Near-Lucas graphics adventures [Archive]

Guybrush_Threepwood

11/07/2006, 03:10 pm

After they started speaking about Discworld, I thought it would be cool to have a thread to speak about less known adventure games.
The first a.g. outside LucasArts that I can think of is "Flight of the Amazon Queen", many of you surely already know it. It's the one I liked most, a mix between Monkey and Indy.
Then there's "Bud Tucker in double trouble", very good game, sadly known by a few.
Oh, and "Touché: adventures of the 5th musketeer", another one which seems to have a difficulty very similar to MI2.
Obviously, I didn't mention Simon The Sorcerer and Discworld, 'cause they're so famous that they don't need forewords.
What other games would you recommend me?

MeaningOfLife

11/07/2006, 03:29 pm

I understand that Flight of The Amazon Queen doesn't have as high of a budget as the late 90s adventure games but man, the voice acting, the puzzles, and the unable to fast foward while watching Joe walking from one end of the screen to the other really kills me.

balloftwine

11/07/2006, 03:31 pm

Beneath a Steel Sky! you can download it as freeware because its not available anymore to buy so the kind publishers are giving it away... Its the best non lucasarts adventure ive ever played. Replayed it the other day and its still great.

jp-30

11/07/2006, 05:58 pm

I loved Westwood's Blade Runner. Great story and gorgeous graphics.

Mel

11/07/2006, 06:12 pm

To throw out an amateur game, No Action Jackson. It has a very similar interface, fun graphics and a fun story and puzzles. :)

http://www.talesofinterest.com/no-action/ <---- place to download (free and legal!!)

jp-30

11/07/2006, 07:28 pm

I've always meant to give that a go, thanks for reminding me.

Also, in a similar vein, if you liked Indiana Jones & the Fate of Atlantis, this fan made sequel demo is well worth a look;

http://www.barnettcollege.com/demo.htm

Should keep you busy for 2-4 hours.

Pvt._Public

11/07/2006, 09:00 pm

Isn't Revolution making a Beneath a Steel Sky 2? As for FOTAQ, I hated the voice acting in that game so much I couldn't stand to play it beyond the first hour. I suppose Bad Mojo hasn't been mentioned. It's not very LucasArtsy but I find it to be charming (if that's the word to use...) none the less. http://www.badmojoredux.com/

Emily

11/07/2006, 09:13 pm

Isn't Revolution making a Beneath a Steel Sky 2?

No, they're not. They thought about it at one point, and came up with some initial design ideas, but the game is not in production. (I asked Charles Cecil about this personally last spring at GDC. ;))

SilverShark

11/08/2006, 12:13 am

I used to love playing Dreamweb. Played it over and over.

Was very annoyed the day I upgraded my PC and couldn't get it to run anymore!

Erwin

11/08/2006, 12:37 am

Duckman. Kinda hard to find because it was only released in Germany, which is kinda odd since the cartoon comes from the US.

--Erwin

Guybrush_Threepwood

11/08/2006, 02:57 am

As for FOTAQ, I hated the voice acting in that game so much I couldn't stand to play it beyond the first hour.

You could simply turn off the voices to enjoy such a great game

Oilers99

11/08/2006, 11:34 am

The Last Express. It was the most original, well-written and ignored adventure game of all time. It told what's probably my favorite story in gaming. It used time to add an extra level of depth to adventure design. The game sucked you into a world like no other graphic adventure game before. It sold about three copies.

Even to this day I marvel at how good it is, and how absolutely nobody knows about it. Even in places where adventure game fanatics gather, only a few seem to be aware of its existence, let alone brilliance.

If you like adventure games, you owe it to yourself to track down a copy of The Last Express, and play it.

ChodeMaster

11/08/2006, 12:20 pm

I remember one I played years and years ago, called 'Rex Nebula and the Cosmic Gender Bender'... that was kinda weird... but from memory very funny. Though I admit that was from the perspective of a teenage boy, so it could be far less entertaining than I recall.

grimsqueaker

11/08/2006, 01:46 pm

Guybrush_Threepwood

11/08/2006, 02:32 pm

Hey, has anyone ever played TOONSTRUCK?
I didn't, but the screenshots I took a look at were just charming.

Erwin

11/08/2006, 02:55 pm

Yeah, the artwork is great, but the game does contain certain annoying elements.

--Erwin

Pvt._Public

11/08/2006, 07:41 pm

I should like to, but having installed the game and configured it so that it SHOULD work on Windows XP (One of my past times is making old games which don't work on WinXP work on WinXP. I managed to get Discworld 1 working on it last month) it has a huge gap down the center in anything but 320 by 200 or something, which obviously looks like crap on a 1680 by 1050 monitor. Even a 1024 by 768 monitor.

