Point and Click Adventures

[Stomski]

Since playing Space Quest 2 and Leisure Suit Larry when I was 12, I've always loved a good point and click adventure.


Machinarium - Got tipped off about this point and click adventure last year some time, but finally bought the full version as ShopTo.net have the collector's edition for only £11.

machinarium.net/demo/

The art style is so sweet, puzzles great.

Strong Bad's Cool Game For Attractive People was pretty cool, but I find the Strong Bad world oddly amusing, so I probably overlooked many of the games flaws.

I should probably admit that I haven't played The Secret Of Monkey Island games. I KNOW, I'M SORRY.

Adventuresoft, aside from Simon The Sorcerer, made a game called The Feeble Files. I found this game really good when it came out, but haven't played it since and want to play it again at some point.

[Cullen]

Get the HD remake of Monkey Island stat! I got it on the 360 and its glorious.

I loves me some point and click adventures. I recently played through Broken Sword on the DS and I enjoyed it immensely. I've also just purchased the Beyond the Steel Sky remake on the iPhone. I was going get Simon the Sorcerer too but that's just a straight port, so I'm not that interested at the moment, but it's only £2 so I'll get it eventually.

A recent surprise was Secret Files: Tunguska which I played on the DS. Not the best ever point-and-click and the ending was weird but it had interesting characters and fairly decent writing, along with good graphics. Worth it if you can find it on the cheap.

[Stomski]

Beneath a Steel Sky was pretty good. I thought they released the data files to be free to be used with ScummVM??

www.scummvm.org/downloads/

(Just noticed there's a GameCube build, something I may actually want to run on my newly Qoob'd GameCube!)

Had seen there was Monkey Island SE on Steam for £7, I think I prefer playing this sort of game with a mouse, but then again, I do like my PS3.

Seen that rumours are spreading from yesterday that Monkey Island 2 may be coming to PSN too. So I will be getting them.

There's also a Lucas Arts bundle on Steam that includes The Dig, Loom and two Indiana Jones games. No Full Throttle in that package though??

Also - Day of the Tentacle!

[Dave]

A lot of my favourite games are point and clicks. Been playing Monkey Island 1 again on my DS recently (via SCUMMVM).

Sad to hear the other day that Cing (Another Code/Hotel Dusk) have gone out of business.

[Stomski]

I quite enjoyed Another Code, the last puzzle after the credits was pretty cool.

SPOILER: Click to show

Also the one where you have to fold the DS so the screens reflect, pretty sweet!

Haven't played Hotel Dusk or Another Code: R on Wii. Are they good?

[Cullen]

I thought Hotel Dusk was slightly inferior to Another Code as a game but not by much. The characters, art style and general presentation are much better though.

I really enjoyed Another Code R but it won't be everyone's cup of tea. It's quite slow and could do with more puzzles, but I found it an entirely pleasant romp with some nice graphics. It would have been a lot better with voice acting though. Recommended if you liked the DS game.

Yeah it's a crying shame Cing has gone under. They had another DS game called Again, which was due for release this month (in the US at least). It looks like a cross between Hotel Dusk and CSI, but I don't know if we'll ever see it now. There is also the true sequel to Hotel Dusk, called Last Window, which we aren't likely to see localised if they don't get rescued. Hopefully Nintendo will buy them.

[Stomski]

Ooops, just ordered Space Quest/Police Quest and King's Quest Collections from Amazon, much cheaper than through Steam.

[Dave]

Pretty much agree with Cullen. I was quite a way in to Another Code R before a puzzle made me stop and think, but it was enjoyable and would certainly be worth your time if you enjoyed the DS game.

[Stomski]

From the guys behind Home Star Runner, trailer for Peasant's Quest (2004 apparantly, can't believe it's been so long since I first played this!):
www.homestarrunner.com/pqtrailer.html

And the game itself:
www.homestarrunner.com/disk4of12.html


Found out that Flight Of The Amazon Queen is available as freeware now for ScummVM, sweet.

Sam and Max Season 1 is only £7 from Amazon, anyone know how good these are?

