Possibly the bleakest of all the Black Mirror episodes, Crocodile takes a suspect premise, forces it down our throats, then cuts open our stomachs to remove it and force it down our throats some more.
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Black Mirror Countdown
A fifth season is in the works, so over the next few weeks I’ll be counting down every episode of Black Mirror from worst to best. For those who haven’t seen Black Mirror, it’s basically a darker, more in-your-face Twilight Zone that relies on technology gone amok rather than the supernatural.
Spoilers abound, naturally.
Space Quest 1: Roger Wilco in the Sarien Encounter
Developer: Sierra
Publisher: Sierra
Year: 1991
Platform: DOS, Mac, Amiga
Part of the wave of Sierra early 90’s remakes of the first games in all their popular series, Space Quest fared little better than the rest. Though receiving an “upgrade” in interface, sound, and graphics, I found this to be much less charming and enjoyable than the game it was supposed to be improving.
Continue reading Space Quest 1: Roger Wilco in the Sarien Encounter
Castle Adventure
Developer: Kevin Bales
Publisher: Kevin Bales
Year: 1984
Platform: DOS
One of the first graphical adventures I played, Castle Adventure was literally written by a 14 year-old in his mother’s basement using nothing but BASIC for the game and ASCII characters for the graphics. Given the tools used and the year it was made, it was quite an impressive achievement.
King’s Quest III: To Heir Is Human
Developer: Infamous Adventures
Publisher: Infamous Adventures
Year: 2006
Platform: Windows
AGDInteractive wasn’t the only group working on a remake of King’s Quest III. Four years earlier, Infamous Adventures took a stab at it. While it doesn’t have the production values of the former (or would that be the latter?), it’s a faithful adaptation of the original game and sure to please those who liked the original just fine.
3 Cards to Deadtime
Developer: Big Finish
Publisher: Big Finish
Year: 2010
Platform: Windows
The follow-up to 3 Cards to Midnight, Dead Time improves things a bit by making the game simpler for non-native English speakers. Rather than creating compound words to find hidden objects on each screen, the goal is to now just find everything related to a category.
3 Cards To Midnight
Developer: Big Finish
Publisher: Big Finish
Year: 2009
Platform: Windows
Chris Jones, the creator of the Tex Murphy series, dipped his toe into the casual hidden-object genre. And while for the most part I’m underwhelmed by this type of game, he did a nice job of injecting it with some style and challenge. Rather than simply find a list of objects on the screen, the conceit entails finding a list of words that relate to another word. To wit, if the keyword is “Card” you will want to look for objects such as a shark (for “card shark”) or a key (for “key card”). Think of it as an extra step in your hidden object dalliances.
Pleurghburg: Dark Ages
Publisher: GASPOP Software
Developer: GASPOP Software
Year: 2001
Platform: DOS; Windows
If you’re a Sierra fan who ever wondered what it would be like to combine elements from Police Quest and Manhunter, then you’re decidedly an odd duck. But you’re also in luck, as Pleurghburg (pronunciation: fuck if I know): Dark Ages does just that, providing a tense, gory, exciting adventure.
Enclosure
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.
King’s Quest III Redux: To Heir Is Human
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.
Death By Troggles 
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