/vr/ - Retro Games

[Anonymous No.10003741]

What are the best point-n-clicks for genre novices?
Those which can be enjoyed without heavily relying on moon logic and won't make you fuck up your game permanently if you accidentally get rid of key item.

I've only played pic rel, Maniac Mansion and Larry 1 so far

[Anonymous No.10003751]

>>10003741
Secret of Monkey Island series won't steer you wrong (before 4, avoid that one). Grim Fandango is also safe and fun, same as Sam & Max Hit the Road.

[Anonymous No.10003761]

>>10003741
Pac-Man 2: The New Adventures

[Anonymous No.10003762]

>>10003741

Lucasarts Point and clicks were famous for their 'you can't die, or make a permanent mistake' philosophy, which was different to the others of that time.

The Monkey Island series is the most well known, but also:
Day of the Tentacle
Full Throttle
The Dig
THe Sam and Max Series (even the Telltale ones are pretty good)
and Grim Fandango, which if you buy the remastered version is playable now as a point and click

Branching out a bit further, the Discworld series of games is pretty good for this sort of style - although the first one is notoriously hard.

Other hard, but good games include Toonstruck, and Beneath a Steel Sky - though you can die in that one, and will many times.

I wouldn't feel any shame about using a walkthrough personally, none of us did in the 90s; there's even been admissions that part of the popularity from developers around point and click adventures was that it made people call the premium hint lines that existed pre-internet.

As a follow up, you can pretty much tell I'm a Lucasarts-fag. My main knowledge of Sierra adventure games is the Kings Quest and Police Quest games, are they the best places to start?

[Anonymous No.10003782]

Sure, a lot of people like to bitch about the so-called "moon logic" but, mostly, it's just silly bantering.
A point-n-click without "moon logic" would last 15 minutes and feel like an interactive cartoon.

Yeah, there's several point-n-clicks that are considered to be free of that "menace" but in truth they still have moon logic to some extent.

If you want something more or less logical, go for Myst-like stuff, there are quite a few great games in that sub-genre.

[Anonymous No.10003804]

>>10003741
Play Sam & Max it's easy and great. Then you'll be ready for Day of the Tentacle and Monkey Island 2

[Anonymous No.10003812]

>>10003762
Discworld (even the 2nd one, but less so the third one) is a pretty terrible recommendation for genre virgins imo, EVEN if they're into Discworld to begin with and are familiar with some of the weird concepts involved.

Great games though, but I'm glad they absorbed feedback for the second and managed to include little hints when you try to do the wrong thing rather than simply giving you a "THAT DOESNT WORK" for everything like the first one did.

I second the LucasArts library recommendation. The no-death-or-dead-ends philosophy had its trade-offs, but the factor of accessibility and futureproofing it ensured can't be sneered at.

[Anonymous No.10003813]

>>10003762
Space Quest I - III are a good place to start, anon. They're a little more forgiving than some of the other Sierra games.

[Anonymous No.10003821]

>>10003813
>Space Quest

Which one featured death from being eaten by Pac-Man? Iirc you could die from simply choosing a wrong location to explore. There's also one with Alien kissing you, and you only realize that you've been implanted with chestburster 15 minutes later, just before the end of the game.

Maniac Mansion kinda did that too, but you're merely ending up in a prison. The worst outcome that you can achieve is simply blowing up the entire mansion with everyone in it including yourself.

[Anonymous No.10003827]

>>10003813
At least recommend him IV or V anon; it's not as if the overarching "plot" really matters and those have a full point and click interface at least. Granted there's a SCI remake of the first game, but the classic underlying framework of trigger-happy obtuseness is kept basically intact.

Plus SQV is among the best /vr/ Star Trek games ever made lol

[Anonymous No.10003839]

>>10003821
You can get the kids individually killed in Maniac Mansion through a variety of methods, including but not limited to getting them literally raped to death by a 6 foot sentient tentacle.

Great game though; a good middle ground between the zero-stakes deathless LA games and the overly deadly Sierra ones.

