The Year That Was… 1991

By The TAG Team

1991... the year of quality entertainment and quality games!

After a more quiet year, Sierra came back with a vengeance. Space Quest, Police Quest, Leisure Suit Larry and Conquest -series all got new sequels, Space Quest 1 and Larry 1 were remade with better graphics, and completely new games, like Castle of Dr. Brain and EcoQuest were published. If you also count the games Dynamix made (Heart of China and Willy Beamish), the total rises to ten games, which is almost half of the adventure games that made it to our official gaming list. Of course, not all of these games were flawless, but even at their worst (Larry 5 and Police Quest 3) Sierra games had their moments and at their best (Space Quest 4 and Conquests of Longbow) they were unforgettable classics. Compared to Sierra, Lucasfilm again published only one game (Lechuck’s Revenge), but as could be expected, it was almost pure gold.
Sierra and Lucasfilm were getting more and more competition, but many of these attempts had great flaws and deserve to be forgotten (Les Manley 2 and Free D.C.! being good examples). The major exceptions were already established game developers: Access Software with Martian Memorandum, ICOM Simulations with Consulting Detective and Legend Entertainment with Timequest and Spellcasting 201. Interestingly, these three companies had somewhat different agendas. Access Software and ICOM Simulations pointed out the way for the future with the use of real actors and digitized speech, while Legend Entertainment was invigorating a thing of the past by doing text games in an era, when almost everyone else was doing pure point and click (another exception to this trend is Hugo II, but as a shareware game it doesn’t really count).

Another interesting trend was the rise of detective games.There were three pure detective adventures (Maupiti Island, Cruise for Corpse and Sherlock Holmes: The Consulting Detective), and if you count in also one hardboiled adventure (Martian Memorandum), one police adventure (Police Quest 3) and one shareware game with murder mystery elements (Hugo II), you get a total of six games dealing with criminal investigation.

Since it’s the end of the year, we will pick some examples of games we've played for special awards. But first, let's cash out the prizes for the Full House Awards.

Full House

No one figured out the exact order of Top 5 games of 1991, so half the prize (5 CAPs) will go to both Joe Pranevich and Corey Cole, who were clever enough to have the closest guess.

Similarly, no one knew the exact order of Bottom 5 games of 1991, but Ilmari, Reiko and Laukku were close enough to get half the prize (5 CAPs).

Finally, no one managed to guess the exact order of all the games of 1991, but the closest guess for Full House came from Ilmari. And since it wouldn't be fun to have admin get all the CAPs, half the prize of Full House award (21 CAPs) will also be awarded to the second best guesser, that is, Reiko.

In addition to CAPs, we have a selection of Zojoi games to hand over as rewards - three Steam keys for Macventures Retro Bundle containing  the classic versions of Deja Vu, Deja Vu II, Shadowgate, and The Uninvited, four keys for the 2014 remake of Shadowgate and three keys for the first Consulting Detective. The winners of Top 5, Bottom 5 or Full House, please indicate one of these keys as your prize in the comments.

Now, it’s again time to award the games with the best and the worst qualities. Majority of the awards have been decided by our group of reviewers, but readers have also had a chance of voting for their favourite. Let’s begin with that…

Reader's Choices

The readers have had their say about the best game of 1991. The result could not have been more expected - the winner was Lechuck's Revenge with 96 votes (64 % of the total).

I am sure no one is surprised

The best Missed Classic so far according to our readers is Cinemaware’s It Came From the Desert, an appreciation of all the B-class monster movies.

"On behalf of the Cinemaware Fan Club, I heartily accept this award."

Let's move on to the awards chosen by our regular reviewers!

Charles Darwin Award 

For the Most Evolutionary Game of 1991

Instead of  revealing the winner at first, like Trickster did, we'll begin  each category with successful candidates and end with the final winner.

5th place - Martian Memorandum: While other companies were happy to earn money with hint lines and guide books, Access Software was bold enough to introduce an in-game hint system. Martian Memorandum was also one of the first games to use full motion video.

