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?