[Anonymous No.10003848]

Play the VGA remakes of King’s Quest 1-3. They are free, are pretty short on game time, great atmosphere and they have removed the dead ends from the original entries. The rest of the series is also great with 6 being one of the most praised point&click games.
Quest for Glory is also extremely cool with the RPG elements and their 4th one is the peak of Sierra’s ludo atmosphere.

[Anonymous No.10003858]

>>10003848
Has anyone played old Sierra games with a floppy disk and the manuals next to them? Shit loses so much enjoyment when you download a pdf.

[Anonymous No.10003859]

>>10003741
Scooby-Doo Mystery on Sega Genesis if you want an example of a great console point n click
Blade Runner is good

[Anonymous No.10003860]

>>10003762
>>10003848
Start here

[Anonymous No.10003862]

>>10003848
The Quest for Glory II fan remake is probably their best work; they even managed to make it fully compatible with carry-over character files from I and for III. It plays much differently of course, but still.

Regarding the KQ remakes, they (understandably) changed too much too beyond the first one to make them fully acceptable replacements for the original experiences, but they're ok except for the hooks they added for other KQ fan works maybe. Anyway, the first act of KQ3 is one of the coolest setups/setpieces in any adventure game EVER, so it the remake encourages more people to play it, that made it a 100% worthwhile endeavor.

[Anonymous No.10003867]

>>10003859
>Scooby-Doo Mystery on Sega Genesis
Any way at all to play this one with a mouse? Like how you can play NES Maniac Mansion in ScummVM for example

[Anonymous No.10003874]

>>10003862
I was very impressed by the VGA version of Quest for Glory 1. Short and sweet and the class selection actually felt meaningful for the progression. While 2 is arguably the better one, seeing it have no thieves guild was very underwhelming. Even more so considering they had the whole Wizard college sequence. Loved how it was the only one that utilised the calendar system properly nonetheless.

[Anonymous No.10003878]

>>10003867
I think the interface is just kind of built for a controller but joy2key or similar software might help you out

[Anonymous No.10003905]

>>10003827
I would have recommended IV but the Skate-O-Rama kills the game.

[Anonymous No.10003910]

>>10003741
Broken Sword.

[Anonymous No.10003953]

>>10003741
Loom was specifically made to be easy to finish. Play the text version, the talky version reduces dialogue to be able to fit everything inside a CD.

[Anonymous No.10003960]

>>10003953
>specifically made to be easy to finish
That's one way to phrase it. It may simply have been designed to not kill the player or involve a large inventory of items for the usual trial and error experience (and THAT may be the definition of "difficult to finish" in this context)

It's an unique game and a beautiful interactive storytelling piece, quite difficult to dislike unless you specifically set off to for whatever reason.

[Anonymous No.10004047]

>>10003741
Peasant's Quest

[Anonymous No.10004123]

>>10003762
>>10003812
>Lucasarts Point and clicks were famous for their 'you can't die, or make a permanent mistake' philosophy
>no-death-or-dead-ends
Did either of you play Maniac Mansion?

[Anonymous No.10004130]

>>10003953
Loom was my first thought
Primordia is a really good one, not a retro but designed as a tribute to retro point and click games

[Anonymous No.10004160]

>>10004123
Congrats for reaching ignorance the long way around anon, don't forget your t-shirt

[Anonymous No.10004220]

>>10004123
Actually Maniac Mansion is a Lucasfilm Games game, not LucasArts. Don't worry anon, it's a common mistake

[Anonymous No.10004362]

i loved putt putt games as a kid

[Anonymous No.10004383]

https://youtu.be/Uudul4IRZTg
>>10003910
this, but don't play the director's cut re-release. they fucked it up really really really badly.

[Anonymous No.10004418]

>>10003741
phoenix wright

[Anonymous No.10004430]

A bit off topic, but what games would you recommend if I enjoyed I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream and Garage: Bad Dream Adventure? Are there any other adventure games that strike a similar note to those?

