Developer: Femo Duo Entertainment Publisher: Femo Duo Entertainment Year: 2004 Platform: Windows
There exists a game development tool that allows one to create adventure games in Sierra’s AGI system, responsible for their first three King’s Quest games as well as most of their adventures prior to 1989. Most of the games that were made were very amateurish, and even the ones I’ve enjoyed are hardly worthy of review. Enclosure is the exception, an engrossing horror adventure worthy of play by anyone who enjoyed adventure games in the 80’s.
Publisher: AGDInteractive Developer: AGDInteractive Year: 2011 Platform: Windows; Mac
Presumably the final remake from AGDInteractive, their retelling of King’s Quest III does a great job updating and enhancing the original game by Sierra while still honoring the primary plot and structure. They changed just enough to keep the game fresh and if you liked the original there’s little doubt you’ll enjoy this as well.
Publisher: AGDInteractive Developer: AGDInteractive Year: 2002 Platform: Windows; Mac; Linux
Excuse me while I blush for a while. Not satisfied with simply enhancing the original game, AGDI agreed that the original King’s Quest II was utter trash and essentially created a new game. And they only produced one of the best adventure games in the history of the industry.
Publisher: AGDInteractive Developer: AGDInteractive Year: 2001 Platform: Windows; Mac; Linux
Originally known as Tierra, AGDInteractive decided to remake some classic Sierra adventure games. They started in 2001 with King’s Quest. It was an interesting choice given that Sierra had already re-released their crown jewel in 1990 with updated graphics and sound. And while in their remake they didn’t quite make this a game worth introducing to a new generation, they most certainly improved upon it, if ever so slightly.
While the book to adventure game thing has been done many times, it’s rare for the original author to have so much involvement in its design. Douglas Adams had a significant hand in Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, though I don’t think he can hold a candle to the creative control Harlan Ellison had here. Unfortunately, this did not cause for a great game; in fact, Ellison sued to get profits from the game he though he deserved, only to learn the game made no profit. I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream is one of the more ambitious adventure games I have come across that unfortunately couldn’t quite figure out what it wanted to be and is nearly as frustrating to play as it is to be one of Ellison’s characters.
Publisher: Legend Developer: Legend Year: 1995 Platform: DOS
Around 1993, Legend Entertainment decided to mostly stop developing their own ideas and started pounding out adventure titles based on best-selling novels. Shannara was probably the most high-profile of them all. I was hesitant at first as neither the genre nor Terry Brooks’s style appeals to me, but I found Shannara to be a mostly pleasant, if very simple, adventure.
An ambitious final entry into the original Zork trilogy that is a pleasure to read but a veritable nightmare to play, Zork III’s value now is mostly for posterity.
Publisher: Red Thread Games Developer: Red Thread Games Year: 2014, though released episodically through 2016 Platform: PS4, XBox One, Mac, Linux
After waiting six years for the second game in the series, fans of the epic The Longest Journey series waited eight years (and through a massive Kickstarter campaign) to play the final entry into the saga. The first is one of my favorite games ever and I feel similarly about Dreamfall, though in my review I compared it to The Empire Strikes Back: exciting and dark, but ending abruptly with many unanswered loose threads. And I must say Ragnar Tornquist did an excellent job tying up those threads; while Dreamfall Chapters is not always satisfying on a game level, the story itself resonates so broadly that it retroactively makes the first two games more satisfying as well.
If there was a Miss Congeniality award for adventure games, Machinarium would lap the field. Controlling a runt-of-the-litter robot whose goal is to save himself, his robot town, and his robot girl, charm endlessly abounds. Normally a game with no text or dialogue would turn me off completely, but with the exceptional use of picture thought bubbles and flashbacks, a thorough story is doled out to the player without the need for any words.
Regrettably as the older I’ve become, the less effort I’ve found myself willing to put into playing computer games. I prefer to blame the time constrictions of maturation: fatherhood, home ownership, Netflixing with my better half. Ultimately, however, the greatest factor is my waning patience with gratification. This extends to all forms of media; if I have to wait longer than five minutes for stimulation, my interest wanders. Thus, the piled up bin of pilot episodes (sorry Nurse Jackie), second chapters (you too The Girl Who Played with Fire), and barely played computer games (maybe later Quest for Glory 2) awaiting continuation but more likely relegated to eternally gathering dust. Despite this I’m also not looking for cheap and unsatisfying thrills (I’m looking at you Angry Birds). Her Story may be my panacea, motivating me not only to play through its story, but also to forge on and try other games that have been sitting on my virtual shelf for far too long.
Death By Troggles 
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