Game 54: Space Quest IV - Back to the Sequel

By Joe Pranevich

Roger Wilco’s Janitorial Log #4 - I have finally escaped the shopping mall! Vohaul’s Sequel Police eventually caught up with me there, but I gave them the slip and nicked one of their time pods to travel back to Space Quest I. There I managed to avoid a biker gang, but not do all that much else. Now I’m on my way back to Space Quest XII to see if there is anything new I can do there. I might be stuck.

This place looks familiar...

At the conclusion of our last post, Roger had just completed a full circuit of the Galaxy Galleria mall, solving a number of puzzles along the way. We had managed to get new pants, get and lose a job at Monolith Burger, and even pick up half-a set of time coordinates hidden in a copy of the Space Quest IV Hintbook. The biggest loose end in the mall (that I know of) is the ATM card as I received a hint that I did not look enough like a woman to use it. With luck, that will make what to do next clear as I am running out of ideas.

Game 55: Leisure Suit Larry 1 (VGA) - A Lubber for Love

Written by Alex

Having to do that dumb quiz every time you load up this game gets to be kind of annoying. There’s got to be a way to skip it.

Anyway, back to Lost Wages, where we left Larry standing in a hallway in Lefty’s bar near a drunk and a door.

What happens when you use the “smell” icon on the guy.

Game 54: Space Quest IV - Outlet Shopping on the Edge of Forever

By Joe Pranevich

Roger Wilco’s Janitorial Log #3 - Shopping! Seriously, guys? The Latex Babes have left me in the Galaxy Galleria mall, one of the foremost shopping establishments of the near future, without even a decent pair of pants. Well, I managed to buy myself some pants, make a few bucks, and even buy a Space Quest IV hintbook, but I have not yet found a way to escape my mercantile prison. As Jean-Paul Sartre once said, “Hell is other people shopping.” Something like that, anyway.

The walls in the mall are totally, totally tall. Also round

Where we last left our janitorial hero, Roger had just managed to escape from torture at the hands of the Latex Babes of Estros, one of whom is his future ex-girlfriend, and then rescued them from a giant sea slug. Roger’s reward for this heroism was not make-up sex, but rather a one-way trip with the ladies to do a bit of shopping. Awesome! But before we can continue with our events in Space Quest X, we have a brief look at what’s been going on back in Space Quest XII:

What's Your Story - Alex

Alex is currently blogging through Leisure Suit Larry for us and is about to become even more prolific with game playthroughs in the near future, with Leisure Suit Larry V and Police Quest III also coming soon.

My home country is… The United States of America. I am a born-and-bred New Englander currently living about 60 miles outside of Boston.

RetroSmack is Upon You!

I’m sure you came here today expecting to read about Space Quest IV. Well I’m afraid that’s not going to happen now. I’m reclaiming this blog for my own selfish purposes, and there really isn’t anything you, or the Two Guys from Andromeda, can do about it. As much as I’d love to spend the next few paragraphs taunting you for your inability to stop me, I sadly must focus on relaying an important message before that pesky Roger Wilco returns. That bumbling idiot has a habit of unwittingly ruining my plans for blog domination. He won’t succeed this time.

Hear my words Adventure Gamers: RETROSMACK IS UPON YOU!

This unsuspecting planet is about to feel the full force of RetroSmack, and I invite all of you to visit my domain to witness your approaching doom before the rest of humanity. It pleases me much to know that your suffering will be extended, knowingly awaiting the oncoming storm while others live in ignorance around you. As a token of my gratitude for our former allegiance, I have decided to offer you a single chance for glory. You have three days to visit www.retrosmackblog.com and join my cause. Do this, and I shall reward you with riches beyond your wildest imagination. I will allow you to trade your worthless CAPs for glorious Smacks, and you will be trained in the ways of RetroSmack so as to prepare for the upcoming Retrocalypse. Three days I give you. The clock is ticking.

The Trickster

Game 55: Leisure Suit Larry 1 (VGA) – Getting Hammered in Lost Wages

Written by Alex

Where we left Larry

And Larry is back! After our pop quiz, Larry is ready to get to it. The conceit of this game is simple: Larry is a 38 year old bachelor who lives with his mother and is terrified of the opposite sex. One day, he decided he’d had enough with his pathetic existence, put on a leisure suit, and made his way to the city of Lost Wages to get laid. Did I mention that Larry is a virgin?

