Puzzles in TTG easy to beat or harder than Lucas Arts 90's adventure game?

[Everlast]

First of all i have not played other adventure games other than Lucas Arts, and some of Sierra and now TTG. I've been comparing the puzzles of the other games and i still remember that the Lucas Art game had me stuck for years. I have had experience playing some of the TTG but never got stuck for more than days. I believe the difficulty of this games almost nearly killed the genre of adventure games and may have been a strong factor in LA sales going down. Because people play games to enjoy it, but it's not fun when you get stuck for a good time or have no idea what is it you are supposed to do. Remember this games where aimed at kids. I was a kid and had no trouble beating MI2, CMI, Maniac Mansion. This where games i really enjoyed, and finished in maybe no more than a month, but they also werent a piece of cake. I continued playing the games cuzz i was drawed to the story, but maybe others felt discouraged to buy a game where they didnt want to feel they got stuck or for fear of going through the same pain as in the sequel.

Do you guys think LA games where waaay harder than now and that TTG are waaaaay easier than say MI2, CMI Maniac Mansion??

A few example:

The Dig: Recently played the game and having to figure out what Boston had in mind when doing some puzzles was quite hard. There was even a puzzle on having to put all the bones of a turtle together. I can't see how someone can get this right when theres not even a map on how to do it. Having to go through each room for finding maybe a hidden piece was frustrating. There was also a part where you had to elaborate a trap for a rodent who stole a tool to open a door, which u can't figure out how to complete it. I kept thinking i had to catch a bat.

Indiana Jones and The Fate of Atlantis: I was able to beat this game without Sophia, and using the action part. But oooh boy was figuring the correct setting for the three stones was hard, let alone finding em on Crete. That part had me stuck for years, but eventualy i was able to do it when i had a modem. Recently i decided to replay the game and chose the Wits path. I had trouble again with the stones, and now im having troubles fixing a statue to open a door.

SOMI: I remember i used to get stuck on how to open the monkey head, how to get the rope from the corpse. I even though it was bugged. Eventually was able to figure it out after almost a year.

Loom: This game was sooo difficult for me that i never got to be able to leave the 1st island, because i kept thinking there was a spell i hadnt noticed. I never catched the clue "there must be some way to untwist it"

[Hassat Hunter]

Yes, old adventure games certainly are a lot harder than the modern variation.

Still, TTG might still be easier than the competition like "A Vampyre Tale" and "Ankh"/"Jack Kane".

[Little Writer]

There's a fossil of the turtle skeleton one screen back in "The Dig" and the settings for the stones in "FoA" is written in the Lost Dialogue of Plato

[Hayden]

Jack Keane was only difficult for stupid reasons though. Like objects being hidden or incredibly hard to find, or not standing in the correct spot when having to use an item (I spent hours in the upper city trying to figure out how to bring Shari to her senses - it turned out I had to be standing closer to her to use the frying pan on her). Apart from that and some bad voice acting, it was a good game though.

[Hayden]

I find that the main reason for ToMI being a little easy is just because the puzzles make sense; they're logical. Also, there is less time wasted as there is just the single-click interaction. These are the only real reasons, in my opinion.

[Armand1880]

I didn't find the Dig so hard, except one of the first puzzles after you get underground where you have to use the colors to guide the drone down to the bottom of the pit and pick up a plate. That was excruciating!

[Rather Dashing]

Originally Posted by haydenwce27

I find that the main reason for ToMI being a little easy is just because the puzzles make sense; they're logical. Also, there is less time wasted as there is just the single-click interaction. These are the only real reasons, in my opinion.

Sure everyone, even people who don't know how to solve puzzles or what makes a puzzle logical, think the puzzles are logical. Half of them might as well have giant, glowing arrows pointing at them to indicate "THE ANSWER IS HERE".

I can praise Telltale for a lot of things, but some of their puzzle creation has taken a hit since Season Two of Sam and Max.

[JedExodus]

"USE "Monkey" WITH "Wrench".

I hate you Lucasarts

[Secret Fawful]

Originally Posted by Armand1880

I didn't find the Dig so hard, except one of the first puzzles after you get underground where you have to use the colors to guide the drone down to the bottom of the pit and pick up a plate. That was excruciating!

That was awesome. I love having to figure out stuff like that.

[Little Writer]

Yeah, that was actually a fun puzzle. Try out each button, see what it does. The only excruciating thing about it was figuring out how many times you had to select a direction to make the drone travel the right distance. I've replayed "The Dig" recently, after many years, and I was surprised I still knew the right combination on the first try!

[StarEye]

Originally Posted by JedExodus

"USE "Monkey" WITH "Wrench".

I hate you Lucasarts

What game is that in?

[DonCopal]

Originally Posted by StarEye

What game is that in?

LeChuck's Revenge (MI2).

I'm pretty sure there was a book in the Phatt Island Library which listed a whole bunch of uses for monkeys. One of them said "Monkey Wrench."

