syntheticgerbil

You know what guys!? Sam and Max are both dead and are never coming back in any shape or form whatsoever, so deal with it and stop bellyaching. Fuck you.

I just beat Meteos to completion on the DS with all of the unlockable crap unlocked (I know I'm late), and now I'm trying to unlock everything on the mobile phone version of Meteos that I am playing on a J2ME emulator. Problem is, this version of Meteos plays way different than the DS one and I'm not sure I understand how to increase my score in order to get all gold medals through every stage. Unlike the original game it seems like the best way I've figured out that will yield a higher score it to constantly do 3 vertical blocks over and over without anything on top. It doesn't help to launch a ton of Meteos at once at all. I've looked online for instructions or some kind of guide to maximizing my score in this game, but I'm afraid no one plays mobile phone games. I mean it's probably better no one plays mobile phone games because they usually really suck or have lots of naked women. The Meteos one is a lot better than some of the others I've seen so far, so maybe there's a chance someone else here has it and can help me?

No, it's cool, I knew what you were saying, you just brought up a funny memory for me.

Hey that's what my dad would call him when grumbling for me to get off his computer.

I've always loved the Looney Tunes gag where the character shoots the guy who won't stop shuffling around in the audience.

Unlock nude mode.

Yes that too, although I guss Psychonauts wasn't that memorable to me. I'm having a hard time thinking of all the things I did in that game and whether they felt more adventure like than platform like. I remember getting nauseous a lot playing Psychonauts which usually doesn't happen to me. It could have just been a personal thing, so I'm sorry if my memory is hazy. I distinctly remember more than anything how I felt really sick trying to get all of the figments in the rollerball level and had to stop and continue the next day. I also remember feeling gross because of all of the twistiness of the Milkman level. I was playing it on a really small TV in the dark a lot, which probably didn't help things.

Ah I completely forgot about that one. That one is a major departure in style as well, one of which I also don't prefer.

How would you even turn Brutal Legend into a Guitar Hero game without completely changing what the game is about? I mean I'm sure that's why that ill thought out effort failed, but it's funny someone even had the idea that they could in the first place.

I kind of don't like how long the Full Throttle credits are but they certainly give you the feeling of an actual movie. The credits are there to heighten the emotion as Ben rides off alone without Mauren and the credits come up and let you know it's over, so you are forced to reflect on the ending and the rest of the game as the credits roll, since they are not just tacked on the end in a separate screen like most games. The bunnies are great too, as well as all the haikus and cats, even though that stuff only lengthened the credits.

Thank you, I completely forgot about Ico which is also in the same vein. I know Beyond Good and Evil is in many ways a Zelda clone, but it feels much closer to adventure than any Zelda game, even though Wind Waker was definitely further in that step. I guess there's too many of the systematic things that Chris talked about a few podcasts ago as representing an RPG for me to completely feel like I'm playing an adventure game when I play Zelda. I have not played Okami, but it is on my list for one day in the future. I assume it's closer to Beyond Good and Evil than a 3D Zelda? I've played a few parts of Resident Evil 2 and 4 (and others over the years), but I've never sat down and finished them. RE2 especially felt very systematic with the constant searching for keys and ink cartridges for your typewriters in order to get to the next part. I think the strung out stuff really makes the games more suited to their genre name as survival horror even though there are adventure game elements incorporated. I guess I think of the DS games you named as mostly just regular adventures, although tied more to a linear interactive story the way some Japanese adventures have been like Snatcher, but I'm clueless on what they are doing different or new as I have not played any you listed. When I free up some of my backlog games, I'm definitely planning to check out the plethora of DS adventures. Definitely though, with everything you listed, to me it seems to go with my feeling that it is much more viable for the third person character oriented adventure to evolve than the likes of Myst, Riven, Lighthouse, and Amerzone. I really liked a few podcasts ago when Chris was talking about how every genre since the mid-90s has seemed to have merged traditional adventure aspects into their story. I think that has also had a lot to do with making me more open to different genres as I get older as well.

Well apparently going into 3D made every Broken Sword puzzle about pushing crates around. But more seriously, you mention puzzle games, which aren't going to change in terms of setup. Good puzzle games usually use a tried and true formula for addiction, only making their graphics better over the years. I don't necessarily have a problem with that changing and can enjoy an old puzzle game just as much as a new one. I feel in most part the same about adventures. Realistically, even though everyone made fun of them at the time, I think one of the few ways you could evolve an adventure was by turning them into "action-adventures" which is a stupid name for a genre and has worn out it's welcome anyway. I like to think of it merging the best parts of a thinking-man's action game like Another World or Prince of Persia (and later Oddworld) with the sensibilities of a game where you must talk to characters and have an inventory system. So you get games like Beyond Good and Evil, which in my head is basically an adventure game because it's very action light and the stealth sequences are very puzzle oriented. It would have been nice if the game used more inventory interaction and relied on conversing with characters more, but it was pretty experimental. I'm really having a hard time of thinking of another game that balances the adventure aspects and is new like Beyond Good and Evil. Maybe someone else can name some? The other half of adventure games that aren't 3rd person point and click where it's just 1st person doing puzzles only, or Myst-clones as some would say, are just never going to evolve. A part of me thinks that Full Throttle being lumped into the same genre as Riven has hurt the genre over the years, Gabriel Knight 3 puzzles aside. It's not necessarily a bad thing, but sometimes I'd rather call these "puzzle games" except when I think of puzzle games I think of Wario's Woods. I think a lot of new adventurers get excited about one or the other and get confused when recommended games from both classes of adventure. I see a lot of people try to distinguish what they are saying on forums by asking people to recommend "cartoon adventure games" but that's sort of selling the 3rd person aspect short.