[Anonymous No.10004457]

>>10004430
You can try general horror/suspense stuff like Gabriel Knight, Dark Seed etc.

[Anonymous No.10004461]

>>10003741
Start with Discworld.

[Anonymous No.10004482]

>>10004430
maybe try The Dark Eye (1995)

[Anonymous No.10004505]

>>10004461
I love Paul Kidby's art. It's funny how after a decade and five books of depicting Rincewind as an old man with a white beard in the cover illustrations despite that specifically contradicting his description, he finally had to update him probably because the videogame people asked for the character to look like he does in the game.

Obviously he didn't like changing it (or wanted to acknowledge the fact that the games are mostly their own continuity) because he went back to his original design for the final Rincewind novel a couple years later.

[Anonymous No.10004516]

>>10004505
Fuck I meant Josh Kirby obviously. It's also weird both key illustrators for the series had such similar last names

[Anonymous No.10004529]

>>10004430
Dark Seed 1

[Anonymous No.10004592]

>>10003848
This is good advice, can't go wrong with KQ or QFG. You can even start with KQ6 - you're not going to miss anything major, but for QFG I would definitely start with 1 since the stories carry through.
If I had to pick one series though I would definitely go with QFG. I played through them when I was 8-9 years old with no guides, just working with my sister. They're really not that hard.
I personally think the Sierra point-and-clicks are much better than Lucasarts.

[Anonymous No.10004657]

Pajama Sam

[Anonymous No.10004817]

>>10004430

Sanitarium is a similar vibe.

[Anonymous No.10004834]

>>10003741
Both Ringworld games
https://gamesnostalgia.com/game/ringworld-revenge-of-the-patriarch

[Anonymous No.10004835]

>>10003812

Personally, I got on OK with Discworld II as a youngster; I have a feeling it was what actually got me into the books (rather than the other way round), but I definitely had to use a walkthrough for a lot of the puzzles - partly as I didn't have enough relevant world knowledge.

The first one is ridiculously hard, in part as you have to do a lot of pixel-hunting to find stuff, and they have some pointlessly obtuse puzzles.

I only ever managed to part play Noir, but liked the experience I had.

[Anonymous No.10004847]

Lucasfilmfags and Sierrachuds are the worst.

[Anonymous No.10004880]

>>10004383
I forgot to say that, you're absolutely right.

[Anonymous No.10004883]

>>10004847
>t. Legend Entertainment snoyboy

[Anonymous No.10004890]

>>10004461
You cruel, cruel man.

[Anonymous No.10004904]

>>10003812
Did you get the number of that donkey cart?

[Anonymous No.10004921]

>>10004047
throw baby

[Anonymous No.10004930]

>>10003741
I had a lot of fun with The Dig recently. It's not really a genre I'm massively familiar with but I didn't need to resort to a guide too many times. I also liked Full Throttle (but fuck the driving section). The Space Quest games were also really really funny and enjoyable. But with the original 3, it might be worth looking at the manual or some gameplay because they're not exactly intuitive for a modern gamer who's not used to game like that.

Also don't feel bad if you have to use a guide sometimes with these games. Just get to a point where you feel like you've tried everything and then try some more, and then start to think about a guide. They were made confusing on purpose sometimes to get people to ring their expensive helplines.

[Anonymous No.10005285]

>>10004430
>>10004529
I'd only recommend Dark Seed if you're perfectly comfortable with the puzzles and progression being 95% bullshit, there's so much in that game where the solution is so very arbitrary and illogical. You could argue there's something thematically fitting about unfamiliar and alien logic, given the setting of a distorted nightmare dimension which mirrors real life in its strange and alien ways, but for gameplay this just doesn't work.