[Dave]

I've not actually played Sam & Max. Actually I played Hit the Road years ago, but I haven't tried the recent Seasons.
Keep meaning to, and I still have a free download I can claim from Telltale for preordering TMI, but with the season so cheap I may just buy that and sample something else.

Speaking of Monkey Island, rather unsurprisingly the second gameis getting the special edition treatment.

[Stomski]

I have changed my opinion. MACHINARIUM is plagued by slow down on account of being "written" in Flash. Not sure how my PC can't handle a point and click adventure.

One of the puzzles is even impossible due to the slow down.

Some items are impossible to see on account of being VERY DARK GREY on A SLIGHTLY LIGHTER BUT STILL VERY DARK GREY.

Almost as bad as the 2x3 pixel box of matches in Simon The Sorcerer.

At least in Simon The Sorcerer 2 the introduced a button to view items on the screens and they'd highlight.

I don't want to start clicking randomly on objects. I want to see them or be clued in on their whereabouts.

Rant over, the game is still full of charm and most of the puzzles are awesome.

[blueshift]

I love point and click games. I don't like the ones where you have to 'pixel hunt' so much though, I think that is cheating on the game developer's behalf

[Stomski]

Yeah, got ScummVM running on my Android phone.

[Stomski]

Completed Machinarium. What a lovely game.

But more annoyances in the form of not knowing what's just background and what actually allows you to use it. I don't think in this style of game you should have to resort to running your mouse over the screen until you see the cursor change. I guess it's a trade off with the art style of this particular title.

But you can't fault the game for it's charm and majority of puzzles are great.


On to the rest of my point and click collection!


Playing Flight Of The Amazon Queen on my phone

Dug out my old Adventure Soft disks. Goshdangit - My Feeble Files CDs are broken When you buy a game, do you buy the license to play it, or do you buy the physical disks themselves? Or is it a combination? If so, surely Adventure Soft should replace the disks at cost price? Unless I can get the disks from elsewhere??? ANYONE? PM me with your suggestions!

[Cullen]

Last week I found out Last Window (the sequel to Hotel Dusk by ill fated developer Cing) was getting localised and released in Europe. In fact it's in shops now and I picked it up on Monday. Only done the first chapter but it's the same Hotel Dusk magic: sharp writing and a gorgeous art style.

[Stomski]

25 years after playing the demo I finally played Lucasarts' Full Throttle.

Whilst the animation and art style is fantastic, the story is pretty basic and it doesn't really know what it wants to be, some kind of steampunk future or 80s biker gang against the man and it never really manages to blend the two successfully. The puzzles are minimal and pretty basic with only two or three per environment. The final act is especially bad, being a series of 'figure this out in the time or you've got to start again' challenges that whilst not particularly difficult, if you do fail you're subjected to a cut scene again drawing the experience out. If you're just going to reset one or two steps on a fail, why even have the time limit?

That said, it's short enough that you're not left frustrated that you sunk too much time into it and it's worth a play nonetheless. It just feels like each environment needed 4x the number of puzzles. I kept returning to locations thinking - that can't be all I have to do there... but it was.

[Stomski]

Finally playing Secret of Monkey Island for the first time. It's the remastered edition, but I play with the original graphics and UI. What does this say about me? Generally it's decent, but there have been a few puzzles so far where I've been left a little annoyed by what the solution actually was. Still, only a third of the way through.

Also, I just learnt that a Sequel to Beneath a Steel Sky just came out. Hurrah! For those who haven't played Beneath a Steel Sky - go get ScummVM and download the files - they were made Freeware in 2003 and are available from the ScummVM website.

[Pinwig]

There's also a free self-contained windows installer for Beneath a Steel Sky at gog.com. There's a big review for Beneath in Retro Gamer this month. They rated it quite highly for fans of the original.

[Slack]

Point and Clicks are my favorite of all time. I have played most of the well known ones and a fair few oddities. I loved Beneath a Steel Sky too. Other notable mentions
Monkey Island 2/3
Noctropolis
Full Throttle
Indiana Jones And The Fate Of Atlantis
Gabriel Knight 1/2
Broken Sword

Hell there are so many