29th July 2004, 11:10 PM
Syberia is okay. Solid adventure game. I played the demo. It seemed like a very pretty, and very sterile, adventure game... it's like Myst -- it looks nice, but you don't interact with what you are looking at much. No descriptions of items, conversations seem strange and not quite right (sometimes just like it's there to be a block (to your path) and not to be a full conversation)... but the graphics are nice and it has a decent story. Solid and better than the other stuff from the last couple of years, but not exactly a classic. In short, it's just blown out of the water by The Longest Journey. Seriously, GET THAT GAME! Everyone with the slightest interest in adventure games should have that right about on top of their must-buy list. No question. NOW! :)
I'd say "get Quest for Glory Collection", but it's pretty hard to find in stores (:D) and somewhat expensive on EBay. :) Similar (only less so because I personally prefer QFG) for Space Quest. QFGV? It's okay, but ... contraversial... among the fanbase. It made the combat much faster and much more arcadish... and much more frequent... but it does have QFG humor and characters. The combat made a lot of fans dislike it though... a somewhat dissapointing end to the series, really. Still a good game, but not quite up to the level of the first four.
But at least it IS a QFG game, unlike KQ: MoE...
KQ7... right, it lets you continue. Forgot that, haven't played it in a while... yeah, it's a very nice option. But the rest of my Sierra adventures don't allow that... well, I don't know about EcoQuest. You can't die and I don't remember if you can even lose... maybe in a couple of places but it's not normal. But that's to be expected from a game aimed at a younger audience... it's a good adventure, but clearly aimed at a younger age group.
As I said, Lucasarts makes you not miss death by their great game designs and styles.
'couple of clicks' puzzle "combat". Like the combat in TLJ, except you can die... not the same at all as Indy Fate, CoMI, or Full Throttle, no.
Of course I always use multiple save files! The problem is as you say that sometimes you don't see a dangerous part coming... that's happened in Space Quest, obviously... or you get complacent and don't save for a while... and then DIE in some stupid easy fight... like Quest for Glory sometimes... (remember, it's a Adventure-RPG, with stats and fighting and the rest... though heavier on the adventure than RPG (though the combat element gets more and more pronounced as the series continues), I'd say, it has definite elements of both.). It's funny, but I never fealt like the deaths were horribly unfair in QFG. I'm sure part of it is because it's an RPG and you expect to die in them, but also I think that they have less of the stupidly unfair deaths from puzzles. You can die from monsters and stuff, after all... though I am also sure that they have some stupid deaths, it isn't quite as noticable on that front.
As you can guess, if the deaths come from combat I don't mind nearly as much. It's to be expected, after all, that if you lose a fight you lose the game...
But I wish that whoever thought up the SQ5 EVA thing would have had some pretty serious second thoughts. Okay... so, a crew member is lost in space! Floating away. You take quick action and get in the rescue ship. It doesn't have much air, unfortunately, so you've got to be quick... now, wrestle with the controls! Even with the slowdown patch it still runs quickly and controlling it is hard. You use the mouse to click on and drag a joystick thing in one of the four directions to make it move/turn that way. Slow and cumbersome. The craft also has a arm to grab the guy with. Fortunately, it's also a pain to use and I haven't yet figured out how to actually pick the guy up. The one time I miraculously got in the exact right spot for the 'grab' symbol to appear on screen I couldn't figure out how to actually PICK UP the idiot... and then I ran out of air. I do that a lot, it doesn't last long...
ARGH!!! Roger Wilco to the rescue? Oh just let him die... :evil: ... :)
Go, Buy, start the long journey (because it's a pretty long adventure game... :)), and get excited for the upcoming sequel. :)
http://www.longestjourney.com
I'd say "get Quest for Glory Collection", but it's pretty hard to find in stores (:D) and somewhat expensive on EBay. :) Similar (only less so because I personally prefer QFG) for Space Quest. QFGV? It's okay, but ... contraversial... among the fanbase. It made the combat much faster and much more arcadish... and much more frequent... but it does have QFG humor and characters. The combat made a lot of fans dislike it though... a somewhat dissapointing end to the series, really. Still a good game, but not quite up to the level of the first four.
