Sierra Adventure Games Hit Steam
http://www.joystiq.com/2009/07/23/space-quest-and-kings-quest-collections-join-steam-with-other/
Apparently Vivendi wants to steal LucasArt's idea :P Go figure. In any case, King's Quest and Space Quest "complete collections" for $20 ($15 sale right now tho)
Apparently Vivendi wants to steal LucasArt's idea :P Go figure. In any case, King's Quest and Space Quest "complete collections" for $20 ($15 sale right now tho)
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I already bought the 2006 reissues of Space Quest and King's Quest, with Police Quest to boot.
Also, some of the older ones are *really* dated. Text parsers and somewhat primitive EGA graphics... Of course, these are conveniently left out of the Steam pages' screenshots
I will admit my Space Quest experience is rather limited though
EDIT
I was mistaken, but not by much
I've never played Sierra games because I'm not a fan of being whacked over the head if I make a mistake, but I have considered just grabbing some walkthroughs and running through them at some point.
They should work on 32bit Vista, except for King's Quest VII. That, however, may still run, if only in a window.
Take a look here: http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?t=923874
Never played King's Quest although I've always wanted to.
I've got the 2006 reissue of Space Quest but still haven't given it a spin
STILL, FANTASTIC NEWS FOR ADVENTURE GAMING!!!
It's another reason I was disappointed with the Secret of Monkey Island: Special Edition. While the game is awesome; I just wanted it for the collector value.
It's great news, but not the greatest news.
To those of you who dislike all the dying in their games, I wish you'd give them another chance. As long as you save your game a lot, the death scenes are often a good chance for another laugh, especially in the Space Quest and Quest for Glory games. I'm not saying the "you can die" philosophy is better than the LucasArts/Telltale "you shouldn't be punished for trying something" one, but it is what it is, and it's not all bad. Give them another shot. Just save compulsively.
Yeah, another thing that really turned me off from ever actually playing through them.
Anyway, there are plenty of Sierra games that you won't die. And Sierra is slightly more faithful in the 'choose-your-own-adventure' mantra, where you can actually make a decision (be it a wrong or fatal one) instead of getting stuck in following the designers logic.
Hope Steam releases Phantasmasgoria. It's a one game that I really wanted to play again. Oh! Shivers too.
I have a copy of Phantasmagoria floating around here somewhere, never actually installed or played it, got it on ebay in a lot of other games. And I do have Shivers Two, and I did actually complete that game, but I never played the original one.
I wonder if they'll put the Gabriel Knight series on Steam?
Ever since they bundle the full game of Gabriel Knight 1 in the Computer Gaming World magazine, there are plentiful of copies around. Yet to see a minty Beast Within on ebay or from retail yet, but I would really love to have a copy of that (instead of getting it off steam).
I can't be bothered with GK3.
Vehemently agreed. Never did finish either Shivers game. Loved the soundtrack in the sequel, though. Cheesy rock at it's finest, with a couple of honestly good tracks.
I still listen to the soundtrack regularly. "Was I Even There?" is a personal favorite.
The Shivers games were pretty good. Did someone mention Phantasmagoria? I really should go play that again sometime. I love that crazy Don!
I got GK1 first, but then when looking for GK2 the only way I could get it was a bundle pack with GK1! So I have two copies of GK1 (I think I still got the box I got the 1st copy in) if anyone wants?
I really hope that these other not so famous Sierra games will get their rightful re-releases (or remakes) so that a new generation of players will get the chance to one of the more successful adventure franchise in the past.
Heh, that's my favorite too.
And on that note, maybe Lucasarts could make Grim Fandango available eventually. It's not like they're doing anything else with that franchise, and it could potentially make them money again if released to a new audience.
Maybe older games were easier to made compatible with the new systems (all you really need is some DOS emulation). Some people have reported that Grim Fandango has serious issues with the XP (although I had zero issues when I replayed it in June) and I don't know how well it works with Vista. And I don't know if LucasArts wants to spend resources to make games work in the new OS.
I know Lucasarts has at least mentioned it in their big announcement about putting their older games on Steam, and it would be a real shame to keep sitting on it, especially if they plan to keep doing rereleases.
It's a nice game in it's own limited way. Despite small game area and short duration it has some nice puzzles which really make you think. If you liked the first one, you should also try King's Quest 2, which is pretty similar with the first game, except that story is better and you have bigger area to explore.
Why would Grim Fandango need a SE? All it would need is a patch which solves some compatibility problems, but even that is unlikely since LucasArts has had rather hostile attitude towards XP patches (for example Infernal Machine is practically unplayable in modern systems and Lucas refused to do anything to fix the issues).
They just released Loom, both Indy adventures, and The Dig on Steam, as well as updating MI1, why wouldn't they do the same for anything else?
I think updating the models for GF and maybe retouching the backdrops for a higher resolution would be great.
All except SMI:SE are DOS games which run on emulator. It's certainly much easier to make DOS games use emulator than make real XP patches for Win95 games. Also Monkey Island is certainly most succesful adventure game series LucasArts has ever made, while Grim Fandango was a commerical failure. I would expect to see sequels or SE versions of more succesful titles first. Also compared to first Monkey Island graphics of Grim Fandango haven't suffered similar inflation.
Personally I don't see why GF, Curse or Escape would need new graphics, like some people have suggested on these forums, because those games still look quite good. Don't get me wrong, I really like Grim Fandango, but I would rather see XP patch and proper sequel (or prequel) than some SE version of the original game.
SEs are the path to new adventures from LucasArts or further licensing. Have to represent the licenses to audiences so they care about sequels.
Besides, we're working to Windows 7 - XP is pretty old at this point.
I liked the idea of SE in case of SMI, because I thought it as a tribute to the classic and I might be willing to pay for SE version of LCR, but that's it.
I certainly won't be buying new version of every LucasArts title, because that would feel like killing the golden goose. But I support the idea that they put originals to Steam, so that I could buy the ones which I don't have (that is Labyrinth, Maniac Mansions and Zak).
However if they introduce new titles instead of SEs, then they can have my money. Sierra tried the same remake stunt in the early 90's and eventually abandoned the remakes, because not enough fans were willing to pay twice for the games which they already owned. I'm betting that if Lucas would just focus to SEs they would soon start thinking that making adventure games is not good business.
LucasArts did it right by remaking the first monkey island. Although I do not agree with the interface changes. People need to buy that game so hopefully more are remade. Like the Dig, Indy , Full Throttle , DOTT, maniac mansion etc....
I think they could also expand upon these games and give you the choice to play an expanded version as well as switch between the graphic modes.