Pvt._Public

11/08/2006, 07:42 pm

5 Days a Skeptic ( http://www.fullyramblomatic.com/5days/ ) was a really awesome indie game. I remember playing it the first time at night and it totally creeped me out! The dialogue (if I remember correctly) was very well done and funny, the puzzles were good, the cutscenes scared the pants off me, excellent excellent storyline etc.

It's free to download, and I really recommend everyone try it if they have the time!

PS: If you do decide to play, just remember to save often. There is a time in the game where you can die. (learned that the hard way! lol)

I loved this game. The sequel I got stuck on near the end because of the random walking around of the evil guy but the first I consider not only one of the best indie games I've ever played, but one of the best adventure games I've ever played!

grimsqueaker

11/09/2006, 04:24 am

I loved this game. The sequel I got stuck on near the end because of the random walking around of the evil guy but the first I consider not only one of the best indie games I've ever played, but one of the best adventure games I've ever played!

Glad someone else enjoyed it! I played the sequel too, but I still liked Skeptic better. :) I just checked his website and apparently there's a 'middle' game caleld Trilby's notes to fill in the Gap between Skeptic and Stranger. Judging from the screenshots it looks as creepy as the other. :p

thom_h

11/10/2006, 05:28 pm

Toonstruck was a fantastic piece of adventuring bliss - sadly I can't get it to work on XP :( Has anyone managed this?
My favourite non-Lucas games would have to be 'Beavis and Butthead: Virtual Stupidity' and 'Bud Tucker in Double Trouble'.

I've got a question if anybody could help? I'm looking for a game from quite a few years back (maybe '01 or 02?). It's a 3D aventure game, and all I can remember was that it was set around a family of aliens living in a house or something? I know that's quite a terrible description but that's all I can remember, I'm really intrigued to find it. :o

Squinky

11/10/2006, 07:20 pm

Are you thinking of Stupid Invaders?

I got Toonstruck to work rather nicely on XP using the latest version of DOSBox. This was back in about April or so.

thom_h

11/11/2006, 04:09 am

Ah thankyou, yes I think that might be it!
I've just been really intrigued to play it, I'll have a look at that.
I'll Google up the DOSBox too, is it just like a SCUMMVM for DOS games I guess??

Haggis

11/11/2006, 04:13 am

I'll Google up the DOSBox too, is it just like a SCUMMVM for DOS games I guess??
It's sort of like that, only with a command line interface. You put your DOS games in a separate folder, and mount that folder as a virtual drive in DOSBox. Once you get the hang of that, there's nothing to it, and it emulates DOS games perfectly.

thom_h

11/11/2006, 04:18 am

Wow that sounds so good! I've got a tonne of old games, I can't believe I've never heard of that before. Thanks!
:)

Quuux

11/13/2006, 09:28 pm

A lot of the games mentioned are pretty fun, but the neatest one I played in the days of old was Neverhood; claymation adventure, just fun and silly and you can only die in one obvious sport (although I thought it was a joke and hadnt saved oops :) )

bigtopfrank

11/19/2006, 07:39 pm

Mel

11/21/2006, 05:12 pm

needless to say that people should really check out the underdogs to find some decent games:
http://www.the-underdogs.info/
one place of interest is the special collection of Amateur Underdogs:
http://www.the-underdogs.info/collect.php?id=16
I agree with all the games mentioned, but one I quite liked about 10 years ago was Noctropolis.

I know I'm opening a can of worms but...

The problem with that place is some of those games are still commercially available. You could also find many of them on eBay (I would try either of those first personally).

Edit: Hmm, maybe I don't understand that site well (I've never visited). It looks like if the games are still available to purchase, they have a link to the place selling them. I would personally still try eBay for some of the others (obviously except for the freeware games). :)

bigtopfrank

11/21/2006, 06:48 pm

i like the site, it's good for reviews and stuff. it has tended to move towards the freeware realm of gaming the last couple of years. and now, it simply seems to be in disarray, as it hasn't been updated for months.

as for the questionable legality of the games, i got this off wikipedia (but of course!):

The site claims to be more of a museum than a download site, offering what are now argued to be "great" games that never received due attention upon their initial releases (the "underdogs" referred to in the name). The site is careful about copyright concerns: if a game available for download becomes once more available for purchase, or if a game's copyright holder so requests, the downloadable files are removed, replacing them with a link to the site selling the game if applicable.

the got into a lot of trouble 3 or 4 years ago for having copyright protected games on there, since then all seems to be ok.