But at least it IS a QFG game, unlike KQ: MoE...
KQ7... right, it lets you continue. Forgot that, haven't played it in a while... yeah, it's a very nice option. But the rest of my Sierra adventures don't allow that... well, I don't know about EcoQuest. You can't die and I don't remember if you can even lose... maybe in a couple of places but it's not normal. But that's to be expected from a game aimed at a younger audience... it's a good adventure, but clearly aimed at a younger age group.
Quote:Monkey Island's lack of deaths is just fine, and in fact, I think it actually helps the comedy. Guybrush has always been this laid back pirate ya know, and honestly I love how everything just works out for him no matter WHAT, so it's perfect that there's no way to kill off the guy, plus the whole attitude of the game is comedic and just a calm little journey, so a sense of danger is really only a comedic tool at best. In a game like that, no deaths is perfect. I'd also go as far as to say games set in the current day, except in really dangerous settings, should be safe. I recently got Syberia, namely due to word of mouth. The whole setting of the game really doesn't cater to my character dying all the time, so really a threat of death wouldn't fit here. It's pretty fun so far, though I got stuck and haven't played in about a week. I'll go back though, I always do with these games .
As I said, Lucasarts makes you not miss death by their great game designs and styles.
Quote:KQ games really don't have combat. I mean, you really don't enter any sort of combat mode or phase or anything like you do in Monkey Island for example. The closest thing is when you are in a very dangerous situation and your goal is solving a puzzle surrounding some villian. There are a couple games that do in fact end in a combat situation against a final boss, come to think of it, but for the majority, all the enemies are handled exactly like any other puzzle, only if you take a wrong step, boom, you get stomped on by a giant.
'couple of clicks' puzzle "combat". Like the combat in TLJ, except you can die... not the same at all as Indy Fate, CoMI, or Full Throttle, no.
Of course I always use multiple save files! The problem is as you say that sometimes you don't see a dangerous part coming... that's happened in Space Quest, obviously... or you get complacent and don't save for a while... and then DIE in some stupid easy fight... like Quest for Glory sometimes... (remember, it's a Adventure-RPG, with stats and fighting and the rest... though heavier on the adventure than RPG (though the combat element gets more and more pronounced as the series continues), I'd say, it has definite elements of both.). It's funny, but I never fealt like the deaths were horribly unfair in QFG. I'm sure part of it is because it's an RPG and you expect to die in them, but also I think that they have less of the stupidly unfair deaths from puzzles. You can die from monsters and stuff, after all... though I am also sure that they have some stupid deaths, it isn't quite as noticable on that front.
As you can guess, if the deaths come from combat I don't mind nearly as much. It's to be expected, after all, that if you lose a fight you lose the game...
But I wish that whoever thought up the SQ5 EVA thing would have had some pretty serious second thoughts. Okay... so, a crew member is lost in space! Floating away. You take quick action and get in the rescue ship. It doesn't have much air, unfortunately, so you've got to be quick... now, wrestle with the controls! Even with the slowdown patch it still runs quickly and controlling it is hard. You use the mouse to click on and drag a joystick thing in one of the four directions to make it move/turn that way. Slow and cumbersome. The craft also has a arm to grab the guy with. Fortunately, it's also a pain to use and I haven't yet figured out how to actually pick the guy up. The one time I miraculously got in the exact right spot for the 'grab' symbol to appear on screen I couldn't figure out how to actually PICK UP the idiot... and then I ran out of air. I do that a lot, it doesn't last long...
ARGH!!! Roger Wilco to the rescue? Oh just let him die... :evil: ... :)
Go, Buy, start the long journey (because it's a pretty long adventure game... :)), and get excited for the upcoming sequel. :)
http://www.longestjourney.com