4th place - LeChuck’s Revenge: The second Monkey Island had beautiful graphics and a good dialogue system, but these can hardly be called novelties since VGA graphics and branching dialogues had been used by earlier games. Truly radical in LeChuck’s Revenge was its innovative use of background music with the new iMuse system, which allowed seamless transition from one piece of music to another.

3rd place - Space Quest 4: Technically the voice narrated version of SQ4 didn’t appear until 1992, but it is still the best of its kind. We will especially remember the talent of recently deceased Gary Owens.

2nd place - Dr. Brain: While not really a traditional adventure game, Castle of Dr. Brain was an early example of a completely different genre, namely, that of pure puzzle adventure games. This would be almost a cause for awarding the game, if we wouldn't have played an even more evolutionary game.

Winner - Consulting Detective: And the title of the most evolutionary game goes to a computerised version of a board game that we had difficulties deciding what to call it - was it an adventure game or something else? In addition to defying genres, Consulting Detective  was also technically innovative. The move to a solid FMV interface presages a lot of the games that will come in the 90s, as integrating video clips in games will become vogue for a while.

"Remember guys, we are doing history right now!"

Lament Configuration Award 

For the Most Ridiculous Puzzle of 1991

6th place - Killing the Dalek (Hugo 2): In a section completely unrelated to the rest of the game, you use a phone box to end up in an alien planet, shoot a Dalek and receive a sonic screwdriver from the Doctor. Talk about copyright infringement!

5th and 4th places (tied):

Saving Marie’s life (Police Quest 3): Every puzzle in the game was a meticulously designed paragon of logic triumphing over a chaotic and seemingly random world. In Police Quest III, the designers made a game that was almost TOO REAL in depicting how police detectives investigate and solve crimes. To qualify something like Police Quest III as a "game" is in and of itself slightly offensive, as Police Quest III is more of a reality simulator masquerading as computer-based entertainment. Still, it’s good that Jim Walls became a police officer and not a doctor. Not kissing Marie on the first day apparently condemns her to life in an incurable vegetative state.

Solving the mystery of the unfaithful wife (Timequest): The most ridiculous puzzle in the game was the one where the colors of the harem women matched the colors of the vizier's outfit, and somehow the player has to intuit that the woman matching his gloves is the guilty one. This puzzle can be bypassed by luck or brute force anyway (there are only six women in the harem), so its inclusion in the game was somewhat pointless.

3rd and 2nd places (tied):

Getting rid of a vampire (Elvira 2): Killing the pure-breed vampire makes no sense. You have to use a tuning fork to break a window to let sunlight in and kill the vampire. The only problem is that it is a moonless night, and there is no other way to kill the vampire.

Getting into a pawn shop (Les Manley 2): Wax casing for acidic Alien? Learning of a criminal plot, accusing someone of it and then being allowed into their movie studio? No, no. The most ridiculous puzzle in the game is definitely the first one. You need to impress 'The Boyz', a wannabe rap group out the front of a pawn shop. To do so, you speak to a computer hacker reminiscent of Jonny Lee Miller's character in 'Hackers' (given that he's apparently not allowed near a phone) who says that you 'need (gang) colors' to scare them off. You go to the beach, read a magazine headline to cause a solar eclipse and steal a lifeguard's bandana. No, this will not happen anyway, and it will literally not allow you to continue until you have stolen the bandana. Ridiculous, you say? You haven't seen the best.

Winner - Finding a firefly (Spellcasting 201): The entire sewer section was somewhat difficult in Spellcasting 201, never quite explaining itself well enough. The fact that there are 'locator goggles' that disappeared every time you went down there was bad enough, and the 'active nodes' to make the maze in it more difficult for no real reason other than copy protection? Bad enough. However, you need a light. Instead of giving you Magic Light or a torch, you have to go to the cafeteria, which the last game had set as a completely useless area with nothing going on in it, take a freely offered casserole during lunch hours (which the game all but tells you is useless), LOOK at it.. and then a firefly larva pops out of it. No clues offered. No 'there's a firefly in my soup!' gag. No 'firefly casserole and buffalo wings on menu'. Just 'why wouldn't they examine an object we tell them is a red herring?' AAAAARGH!