QYmrRyFsZN8 Sam and Max Hit the Road, because I get to shoot stuff!

Well I still don't see it as the same. Loom was rewritten, yes, but I personally enjoy the voice acting and the story remained unchanged. I prefer the FM-Towns version because you get more of the same beautiful artwork done in the same vein as before. Some people prefer the 16 color version, but I see less difference between 256 color VGA Loom and 16 color EGA Loom that SMI 256 colors and SMI 16 color, especially in terms of character closeups. I definitely don't see the same amount of difference between the NES and PC version of Maniac Mansion though. Both games had very rudimentary graphics and the NES game, while uglier in many instances, was a port to a lesser system, which makes it more understandable. To put it very plainly, the difference between the CD-ROM version of Monkey Island and the Special Edition is more like the DOS version of Prince of Persia versus the Sega CD version: This is okay above, the graphics are changed, but are certainly not jarring. Many would consider the SNES version the best version of the game, which is very actually very close to the Sega CD look during gameplay. None of that is very jarring. Those are all very much the normal differences you would see in various versions of games from the late 80s and early 90s. This kind of stylistic change however, is not okay: To me, that's more of what's going on in the Monkey Island Special Edition.

I've been hearing this a lot lately for whatever reason, but you have to admit there is much less discrepancy going on from the EGA version to the 256 color version than the 256 color version to the Special Edition. The Special Edition has many more drastic stylistic changes between the last version 20 years ago, and you did not mention all of the graphic mistakes as well. And before it is said, yes I understand in the 256 color versions of every LucasArts adventure with a 16 color counterpart, the EGA sprites are incorrectly used every once and a while, but I don't find that as equal or jarring as cut out trash on the screen or unhidden big pixel layers. Maybe that's a difference of opinion and you may not even bring it up, but I just don't feel it's the same. What I feel you're describing is more like when someone picks whether they prefer to play the FM-Towns, 16 color, or CD version of Loom or maybe whether they want to play Maniac Mansion enhanced on PC or NES. To me the best special edition would just have Spiffy's portrait put back in as I don't know why that was not done long ago. I would not mind music and voices as well though.

Geez! Two weeks for all of that misfortune! I sure hope everyone will turn out a winner! I hope your back feels better soon so you can play more games. video games.

What is that? Literally? Like a real blowjob? Like a real explosion in my house? Like a tornado is coming soon? What is going on here?

Is this a poem about marijuana?

GASP!

Since I was the only person you quoted in your long post, I guess this warrants a reply. I'm sure I'm up for, "you can't talk about those games because you didn't play them" but everything you listed looks incredibly boring and I have no plans to play them ever. Maybe developers should be working harder to make interesting adventures that will attract older adventures players who've already, "been there, done that." Part of it is though, I think they are doing just fine with the niche of budget players, so why would they want to change? And second all Runaways are crap. They are ugly, poorly written (I know it's a translation!), poorly designed, and have idiotic generic characters. You also play as a "bro" in the second Runaway with a soul patch. Why would I want to do that unless I'm playing a game where he swallows razor blades and does not solve any puzzles? I've played the first Runaway... never again. Especially since you changed my quote to only say 3 was bad. Of course it doesn't help that most of the adventure games you listed and are released nowadays just end up in the $5-10 jewelcase bin at Office Depot a year or two later, which I'm sure is a testament to their quality as newer releases. Oops, too late. Nice first post. I can also agree with this because while most of the adventure games I love are all old, I can also name a bunch of terrible old ones I have played through or given up on before the predominant current dark, stale adventure game style that was started by The Longest Journey and Syberia. I'm sure I'll play more adventure games again when the inevitable style shift comes one day. But egads, I don't want to see the game Down in the Dumps ever again!

Nappi, you almost took the cake for internet embarassment.

Nachimir, you sure have also taken the cake for internet embarassment.

Did he flatten it by crushing the screen with his bare hands?

Oh, I hope so! I'd be charmed! Also on bosses, when you get to the last boss of Majora's Mask with all of the masks, you don't even have to try. It's a completely backwards scenario that I don't think I've seen anywhere else.

Toblix, you sure have taken the cake for internet embarassment.