So yeah, it’s a stupid plot. It’s also based on an old text adventure game called Softporn Adventure, which I believe someone will get to on this site in the near future (Admin's note: Done!). Anyway, let’s help Larry get some!

Missed Classic 9: Softporn (1981)

By Ilmari

Since Alex is about get his hands on the remake of Larry, I thought we might take a look at the game which it is based on. But didn’t Trickster already review original Larry way back then? Indeed, but before there was Larry, there was Softporn. Yes, we are getting back to the very source of smut, that has now, in form of Larry I, been remade three times - that’s gotta be some sort of record!

Softporn is a bit of weird one among the early Sierra adventure games, as it is the only real non-graphical text-adventure Sierra ever published. The game itself was made by Chuck Benton, a field engineer from Boston. It had begun as a programming exercise, but Benton had then got the idea of making some money with the game. This proved to be rather difficult, until Ken Williams, who happened to have purchased a copy from Benton in Applefest 1981, called and asked if On-Line Systems (the predecessor of Sierra) could publish the game. (For a more detailed story, look at the Digital Antiquarian).

Sierra didn’t really change Benton’s game in any way, although there was a talk of a graphical upgrade even back at the day. What they did was design a new game box, with a famous picture showing Roberta Williams with two other lovely ladies in a jacuzzi.

Kenny, I know what you are thinking, stop that immediately!

Game 53: Hugo II, Whodunit? - Final Rating

By Deimar

So before starting with the rating I have to state that I went back and finished the game “the right way” using Joe Pranevich’s ROT13’ed clue. To be honest, half of me wanted the game to be something else. I see some potential with the set up. The mystery might have not been great, but looking at clues like the will in the safe or the health insurance letter it could have been so much better with a little effort... But no. The “right ending” is just lazy. You can say “nobody” when Higgins ask you “whodunit” and then Harry congratulates you instead of laughing at you. I’m ecstatic. Let me show you how much by rating the game.

If you never thought I could guess it is probably because it is impossible to guess at this point without “failing” once...

Game 54: Space Quest IV - The Time Traveler’s Ex-Girlfriend

By Joe Pranevich

Roger Wilco’s Janitorial Log #2 - After escaping from the destroyed city, I managed to snag myself one of Sludge Vohaul’s time pods. With a bit of luck, I found myself in Space Quest XII, a strange aquatic world filled with dinosaurs, sea slugs, and very attractive women. Me-from-the-future used to date one of them (go me!), but I seem to be stuck in the friend zone now. I saved her life and now she wants to go shopping? Perhaps my leaving makes sense after all...

Roger admires the view while we have a little chat...

A Change in Plans: SQ4 Bugs

In my last post on Space Quest IV, I died a lot. More than a lot, actually. It was pretty much wall-to-wall death there for a while and that wasn’t very fun for me and also probably not all that much fun to read. Several posters commented on that as being part of a “timer” issue with the specific version of SQ4 that I am playing, the GOG.com version which is based on the CD-ROM version from 1992. There was some debate whether this problem was real or just because of faster computers, so I decided to get to the bottom of the situation through experimentation.

Searching the seedier corners of the internet, I located a download of the original floppy version of Space Quest IV and spent a few minutes playing it up to the beginning of my wall-to-wall deaths, to the point where I emerged from the manhole to try to sneak into the policemen’s aircraft.

Memories... I saw this screen a lot last post.

Game 55: Leisure Suit Larry 1: Leisure Suit Larry in the Land of the Lounge Lizards (VGA Remake, 1991) - Introduction

Written by Alex

Hello everyone! This is Alex, a long-time lurker, sometime commenter, and now full-fledged reviewer at the Adventure Gamer. I am very excited to be helping in keeping this great blog running, as Trickster has provided me with hours of entertaining, and informative, reading. I have volunteered to take on a handful of Sierra games, being that Sierra games are mostly what I played growing up. And since nostalgia is such a powerful thing, I’m looking forward to sharing my trip down memory (or was that “mammary”?) lane with all of you, starting with Sierra’s 1991 remake of Leisure Suit Larry 1.

Game 53: Hugo II - Won(?)