Defying genre conventions can sometimes be good and clever, but sometimes conventions are established for very good reasons, and just because something defies conventions doesn't mean it's inherently good or clever. Instead of applying your intellect and actually thinking through the solution to problems and puzzles, as any good point and click adventure, you're instead just bumbling through and bruteforcing the nonsense until it lines up, you could just as well be gambling to progress in the game.
You'll constantly hit a dead end because you didn't figure out what arbitrary task or method was needed to move forward, or that you needed to do X or Y at a specific time, for every thing which kinda makes sense or lines up with something, there's a lot which doesn't and which you'd never assume or conclude without giving up and throwing random shit at the wall without thinking to see if it'll maybe work.

It's gorgeous to look at, I love the licensed H.R Giger art, but it's all just kind of stitched together around a flimsy and unenjoyable game. I won't go into extensive detail since it's not retro, but the recent Scorn has a lot of parallels, beyond just the source of inspiration, its visuals are breathtaking but it's not all that engaging, like Dark Seed, you could have made a much better puzzle solving adventure game (or a shooter/slasher game), with all these assets.

I almost never say this, but Dark Seed is the rare kind of game which is unironically best experienced by watching a longplay.

[Anonymous No.10005513]

>>10003741
Can the genesis Scooby be played with mouse?

[Anonymous No.10005545]

>>10004930
The driving section becomes a lot more bearable when you realise it's essentially a puzzle about finding the right weapon, but it's ridiculously frustrating before that.

[Anonymous No.10005559]

>>10003762
>Other hard, but good games include Toonstruck
Toonstruck isn't hard. It is pretty much straightforward 99% of the time.
There are exactly three hard points in that game:
1) one time out of, like, two, it uses cartoon logic.
2) one time (and one time only) it prompts you to go pixel hunting.
Notice that these two points are happening only once or so throughout the whole game, so you mostly just do not expect them.
And the third hard moment is just a particularly nasty wordplay, but english's not my native, so I might be a bit biased.

[Anonymous No.10005570]

>>10004123
Same with Zak Mckraken, it’s almost impossible NOT to lock yourself out of beating the game.

[Anonymous No.10006518]

>>10003741
masterpiece

[Anonymous No.10006526]

>>10006518

[Anonymous No.10006529]

>>10003741

Sam & Max Hit The Road, intro related
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cBott6aV3fs
Monkey Island 1-3
Indiana Jones And The Fate Of Atlantis
Full Throttle
Grim Fandango
Day of the Tentacle
The Walking Dead: Season 1

Space Quest series are much more difficult but fun especially if you're a sci fi nerd
Quest For Glory series ditto, which I think was the first real WRPG as well

[Anonymous No.10006535]

>>10006518
It lacks the personality and flair of the rest of the LA library and the half-assed combat "engine" drags it down a little, but honestly in many ways it was the peak of the genre for its scope and replay value alone.

Not to mention it has a better concept and storyline than any of the modern Indy films.

[Anonymous No.10006569]

>>10003751
>Sam & Max Hit the Road.
>safe
But it's loaded with moon logic.

[Anonymous No.10006595]

>>10006518

I keep forgetting about the Indy games. They're great, FoA is definitely the better, more accessible one though - TLC is really hard, and was pretty hard to run on Windows back in the day. DOSBox will probably solve a lot of the problems.

[Anonymous No.10006804]

I feel like Scooby Doo Classic Creep Capers for the GBC is really babby's first point and click, and immensely soulful and enjoyable too.

[Anonymous No.10006853]

>>10006804
Speaking of GBC, Fish Files is quite fun and easy as well.

[Anonymous No.10006889]

>>10004921
Make Friends With The Kerrek

[Anonymous No.10006916]

>>10004904
Did seth mcfarlene come up with that joke?

[Anonymous No.10006923]

>>10006595
ScummVM is the way to go for 99% of the adventure games these days. The Indy games have been working perfectly for decades. You can choose adlib, fm towns, cd, etc. and even EGA graphics if you're truly nostalgic.

[Anonymous No.10007000]

Speaking of ScummVM, do you have have a preference for soundfonts? Which one had the best results, Fatboy, FluidR3, UHD3? I never had a good sound card so I don't know any better. Is the MT-32 emulation good enough or I should set up Sound Canvas?

