Sierra vs. LucasArts

[Darth Marsden]

IIRC, it's quite possible to die in Gabriel Knight 1 because you didn't pick something up earlier in the game.
Can someone confirm that for me? I'm pretty sure that's the case.

EDIT: Here's the Let's Play. Every one of the Number.whatever entries is about dying, and many of them explain that you need items (or people!) to survive the game.

[hangingwithmonkeys]

Originally Posted by Darth Marsden

IIRC, it's quite possible to die in Gabriel Knight 1 because you didn't pick something up earlier in the game.
Can someone confirm that for me? I'm pretty sure that's the case.

EDIT: Here's the Let's Play. Every one of the Number.whatever entries is about dying, and many of them explain that you need items (or people!) to survive the game.

I had to play it twice the first time I played. I think, because I forgot a item that I needed later on. But I died a couple of times. Some times on purpose.

[cormoran]

Overall Lucasarts. But it's verrrrrrrry close.

LA gave me my first taste of adventure games with Day of the Tentacle, Sierra gave me my first adventure series with Space Quest when I finally got a PC of my own. LA made my favourite adventure game with Full Throttle, Sierra made my favourite adventure series with the Gabriel Knight trilogy.

[Jennifer]

Originally Posted by MusicallyInspired

And yet LucasArts abandoned that form of game design immediately after their first game (unless it crops up in Zak too), while Sierra continued to pursue it in many of their games again and again.

It was rare, but it wasn't completely abandoned after the 1980's. Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis also had a similarily nailbiting ending. You are given limited time to try to talk Ubermann out of his plan. If you chose the wrong dialog choice, Indiana Jones would be turned into a "god" and would die. Alternately, another wrong dialog choice would mean that the same would happen to Sophia, although the latter would result in an alternate ending rather than death.

[MusicallyInspired]

That's not timed at all, is it? It's entirely based on choice, which is completely different. I seem to remember talking him in circles over and over until I picked one dialogue path or the other. I also consider it to be more like an alternate "bad ending" than a death, really, because it's the very last puzzle before the end of the game. Still, it's similar to the end of GK1 for sure. Also, Sophia being god-ified happens when you forget to release her from her prison and throw away the necklace, purging her of Nurab-Sal. You could call that a dead end, but again I consider it more like a bad ending.

Either way, it wasn't a popular design decision among LucasArts games. And in FOA's case, it was a special circumstance and not entirely the same.

[Jokieman]

Back in the day it was Lucas Arts. now Lucas Arts just keeps going back to the Star Wars cash cow. Sooner or later that Cash Cow is going to die off though.

LA is headless, aimless, and largely pointless these days. And sadly I can see them dying off in the next couple of years and taking their IP with them.

[DAISHI]

Originally Posted by Jokieman

Back in the day it was Lucas Arts. now Lucas Arts just keeps going back to the Star Wars cash cow. Sooner or later that Cash Cow is going to die off though.

LA is headless, aimless, and largely pointless these days. And sadly I can see them dying off in the next couple of years and taking their IP with them.

This same complaint actually previously caused it to diversify. It's cyclical.