As a reward for their efforts, the good people in Legend will get a piece of their infamous casserole

Death of Han Solo Award

For the Most Memorable Moment of 1991

3rd place - Saved by a frog! (Willy Beamish): Most memorable moment is when you are "killed" (for the nth time) by Leona and Louis at her mansion. Just as the death animation plays and Willy is drowning in their oversized aquarium, Turbofrog swims down and rescues you (with Horny and Gigi in tow, depending on how you solved earlier puzzles). That immediately followed Gordon's surprising reveal to the press of the grand plot, underlining that the story and character threads were coming together in the end of the game.

2nd place - Intimate moment (Conquests of Longbow): Getting it on with Marian in the grove was handled in a very romantic manner--great dialogue. The game was filled with other memorable moments: Robin "blessing" the Sheriff, the entire Saturday Fair scene/archery contest, rescuing the knight from the fens monastery and escaping down the tower, freeing Fulk, and rescuing the boys. Hell, this whole game is a memorable moment. But not as memorable as the next one.

Winner - Back to square 1 (Space Quest 4): Wow, we are back in SQ1! Although the Kerona setting itself felt so empty, no true fan of the Space Quest series will fail to love this moment. And to top it all, it's drawn in a style reminiscent of the old EGA graphics.

Still, you can't beat monochrome!

Needle's Eye Award 

For the Most Unsolvable Puzzle of 1991

3rd place - Finding new things (Cruise for Corpse): The searching puzzles were awful. You could easily brute force them, but with dozens of items to interact with in every room (every towel in a closet had an individual description), it takes hours to search every cranny of every room. It's a way to pad out the time, but it adds nothing since there is no rhyme or reason for the objects to appear when they mysteriously did. Even the admission at the end that Niklos/Dimitry was pulling our leg and leaving clues on purpose doesn't paper over it.

2nd place - Opening a jewel box (Maupiti Island): a) Find peculiar symbols in a pirate cave. b) Notice that these symbols are actually numbers combined with their mirror images. c) Notice that a locked jewel box has the exact same inscription as the pirate cave. d) Notice that the symbols in the cave are plotted as locations in an inverted island map, which you see almost never. e) Read a passage in a book that appears to have no connection with the cave. f) Notice that the phrases in the book might be connected with places in the island. g) Fiddle with the order of the numbers, just because. h) Instead of numbers, use their sums. i) Change into a modular arithmetics, because otherwise you won’t make any sense of the sums. j) Presto, the jewel box opens! No wonder it took ages to solve this puzzle. And yet, it was almost solvable, unlike the next puzzle.

Winner - Solving the killer (Hugo 2): Hugo’s uncle is presumed dead and the whole house is full of friends and relatives with a clear motive to get rid of him. So who did it? Apparently no one and Hugo’s uncle is alive! Too bad there’s no way to deduce the answer before you actually hear it.

Personally, I'd blame Chuck the Plant, hiding in the corner

Magic Square Award 

For the Best Puzzle of 1991

5th place - Fooling an ATM machine (Space Quest 4): The best puzzle in the game is the one involving an ATM card. Although maybe not amazing, it still involves a neat line of puzzle dependencies: you need to buy pants to get a job; you need a job to earn enough money for women’s clothing; you need women’s clothing to be able to use the ATM card. Some points must be deducted, because making fun of cross dressers is not polite.

4th place - Finding a password for Tower of Babylon (Timequest): The antagonist of the game had left to various historical locations taunting messages, all of which contained a number. Putting the first letters of these messages into an order indicated by the numbers, spelled out a password unlocking a passage to Tower of Babylon, where the endgame occurred.