[Anonymous No.10007078]

>>10004160
>>10004220
Pedantic turds.

[Anonymous No.10007134]

what was that site that offered in-depth spoiler free hints for all sorts of pointandclicks?

[Anonymous No.10007419]

>>10007134
https://www.uhs-hints.com/

[Anonymous No.10007447]

>>10003741
This genre was perfect for a Scooby-Doo game, like it was made for it. But man the senseless puzzles pissed me off


>>10006535
>Not to mention it has a better concept and storyline than any of the modern Indy films.

Not exactly a feat there but yeah

[Anonymous No.10007503]

>>10007000
Yeah MT32 works great.

[Anonymous No.10007539]

>>10003741
Play Simon the Sorcerer 1 &2 and the Feeble Files if you're up for it. Other than that of course The Longest Journey, the best adventure game ever to be created.

[Anonymous No.10007591]

>>10007419
awesome thanks anon

[Anonymous No.10008027]

>>10003953
>Play the text version
This. Specifically play the EGA version with the original graphics.

There's even an MT32 upgrade available here: https://community.pcgamingwiki.com/files/file/1318-loom-ega-mt-32-upgrade/
for Roland MT-32 sound, plus it adds the musical Overture to the game. (Extract the loomup_unzipped.zip into the Loom game directory.)

You could also try playing it with full orchestral soundtrack by placing these sound files into the Loom directory as well: https://www.mediafire.com/file/7j6ssjn3hhciecc/loom_orchestral_soundtrack.zip/file
(requires the latest version of ScummVM to work though and only works with the EGA version)

[Anonymous No.10008036]

For me it's text adventures

[Anonymous No.10008037]

>>10008036
pity rec.games.int-fiction was taken over by wokies

[Anonymous No.10008048]

>>10003960
Aye.

[Anonymous No.10008127]

>>10004123
>>10005570
To be fair a lot of people don't look at the stuff before Loom or Monkey Island, and the whole "No unwinnables, no death" philosophy was introduced with those... but iirc Fate of Atlantis had deaths.

[Anonymous No.10008198]

>>10006569
Is it? I’ve played a ton of these point-n-clicks and only recently played Sam and Max and found it to be a lot easier than the ones I’ve played in the past. Was kinda disappointed by it overall, desu.

[:) No.10008451]

>>10003741
The Walking Dead

[Anonymous No.10008526]

What the heck is moon logic

[Anonymous No.10008529]

>>10008526
the monkey wrench puzzle in Monkey Island 2

[Anonymous No.10008536]

>>10008526
There are too many useful results for search engines if you cared to do your homework but I wanted to post this here instead because it's funny, relevant and buried under search engine optimized results
https://www.oldmanmurray.com/features/77.html

[Anonymous No.10008559]

>>10003762
>Lucasarts Point and clicks were famous for their 'you can't die, or make a permanent mistake' philosophy, which was different to the others of that time.
Still didn't make their game easy. i did love fate of atlantis.

[Anonymous No.10008878]

>>10008526
It's the same concept as when people call the Japanese language "moon runes". i.e. a handy buffer expression to transfer the responsibility for lack of resourcefulness or simple ignorance onto the game or the developers.

[Anonymous No.10008885]

>>10008526
it's when a puzzle has artificial difficulty

[Anonymous No.10008891]

>>10008198
It's a great game in terms of general inventiveness and concepts and I do love it, but compared to other LA games it has a problem of general lack of forward momentum storywise. You're just stumbling throughout new wacky locations and solving puzzles but you don't really care as such (or often, even remember) WHY you are doing it; it gets specially random by the end with the final totem pole puzzles.

To be fair the source material was also exactly like that: the overarching plot didn't really matter, it was about the per-panel wackiness.

