remember many of them. Lots of my friends had problem with the difficulty in part two but it can definitely be solved of your mindset is right.
However, personally I felt that recent adventure games overdid the inventory puzzles. It's usually about combining items in a sense that is probably only logical to the game designer and nobody else. And with the obvious lengthy gameplay in the recent games (as compared to the adventure games in the early and mid 90s), there will be many more inventory puzzle than there are any other sort of puzzles, putting a dent in the overall gameplay of adventure gaming.
Also, with voices and cinematography being part and parcel of recent adventure game, the excitement the characters bring about are a big part of adventure games now. And on that note, I really can't recommend Syberia to anyone, since the protagonist - Kate Walker, is pure boring. Yes, Syberia have some of the most memorable scenes ever and I'd personally played it twice (both I & II) to relive the scenes. However, the conversation and the lack of humour can really put a dent in the interest of continual playing.
There are many recent adventures game out there in the market. And it really depend on your interest to choose your poison. If you like humor, you can consider Ankh, Ceville, and Grim Fandango (since you didn't mention it). If you like murder/suspense, you can consider Still Life, Agatha Christie's series and Barrow Hill. If you like Myst-like game, you can try Myst IV & V, Atlantis series, Mysterious Island and Echo.
I also highly recommend you to visit adventuregamers for more adventure game coverage.
Grim Fandango I got (and I have played it several times), infact I have bought every LucasArts adventure games besides Labyrinth, Maniac Mansion, Zak McKraken and Day of the Tentacle. (Everything else in CD, except Indy games which I have in Amiga and Steam versions and Loom and SMI:SE which I have only in Steam versions). I certainly hope that they would put Day of the Tentacle to Steam, because finding CD version has turned out to be practically impossible (and if I'm correct DoTT includes the original Maniac Mansion as game inside game).
But I will read reviews about the games you mentioned and see if I can find demo versions of any of the games mentioned in this thread.
I agree with all of these, and I append:
Fahrenheit (also known as Indigo Prophecy).
Recently, I have found that the Japanese have been making graphic adventures for the Nintendo DS. Cing put out Trace Memory, which is pretty good, as well as Hotel Dusk Room 215. If you have a DS, they may be worth checking out.
I personally feel that the locations in the game were absolutely stunning and unique; part of the game was the feeling of going somewhere exotic and just exploring that place.
What the game was truly about, however, was the journey of the main character. You slowly find out about her life and her work as the story unfolds, and as you journey with her through her problems and her determination in trying to find out the secrets of this old toymaker, you discover that her old life basically sucks, has no meaning, her husband and her best friend are jerks
The game is basically taking a journey with someone through amazing and mysterious places, and learning life's lessons.
If you're after some stone-cold classics, why not try out Maniac Mansion Deluxe, a complete remake of the original with fancy new graphics? Also highly recommended comes Beneath A Steel Sky, in my opinion one of the best commercial adventure games ever made, and now released completely as freeware.
A slightly weirder proposition is Reality-On-The-Norm, which is what amounts to an open-source adventure game universe. All of the games are set in the town of Reality-On-The-Norm, and many of them feature a central cast of characters, but the joy of these games is that anyone can make one. Resources such as backgrounds, characters, GUIs and music are freely available for download, and the characters and locations belong to everyone and anyone. Obviously this leads to some varying quality in the games themselves, but it's a fascinating project and there are many more hits than misses.
As an adventure gaming fan, things were pretty bleak from a commercial point of view for a long time. These freeware games got me through it.
Oh and I second all of the games & sites you've mentioned.
I did not know that! That's pretty neat, and provides me with a plan to get hired by Telltale. All I have to do is create a popular series of online adventure games. How hard can that be?
Yahtzee's games are wonderful. My favorite is Trilby's Notes; well that's one of my favorite adventure games period.
And if that doesn't sound appetizing enough, Crowshaw recently released the Special Editions of 5 Days, 6 Days, 7 Days, Trilby's Notes, and 1213 for free on his old donate page. They're the original games with more content and story apparently.
I plan to play them as soon as I get the free time for games.
You are right on about the journey of the main character on Syberia. But that intention was clearly not shown, especially when you have an automaton that is more colourful and more memorable than the main character. Let's face it, Kate Walker can't possibly be anymore boring. She doesn't even make sarcastic remarks most of the time.
TLJ can easily face the same criticism as Syberia too. But at the very least April Ryan have more spunk that Kate Walker, and the whole mystery about who she is in the two worlds lasted throughout the entire journey. It manage to do a story-telling at a level that is much better than most of the games out there. Well-thought through and well-designed, with many side-stories to further mystify April, and to introduce the players to the different races on Arcadia. Yes, they may be red herrings, but I would consider them strong story-telling to make you feel for the character in a colourful way, and to build up to the nice ending of the journey.
Barrow Hill and Dracula are pretty decent horror themed adventure.
Still Life is pretty good too, though I would really put it on a stretch in terms of horror.
Hmm I see. Sounds like this is a game I should check out.
I enjoyed Still Life, except that one robot puzzle near the end which is a total change of pace from the rest of the game. It just jars when you have hours of point and click then get thrown a timed lazer grid puzzle. Eugh.
But ooo er... modern games... I enjoyed the demo of Ankh.. neverplayed the rest of it though. Farenheit has always interested me but the timed sequences put me off, do they involve too much button mashing?
But yeah, most of my adventure games are 99 or older lol.
LOL. I'm laughing so loudly when I read your Benny Hill bit, my brother actually came dashing to my room to ask me to share the joke. He was totally puzzled, while I continue laughing at your statement.
Why would you even think of Benny Hill?
Still Life have numerous horrible puzzles. Remember the bit about lock-picking?
The Broken Sword serie on the other side is fantastic, especially the first part is one of the best adventures ever made, better than quite some of the LucasArts adventures. The successors aren't as good as the original anymore but still good adventure games with just that special Broken Sword mood. I recommend playing them all.
Due to the recent release ( http://www.telltalegames.com/forums/showthread.php?t=10711 ) i also suggest the Blackwell series, very moody.
I did enjoy A Vampyre Story and i'm looking forward to A Vampyre Story 2 as well as Ghost Pirates of Vooju Island. Deck13 is making good adventures like the Ankh series and there are a couple of other nice ones from germany and a few first person adventures i can't remember the names right now. A few enjoyful games but nothing which really stands out like Broken Sword 1.
Interesting site and they got a lot of reviews about many games, but it seems that I disagree with them on several occasions (for example they think that Escape is better game than Curse or Tales), so I have to take their reviews with a grain of salt.
If you are wise, take ALL reviews with a lot of salt. Never let any review help you make up your mind about anything. Experience it yourself, even if it is horrible.
I am currently playing a pretty horrible game myself, called Secret Files 2 - Puritas Cordis.
There's some sequences where you have to press the right button combinations in time, but no button mashing per se. It's a good game, but try to avoid the ending since it ruins the whole experience. The beginning was the best part, I think. I like games that tell the story from two different perspectives.
On the same note I'm now trying to get through Still Life 2. Stay away from that one!
There are some people whose reviews I have been reading for years, who have similar taste and I have learned to trust to their judgement, but otherwise sure. When I find new site I usually check their preferences by reading reviews of the titles which I own, so that I know how much they agree or disagree with me. Adventure Gamer site seems to disagree with me in several cases, so their reviews don't help me to decide if something is worth buying, but at least the site helps me to learn what titles there are.