By Deimar

Penelope Journal Entry #21: Dear diary: I still don’t know where Hugo is nor Horace’s murderer nor what I’m doing walking this endless garden. Getting past the killer bees was dangerous enough but now I have had to fight a snake and a dalek. Satisfy the needs of a dog and a genie and play a game of “whodunnit”. And I have no clue of why anything is happening. If only I could know what Hugo has been doing by merely thinking about him…

Last time we have just past the bees just because it was the only place we could go. Which seems to be the motivation for all the actions Penelope does in the game. In any case, in the new screen we see an old face. The guy in the boat from Hugo’s House of Horrors. Yeah, the one who tends to ask about the name of the dog of a semi-famous TV star from the 60’s. THAT guy. And he starts to question Penelope. Again. I hope he dies a painful de… oh. Ok. Apparently David Gray also got wind of the hate this character produced and just made Penelope hit him with his own wand in what is a genuine funny moment. My faith in humanity is restored. However, the rest of the screen is completely devoid of any interaction and you have nothing to do but to choose one of the two exits that doesn’t involve killer bees.

Admit it. All of you not so secretly wanted to do this.

Game 54: Space Quest IV - Roger Wilco’s Bogus Journey

By Joe Pranevich

Roger Wilco’s Janitorial Log #1 - Time: the final frontier. These are the thoughts that were running through my head as I jumped through a “rip” in time to flee some murderous-looking robots. Who was that handsome young lad that pushed me into the rip? I have no idea, but some day I will have to thank him. I landed back home, Xenon, but not the Xenon I remember. This one has been destroyed by an evil AI hidden inside a copy of Leisure Suit Larry. Judging by the subtitle, this must be the work of my arch nemesis, Sludge Vohaul. With a bit of can-do Wilco attitude, I snuck into a patrol ship and nicked my very own time pod. Time to begin my long voyage home.

Reminds me of a certain cantina I could name.

We begin our story right where Space Quest III left off, albeit with better music and a more expansive color pallet. Roger dropped the Two Guys from Andromeda off on Earth to design adventure games for Sierra On-Line and now he’s returning to Xenon. Of course, there’s no hurry right? He has plenty of time to stop off at a neighborhood space-bar and throw back a few. What Roger doesn’t realize is that we’ve now started Space Quest IV and a group of unknown villains are tracking his whereabouts. They have found him at his dive bar and are ordered by their mysterious boss to go after Wilco

Is that space-Gandalf in the corner?

Twenty Questions to Two Guys from Andromeda

By Ilmari

The first game where I realized games had developers was Space Quest 3. At one point of the game Roger Wilco found his way into a lair of evil pirates, who had imprisoned two aliens with prominent pig snouts. My 8-year old self wasn't really sure who these aliens were, until Roger finally drove them to Earth and left them to work in Sierra. Wasn't Sierra the company that had published Space Quests? And they had two pig-nosed aliens working with them? And were these aliens actually behind this game? The name Two Guys From Andromeda was then forcefully imprinted to my mind, especially as Space Quests were my favourite games at the time.

This picture spells nostalgia for me

Game 53: Hugo II - Murder, she wrote

By Deimar

Penelope Journal Entry #1 "Dear diary: After being taken in that horrible house Hugo has brought me to his uncle’s house in England to forget everything of my traumatic experience. However, the minute I fell asleep he disappeared and then his uncle was murdered right in front of me. Ever more, I was locked in my room!! It’s happening all over again!!. But there is no way I’m going to stay put one more time. This time I’m gonna take matter into my own hands and beat the crap out of that murderer. My psychologist says that I have issues. Pff… I’ll show him who has issues when I mop the floor with this puny assassin.

Oh, look, flowers, bees, a river, parrots… What a wonderful place!! Wait. Wasn’t I supposed to do something? "

Alas, poor Horace. Killed in his own house with the only witness being a woman trapped in her room. Not that I knew that at that moment, because I took the hint from the game to look for Hugo and went directly to the yellow book in the bookcase after waking up.

Our intrepid main character!

Missed Classic 8: Mission: Asteroid (1980)

Written by: Joe Pranevich

The Space Quest series was not Sierra’s first foray into science-fiction, nor was Space Quest IV the company’s first real look at time travel. No, both of those firsts have to be credited to Roberta Williams in the Hi-Res Adventure series. While I am still too far away from being able to explore Time Zone (1982), the sixth game in the series, I am right on time to look at Mission: Asteroid, the third… sort-of. This may require some explanation.