[Anonymous No.10008894]

>>10008885
True those age pretty badly and lack soul. Specially without a crt

[Anonymous No.10009659]

>>10003751
>Sam & Max Hit the Road
If you want him to not like these kind of games at all sure, why not. Shit puzzles, shit plot, one of LucasArts worst, only good things are the art and some jokes

[Anonymous No.10009671]

>>10006804
>>10006853

I'm going to download them right now, I had Shadowgate as a kid and I liked a lot seeing an adventure game in a Game Boy, are there more?

[Anonymous No.10009686]

>>10004430
drowned god

[Anonymous No.10009687]

>>10003741
sigh.

[Anonymous No.10009767]

>>10009671
Deja Vu is on gameboy as well. Uninvited too, I think?

[Anonymous No.10009812]

>>10003858
Yup. I remember typing the spells in QQ3 straight out of the manual and you only had a certain amount of time before the wizard would return so you are nervous and if you made one typo bam dead. Also I fell over the cat and died all the time thinking I could get around him.

[Anonymous No.10011657]

>>10009671
I really want to play shadow gate but what's the best version? I want to play with mouse

[Anonymous No.10012097]

>>10007539
TLJ wasn't that great going back to it but it does have some spectacular scenes. Shame about the sequels.

[Anonymous No.10012105]

>tfw I expected to go into this thread and find extremely pleb opinions once again and get surprised for once with all the recs i'd make being there

[Anonymous No.10012149]

>yfw you clicked before you pointed

[Anonymous No.10012153]

>>10004880
I was just lamenting the fact that I own the shit remasters of the first two on steam, but apparently the original versions are available as free DLC.

[Anonymous No.10012172]

>>10004383
I finished it recently. I liked it, and it's gorgeous, but it feels like they ran out of budget halfway during development.
What was so bad about the director's cut, again?

[Anonymous No.10012195]

>>10003741

[Anonymous No.10012209]

You should try The Longest Journey.
Nice characters and comfy atmosphere.
Not stupid hard either.

[Anonymous No.10012236]

>>10012172
Not quoted but it shits up the original superb 10/10 opening, adds terrible scenes that ruin the pacing and shit up Nico's motivations, replace all the background art, repalce the character animations/art with worse stuff, remove the game overs, add static portraits for all dialogues that look worse than without and change some puzzles.
The DC's are inferior. In a huge way in the case of Broken Sword 1.

[Anonymous No.10012270]

>>10004505
>"four eyes" literally has 4 eyes

[Anonymous No.10012305]

>>10004505
>>10004516
>>10012270
Josh Kirby was great like that, he got me into fantasy and I own several prints of his paintings.
Kidby isn't really in the same league.
Have a Pratchett talking about Kirby: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KopJyHD9leA

[Anonymous No.10012306]

>>10003741
>What are the best point-n-clicks for genre novices?
Do you know what age people were when they first played these games? Like 12-14.

You're telling me you're scared of playing games 12 year olds beat?
>h-how do i get into the genre.. i'm terrified,.. what if i make a mistake..

[Anonymous No.10012310]

>>10004430
Gadget kind of have the same mood

[Anonymous No.10012347]

>>10012305
They're so different that it's tricky to just state one of them is the "better" illlustrator, but I'm partial to Kirby's work as well, specially compared to Kidby's more recent work as it is too simplistic and parody-oriented.

Speaking of simplistic but still technically polished, Michael Koelsch (who did lots of videogame work, such as Earthworm Jim covers and whatnot) did the box art for the American release of the second game (most likely the publisher thought Kirby's stuff was a bit out there and didn't reflect the comedic tone as a selling point)

[/csg/ - Chink shit general No.10012504]

>>10011657
Apple II GS, full game, straight in your browser
https://archive.org/details/wozaday_Shadowgate_IIgs

[Anonymous No.10012721]

>>10012504
How do you play Mac games in your browser exactly
Also this isn't csg anon

[Anonymous No.10012743]

>>10012721
Fuck me I left the name

[Anonymous No.10012749]

>>10012721
Open that page and click the playable window
Mame loads in-browser, you can go fullscreen and play with your mouse
Thats the Apple II GS version, you can find the Mac version on archive.org too but it's black and white