Edit: Just checked the catalog and couldn't find it. Perhaps I'm hallucinating

[Rather Dashing]

Originally Posted by DonCopal

LeChuck's Revenge (MI2).

I'm pretty sure there was a book in the Phatt Island Library which listed a whole bunch of uses for monkeys. One of them said "Monkey Wrench."

Edit: Just checked the catalog and couldn't find it. Perhaps I'm hallucinating

Actually, that was use Monkey with...what was it? A pipe? You never used a Monkey with a wrench.

[Avistew]

I thought you used the monkey AS a wrench, not with one.

[StarEye]

That was, to be honest, the point with my post. Guess my sarcasm/joke didn't shine through properly.

[Rather Dashing]

Originally Posted by StarEye

That was, to be honest, the point with my post. Guess my sarcasm/joke didn't shine through properly.

I got it. Then I thought I was explaining the joke. Apparently not.

[Falanca]

Originally Posted by Rather Dashing

I got it. Then I thought I was explaining the joke. Apparently not.

Yeah, well, you made Stareye do it, so technically...

This thread is officially ruined.

[Avistew]

Actually, I still don't understand what part was supposed to be funny >.>

[movrev]

Yeah, puzzles in TTG seem to be quite easier than some puzzles in LucasArts games.

I think it might have to do with their game release model. Chopping up games into episodes released every month more or less requires them to be solvable within the month, so that users buy the next episode when it comes out. In my experience, though, I haven't spent more than 2 days on any one episode (an average of 4-5 hours in total), and I've gone through TOMI, most of W&G and halfway through S&M1. I could definitely cope with a bit more complexity on at least some of the episodes.

On the other hand, having experienced the TOMI releases, I have a great deal of appreciation for all the community this release model encourages. It's great to have teasers for the episodes, to have forums, and to have extras (like the treasure hunt) that add so much to the game value. There's a lot more entertainment you get for the money (even when the puzzles aren't as hard as one would want). I say this even when I couldn't really play the treasure hunt due to incompatibilities with GNU/Linux.

In any case, I do agree with this thread and would love to see tougher puzzles in the games to come. I think the best way to deal with user satisfaction in this regard, though, was the way LucasArts and many others did. By including a choice of the level of complexity right when the game starts instead of having "some hints" and "overlaid text" enabled by default.

[Avistew]

Originally Posted by movrev

I think it might have to do with their game release model. Chopping up games into episodes released every month more or less requires them to be solvable within the month, so that users buy the next episode when it comes out. In my experience, though, I haven't spent more than 2 days on any one episode (an average of 4-5 hours in total), and I've gone through TOMI, most of W&G and halfway through S&M1. I could definitely cope with a bit more complexity on at least some of the episodes.

Well they do say you can "finish it over a weekend or in a few sessions" or something. I'm positive they're not expecting for it to take the whole month. So I don't think it's only about the format.

I think Telltale decided to go for "easier and longer" rather than "harder and shorter". The older games took a really long time the first time you played them, but were much, much faster the second time around since most of the play time was trying to figure out what to do, and the harder the puzzle, the less likely you are to forget how you solved it.
With Telltale games, the second time you play actually takes longer to me, because there is all the things that I haven't tried yet, to get the funny lines and stuff.
I assume if you try to do that on your first play, you get to play a lot longer as well, but whenever I know what to do, I tend to just do it, and miss a lot of funny things as a result.

I personally did think Tales was a bit too easy. And I mean without any hints. I'd be all for it being a bit harder.
I thought the difficulty level of Sam and Max was better. It was hard enough that I got stuck a few times, but not hard enough that it became frustrating.
Tales felt more like watching a movie than playing a games at times, and I guess that's fine if that's what you're aiming for, but I liked that less.

I also felt like there was more useless or frustrating movement in Tales. One of the puzzles in the fourth episode has you do a series of things that are easy to figure out, but if you forget one detail, or look at one item in the meantime, or forget to reset the puzzle, you have to do it all again.
And that's a bit annoying.
Episode 5 also had a lot of walking around to go from one place to the next, in one occasion you have to do that 3 times in a row at least, more if you don't get what to do right away.
And of course the first episode had the map thing, which I found easy but frustrating.

But I don't think the games should go back to exactly the way they used to be. It's a tricky balance, but being able to choose the level of hints makes it easier to find the right place for you. Except when the harder setting still feels too easy or the easier one too hard.

This being said, I can imagine it would be tricky. If the puzzles are logical, then they're easy to get. If they're not, then they're not easy to figure out, but they make no sense. I can see how it would be hard to find the right balance.
And then everyone will think of different things. People have been complaining in Tales about, in episode 1 the totem-thingie with the Marquis inside and in episode 4 about folding the map but I got both of these right away for instance. I'm sure there are other things that took me longer than some people.

I think we'll see with Sam & Max 3 what things will be like. Since their adventures tend to be less logical, will it be harder again?