3rd place - Getting an underage kid into a bar (Willy Beamish): The puzzle that truly surprised us was the one involving a cassette recorder. You have to somehow fool a doorman away from his post and the only thing you can do is to call him. It's all set up so that you have to record a show from the radio and play it back to the doorman. But it has a very nice curveball which is that you can also record other telephone conversations. You have to first phone an astrology service and then use that conversation to distract the doorman, who happens to be quite superstitious. That sort of lateral thinking was a nice change from otherwise simpler inventory puzzles.

2nd place - Programming robot heads (Dr. Brain): You might think that a game that began the puzzle genre, would have interesting and original puzzles, but many of them were ordinary math or logic puzzles. The puzzle where you had to program robot heads stood out from that crowd positively. Still, it wasn't good enough for the first prize.

Winner - Rescuing widow’s sons (Conquests of Longbow): We liked how Robin had to leave the coins on the guards' table in order for them to skedaddle and buy beer, letting Robin rescue the Widow's sons. In fact, that whole rescue sequence, involving getting the monk's clothes, getting the Abbott's beer, playing Nine Man's Morris to win the magic amethyst, befriending the barkeep to learn about the secret passage, infiltrating St. Mary's, having the drinking contest with the Abbott, stealing his puzzle box and the fire ring inside, and ultimately freeing the boys, was probably our favorite sequence of the game.

The unsuspecting guards find their TAG reward

Golden Mop Award

For the Most Memorable Character of 1991

6th place - Brian Forbes (Police Quest 3): This highly disturbed individual did not just believe in alien invasion, he also kept a knife in his underpants, for crying out loud!

5th place - Latex Babes (Space Quest 4): Latex babes change from a teenage boy’s dream into their worst nightmare. We might not remember any of their names, but that shaver will haunt our dreams forever.

4th and 3rd place (tied):

Passionate Patti (Larry 5): Larry is the same lovable schmuck we've seen three times before, but Patti is the standout character in the game. Her jaded yet patriotic persona, constant sexual references, and street-smarts make her pretty interesting. Also, she's the only character with any agency, since Larry bumbles into things while Patti actually makes stuff happen. She takes out the bad guy at the end, after all.

Adam and His Oceanic Friends (EcoQuest): Adam himself was quite memorable, as a smart and plucky environmentalist kid. But the non-human characters beg for recognition too: Gregarious the airless manatee, the ever-rhyming Oracle, Narcissus the French blowfish, Professor Erroneous the turtle...most of the characters were quirky and fun in one way or another. But Adam gets the most screen time and the most lines, so in the end, he's the most characterized and the most memorable.

2nd place - Japanese tourist ninjas (Willy Beamish): They were only in it for one puzzle, but not many games ever made have had Japanese tourist ninjas as characters. Still, they were not the most memorable characters of the year.

Winner - Merry Men (Conquests of Longbow): Just like Trickster struggled with finding a single outstanding character in Monkey Island, similar problem occurs with Conquests of Longbow. The tough thing is that each character is so well written it's hard to pick favorites. Robin himself is drawn really well! We like how, when the action begins, he is growing weary of the outlaw lifestyle and wants to settle down with a good woman. But considering that Little John, Friar Tuck, Marian, Alan and Will are all equally memorable, there’s no other possibility but to choose the whole gang.

Who could resist these guys!

Pooooisonous Snake Award 

For the Most Memorable Sidekick of 1991 

-And Not Necessarily in a Good Sense

4th place - Wattson (Free D.C.!): What could be worse than waking after thousand years sleep, when all your loved ones are dead, finding out that robots rule the world and being assigned to find a robot killer by them? Well, you could be given as a steed and as a companion a metallic My Little Pony lookalike, who has an annoyingly wheeny voice and who fails to get your superb jokes.

3rd place - Morales (Police Quest 3): This outstandingly useless companion does almost nothing else in the game but makes phone calls. Also, why the hell did she leave her locker combination written in her desk? Why not just carry that paper with her or commit those THREE NUMBERS to memory? And did we mention that Morales tries to kill Sonny Bonds at the end of the game?

