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GeekNights Tuesday - Adventure Games
Tonight on GeekNights, we talk about the faded, then revitalized "genre" of point-and-click (or "type in a command") adventure games! From King's Quest to Quest for Glory, Space Quest to Full Throttle, Grim Fandango to Police Quest, nevermind Maniac Mansion or Day of the Tentacle, we recall what these games were to us as kids, and what they are to us now, all of this in light of a recent little game called Kentucky Route Zero.
Also, Scott's Hexbright Kickstarter flashlight finally arrived (with disastrous consequences), Rym's office has a meme infection, Dungeon Village is perfect if you like dungeons and need something cute to poke, and augmented reality may well bring trouble to tabletop board games.
We've uploaded the third and final video of our recent MAGFest appearances - Video Game Ethics - and we're ready to rock two PAX East lectures. Download MP3Source Link
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My first real video game experiences were with the Sega Master System, around age 4 or 5. I have a very distinct memory of when we convinced my dad to get King's Quest. He wound up getting sucked into it and busting out graph paper to map the whole damn game and take notes. That completely blew my mind as I wasn't thinking on that level previously.
Later when I was 7 we got a PC and I picked out one of my first shareware titles...
...Hugo's House of Horrors. Never did wind up beating that thing. I then moved on to some Space Quest games and played Leisure Suit Larry way younger than I was supposed to (parents wonder why are the kids asking trivia about the Nixon administration? We actually referred to encyclopedias as well in cracking the age gate trivia.).
After those early years I was pretty much done with adventure games. I fucked around with Myst a bit in the mid-90s, and played a flash room game or two. Never touched any of the Lucasarts or Telltale games stuff, and probably won't.
I was introduced to the genre when I got my first computer, a Sinclair ZX Spectrum, an already obsolete machine even then... The Dizzy games were the best ones of their kind. You played as Dizzy, an egg with hands and feet. He always wore boxing gloves too. (Good job he didn't have to type with boxing gloves on!) Primarily the game was about taking object A to place B and hoping it'd somehow solve the puzzle. There was a test of memory and experimentation from getting from place to place because as an egg he used to roll along the ground when he jumped or fell and that could lose you the game if he fell in a lake or something.
Several years later we got a Windows 95 computer and got KQ7 for it. I thought that 1 to 6 would be the same sort of disneyfied joy but despite finding that not to be the case I played through them all.
The hardest game was Discworld. It was basically "what if Rincewind (played by Eric Idle) was the main character of Guards Guards" and it was good but relied on puzzles being solved by stupid puns and crazy moon logic. Not long after that I had access to the internet at school so I could look up the real stumpers and the genre pretty much fell into decline. I remember Rincewind telling me "it'll be sad when they stop making these games".
I also played the Quest for Glory series and Sam and Max, but that was about it. Oh, and the more recent Back to the Future ones.
One thing about these kinds of adventure games that I liked so much was that they allowed for collaboration and group entertainment. Family, friends. That was the main reason to play. The only one I played solo was Quest for Glory.
EDIT: I originally thought Mumford and Sons, then asked a coworker and he reminded me of Phillip Phillips, who is an American Idol winner I think.
This is the song though
Edit: And there it is. It's not THAT catchy though. Is it? I'll start whistling it around my office to see if it makes the rounds...
I recognised it as soon as Rym hummed that melody, but who knows who started that meme and why.
- A competitive test of one or more skills: Two men competing in an interview to get a job.
- A series of meaninful decisions: Shopping.
- Consensual interactive amusement: Sex.
Also Candyland.
I had an old game for my first computer where you'd put grass, rabbits and foxes in squares in a field. You'd press go and the computer would show a simulation and tell you how long it took before the animals all died. I always thought that there was a way of winning by getting it stable but I never managed it.
As an AI the foxes chased the rabbits, the rabbits chased the grass and the grass just spawned more grass. Of course the rabbits and foxes also spawned every so often. The point is that within the game I was playing the individual units were also playing a game.
But real rabbits competing for grass and avoiding foxes wouldn't consider that to be a game in the same way we wouldn't casually say that the competing interviewees are playing a game.
"Is this a game to you?"; turns out one of the interviewees is independently wealthy and wants the job just to prove something to himself. Is he playing a game? He's not really playing a different game as he's still competing on the same field. But losing is still something that means something to him even if it doesn't impact him in the same way as the other guy.
I think that the definition of a game is fine. But calling it play when we game is a state of mind.
In fact, that divide is why we run into so much ridiculous umbrage with people at conventions who take issue with our use of stricter definitions of "game."
I think anything that involves choice and has multiple outcomes can be considered a game.
If there's a choice of 2 actions and either choice leads to the exact same outcome, then there's no game.
Since no matter what you make choice there is no effect. You can't play with what you can't interact with. Interaction meaning, you do something, and something else happens because of what you do.
Also, to be a player in the game, you have to be aware of the choices, otherwise you're just a pawn in a meta game.
The 3 definitions are just expansions of the definition I just gave. Since they simply require different components of interaction.
"Test of skill of one or more skills..." requires testing apparatus, and other consenting players. Interaction between apparatus and players, outcomes win/ lose. This definition is based on action/ execution
"A series of meaningful decisions..." requires choice paths. So a game with infinite outcomes, not mass effect 3's 3 endings. How meaningful your decisions are can only be gauged by the variations in the outcomes. The more variations there are, the more meaningful your decision. This definition is PURE game.
"Consensual interactive..." Interacting with anything that can give a random outcome, where the choice is simply do/ don't.
eg. look out the window, or do not look out the window. *looks out the window* omg, there's a rainbow. The interaction is binary, but the outcomes a varied enough for you to keep interacting, if not only subconsciously/ instinctively.
Garfield pointedly states that zero-player games are still games, and uses Conway's Game of Life as an example.
Two MAGFests ago, at a panel we didn't video, dude in the audience got SUPER mad that Scott said Final Fantasy 7 isn't, "by some definitions," a game. He flipped his shit.
The problem is everyone has their own utility. Everyone wants something diffferent. Everyone is subject to their own meta. To have a meaningful discussion, the two parties must be aware that they share the same utility. Otherwise the information from that discussion would mean two seperate things.
State your utility, then discuss.
I want to have a game that has infinite ammo, no reload, no recoil and auto aim. All games that don't have this suck.
Who can I talk to? no one....
I want a game that tests my ability to aim and reaction speed. All games that don't do this suck.
Who can I talk to? clay shooters, counter strike players...