2nd place - Horny (Willy Beamish): Horny is an outstanding frog whom Willy carries around with him everywhere. He manages to beat a German super athlete frog in a competition and earns Willy enough money to gain entrance to Nintari competition. Of course, Horny then has to get caught, but sidekicks do need to be rescued once in awhile. Still, he's not as memorable as a certain Merry Man.

Winner - Much the Miller’s son (Conquests of Longbow): Robin Hood has many great sidekicks: Little John, Will Scarlet, and Friar Tuck. They are Robin’s right-hand men - tough, smart, and willing to mix it up. They've got Robin's back. But since we’ve already covered the Merry Men as great characters, let’s look at a more negative sidekick - Much. We don't know if it's from the stories, but he's more there for comic relief. You quickly learn not to take any advice from this guy. Much even has the guts to suggest using wild boars for distracting guards. Boars???????? No wonder this plan ends miserably.

Rumor is, Robin Hood has considered replacing Much with an irritating owl

Severed Head Award

For the Worst Game of 1991

4th place - Cruise for Corpse: Lion’s share of the game can hardly be called an adventure game as everything seems to focus on constant re-exploring of an uninspired and repetitive setting and collecting dialogue questions. Still, it was filled with adventure game red herrings. For a game with so much weight on interrogating suspects, the dialogue system is horrible. And how come a timed murder mystery has no tension?

3rd game - Free D.C.!: An almost puzzleless game with an infuriating maze and inane use of firearms, just to make the game longer. What’s worst, a game that was advertised as being full of stories was filled with nothing else but snarky dialogue with cardboard characters. And let’s not talk about the ending.

2nd game - Les Manley 2: A game with puzzles so easy they didn’t virtually exist or so obscure you’d not even call them puzzles. Les Manley 2 is full of stereotypes that are largely written poorly and the main character has all of the intrigue of a wet noodle. The game was credited as the first with digitised actors, but majority of the models look like they did it only for the money. And still, it wasn't the worst game of the year.

Winner (or loser) - Hugo 2: A murder mystery without any murder or mystery, full of padding, random events and red herrings. To top it all, the graphics look like they are made with Paint, when there’s sound, you wish there weren’t, and the interface is horrendous.

And this bridge could make even Sierra proud.

Atlantean Medallion Award 

For the Best Game of 1991

3rd place - Space Quest 4: A well-balanced, beautiful to look at and solvable game which goes to great lengths to ensure that you can get all the way back to the beginning to find an item that you missed. Different time zones are distinctive and the idea of using sequels instead of dates is novel, but time travel related puzzles are sorely lacking.

2nd place - Conquests of Longbow: A game with a rich variety of well thought puzzles, which not only found a good balance between giving too much information and being too obtuse, but also allowed true multiple solutions. The story might not be that original, but that’s just to be expected in a Robin Hood game. The narrative has a thrust that never falters, and even revisiting areas feels fresh because of the on-going plot. Sherwood Forest and its surroundings are fantastic places to get lost in, and all the characters feel unique. All this greatness is covered with great, hand-painted graphics and catchy, evocative music. What’s more to ask? Well, there's one game it couldn't top.

Winner - Monkey Island 2: Although many of the puzzles made sense only retrospectively, the intricateness of puzzle dependencies more than makes up for this. The overall plot was full of classic Lucasarts moments, even if the ending didn’t feel quite as satisfying as it could have been. Still, it’s a great experience, it has lovely graphics with lots of details to look at, a well-worked dialogue system with many fun options to choose from, and evocative musical scores flow seamlessly thanks to iMuse.

Let's all party now!

But that's not all! We have a brand new award to give.

Archie Bunker Award

For the Worst Mistake Reviewers Have Made

3rd place - Aperama: We are the experts and we should know these things, but mistakes do happen. When speaking of later accomplishments of Dynamix, Aperama mentioned Blue Force, made by none other than infamous Jim Walls. The thing is, it wasn’t published by Dynamix, but by Tsunami, formed by former Sierra employees. After hearing this, they’ll probably send Brian Forbes after us.

2nd place - Alex: It’s a good thing that Alex hasn’t tried building a career in the world of nobility, because he clearly can’t tell a king from a duke. Unlike Alex suggested, it was the Duke of Austria who captured Richard Lionheart, not the king. Rumor is, European royalty have stopped sending official invitations to TAG reviewers because of this breach of etiquette. Yet, we've done worse.

1rst place - Ilmari: We couldn’t leave the blunder that inspired the whole award go unpunished. While trying to speak of Archie Goodwin, the famous sidekick of detective Nero Wolfe, Ilmari accidentally spelled his surname “Bunker” (yes, B and G are quite close to each other, but it’s still an incredible accident). While we are sure that Nero and Archie B. would quickly bond over pints, this crossover still waits its writer.

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Those were the TAG awards for 1991! And just like last year, you’ll have a chance to guess the TOP 5 for the next year. If you can state which 5 games will be the best games of 1992, you’ll get 10 CAPs. You won’t have to know the exact ratings the games will get, but you do have to get the exact order of the top five games. If no one pinpoints the exact order, persons with closest guesses will get 5 CAPs as a reward.

You’ll also get to guess the BOTTOM 5. The rules and the prizes are same as in the TOP 5, but you’ll have to guess the five worst games of 1992, in the exact order.

And to top it all, you’ll also have a chance to compete for the FULL HOUSE. Guess the exact order of all the games of 1992. If you get them right, you’ll get the TOP 5 and BOTTOM 5 awards, but also 2 CAPs for each game not in TOP or BOTTOM 5. This year getting FULL HOUSE will thus mean a prize of 78 CAPs. Again, if no one gets the exact order right, persons with the closest guess will receive half of the total prize (39 CAPs).

For ease of reference, here are the games we’ll be playing in 1992:

Alone in the Dark
Amazon: Guardians of Eden
Bargon Attack
Batman Returns
Curse of Enchantia
The Dagger of Amon Ra
Dark Seed
Dune
Eternam
Fascination
Frederik Pohl's Gateway
Gobliiins
Hook
Hugo III: Jungle of Doom
Inca
Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis
Inspector Gadget: Mission 1 - Global Terror!
The Island of Dr. Brain
KGB
King's Quest VI: Heir Today, Gone Tomorrow
The Koshan Conspiracy
L. A. Law Game
Leather Goddesses of Phobos! 2: Gas Pump Girls Meet the Pulsating Inconvenience from Planet X
The Legend of Kyrandia
The Lost Files of Sherlock Holmes: The Case of the Serrated Scalpel
Lure of the Temptress
Mixed Up Fairy Tales
Nippon Safes, Inc.
Police Quest: In Pursuit of the Death Angel (remake)
Putt-Putt Joins the Parade
Quest for Glory I: So You Want To Be A Hero (remake)
Quest for Glory III: Wages of War
Rex Nebular and the Cosmic Gender Bender
Ringworld: Revenge of the Patriarch
Rome: Pathway to Power
Sherlock Holmes Consulting Detective: Volume II
Spellcasting 301: Spring Break
Star Trek: 25th Anniversary
WaxWorks

Please make your guesses for TOP 5, BOTTOM 5 and FULL HOUSE in the comments for this post. The guesses should be made before the first two final ratings of the year 1992 will be published. The prizes for the winners will be handed at the end of the year 1992.

By taking part in the FULL HOUSE competition, you’ll also be automatically competing for STRAIGHTS. After a sequence of five games from the main game list has been completed, we’ll look at who has guessed closest the order of those five games. If someone got the exact order, she’ll be awarded 10 CAPs, otherwise, those with closest guesses get 5 CAPs.

Let the contests begin!