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Episode 22 - Q & A: New Teeth Edition
1.8k Plays5 months ago
Roses has new teeth and can't eat no potatoes, but she DID learn about a lot of games with an overwhelming number of cats. We take your questions about achievements, non-adventure game mechanics, console gaming, genre distinctions, Andrew Plotkin's Cruelty Scale, and much more!
Email us! [email protected]
Games Mentioned:
- Lorelei and the Laser Eyes
- A Castle Full of Cats (and the others in the series)
- The Blue Cat
- Tunic
- Gabriel Knight: Sins of the Fathers/The Beast Within
- Dropsy
- Laura Bow: The Dagger of Amon Ra
- Riven
- Warcraft Adventure Game
- Hive Swap
- The Tex Murphy Series
- Arcane: Online Mystery Serial
- Disco Elysium
- Monkey Island II
- Harvester
- A Space for the Unbound
- Zelda (just a bunch of em)
- Brok the Invesigator
- Lair of the Clockwork God
- Bulb Boy
- Clock Tower
- The Neverhood
- Soma
- Banjo Kazooie
- Mario 64
- Scooby Doo (Genesis)
- Princess Tomato in the Salad Kingdom
- Deja Vu
- Cosmic Spacehead
- A Boy and his Blob
- ToeJam & Earl
- Quest For Glory
- Space Quest III
Recommended
Transcript
Potato Preferences and Culinary Humor
00:00:00
Speaker
Potatoes are the greatest food in the world. But just so like any type of potato, like you like mashed potatoes. Yeah. Yeah. I like scout potatoes. Yeah. Oh, do you like those scalloped potatoes that come like in a box? Do you know what I mean? Like Betty Crocker or whatever. And no, I don't like those. I don't like those. I like I'm more on the hash brown side of things. You like a crispy or potato. I love a. Oh, my God. I love a crispy potato. Stop it. I can't eat anything crispy because of my teeth. Oh, if you have a if you have teeth that can't eat a potato, then why even have teeth? I know is this is torture.
00:00:45
Speaker
um but right how long are you good How long can you not eat a potato? Like a crispy potato? Like a week or so, it's not bad. I'm just a little sensitive right now. My mouth is sensitive. Just a sensitive girly. a baked potato with a skin or without a skin? Oh, with a skin. okay Dunkin' Donuts, hash browns. They come in those like little pet pucks, those little hockey pucks. Those are very good. the The outer centimeter of them is good. The entire inside is just like a pile of potato chunks. No, you're so right. Like I get those every now and then, but they need to be like, I have to be like, could you cook them well done? Because they get a little weird in the center. Do they say yes? Yeah, of course. I didn't know you could ask for specific cooking
00:01:44
Speaker
preferences at Dunkin' Donuts. Yeah, you can. You can ask anywhere. I'm going to ask that. I'm going to ask that about everything. Hey, you can't do that, sir. who told me Who told you you could do that? You can't do that. Hand the donut back across the counter. Be like, ah can you do this? Can and I have this done? This is well done, please. Can I have this chocolate glaze donut? Well done. Thank you. ah Yeah, I'll take in iced decaf coffee with caramel and ah can I have that well done? It's just a burnt coffee oh And then they had no matter what when they handed to me I was like I said iced And if they handed to me i I said well done
00:02:35
Speaker
Wow, we are the most insufferable people on the planet. And with that, I'm going to start the music.
Podcast Introduction and Dental Adventures
00:03:00
Speaker
Hey, everybody, and welcome to Save Your Game. It's a podcast about adventure games. I'm your host, Matt Aucamp, and with me is the toothsome,
00:03:15
Speaker
the dental, oh the calcified, I hope not. That's all right. She's got good, good new teeth. It's ah pushing up roses. Hey, everyone. Pushing up roses here coming at you with new teeth.
00:03:38
Speaker
Still very give us a give us a give us a chomp chomp. Can you hear that? I'm leaving it in. Yeah, please. How does it feel? It does feel awkward ah because these are still temps, but I mean, the temps are very, you've seen them. I've sent you pictures. They're very realistic. They don't look weird, but they're basically in my mouth to get me used to the look and to see if I need any adjustments. So the day I got these put in, I went back a couple of days later to adjust them ah to make like minor changes and stuff like that. The only issue with these temps are,
00:04:17
Speaker
they're very much like cemented, they're resonant, right? They're resonant on top of my normal teeth, on top of my, you know, the teeth i that I have naturally. And I can feel it. And my instinct is to like prod it with my tongue. And I hope I'm like not doing anything to like, damn, I mean, they're temporary, you know, they're going to be replaced regardless, but I keep wanting to like prod at the resin that's all like on the back of my teeth. And now when they put in the porcelain when they put in the veneers that those only go on the front.
00:04:49
Speaker
OK. So there's not going to be all this resin holding, you know, composite teeth on the back. And that that's the worst part of it is like I keep wanting to poke everything. Interesting. Yeah. Do you think you're going to miss the resin when it's gone? No. OK. These these need to come out. ah i I get them replaced on July 23rd. So that is approximately three weeks. You're going to miss the resin. I don't think so. Well, I'll, I'll, I'll message you and be like, man, I really wish. he fighting down on that right i miss that red How is the rest of you? Have you played any video games this week?
00:05:33
Speaker
No, I really haven't ah because A, we just recorded not long ago and B, i've I've been wanting to finish a space for the unbound. Right. In fact, I was going to play that a little bit today, but I have just been so busy with the dental work and being in the ah ER and then editing the last podcast. And then I had a video go out. I had my X-Files video go up. X-Files video. Cool. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, and I've been, I bought an art course because I wanted to learn a very specific type of, uh, abstract painting. So I've been kind of like super involved with that. So like every now and then I think on our podcast, we should be like, Hey, if you're not playing a game, what are you doing? What do you do with your time? And that's what I've been doing with my time. I've been practicing a painting. It's been great. That's awesome. Yeah. What about you, Matt? So.
00:06:28
Speaker
I am now. um I feel like I'm just giving Lorelai and the Laser Eyes updates every week. I am i got i looked up my first hint. Oh, I thought you were opposed to that, though. In this game? Yeah, I was. so and And I felt felt so stupid. it was like It's like that sort of thing where you look up a hint and it's not satisfy Like it's not, um
Gaming Updates and Non-Gaming Activities
00:07:00
Speaker
you realize that you didn't need the solution to a puzzle, you just needed somebody to point to something you were being dumb about. Like that's that's what it ended up being. It was like I had the hint and I had the puzzle and I knew they went together, but I forgot about them. And so it was like, I don't know what to do. I'm just like so lost. I think I just need to like maybe look up one hint
00:07:26
Speaker
And it was just like, use the blank with the blank. And I was like, oh, I knew that. I just forgot that I had gotten both of them. Fuck. But also, I had to exercise extreme force of will because i it was the situation where you look up a hint and it is, Like you think you have a goal. You're like, i okay, imagine that like you need to get in this room. And so you're like, okay, how do I get in this room? like um I guess I need to get this key. And then you get the key and it doesn't get you in the room. Like it like it like there's some other obstacle. Like, I don't know, you go to use the key and the guy drops the key down the grave.
00:08:17
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. And then you're thinking like, well shit, because I was just all over the map looking for the key. If I found a device that picked up the key from under the grate, I would have found it already. So now I'm just like, I'm even more stuck than when I got the hint. Oh You know what do I mean? Yeah, I do know what you mean though. Like the thing was like, I know like it didn't get me what I wanted. it it it' it gave me another puzzle without giving me any progress. um So your instinct there is like, you just get frustrated and you're like, fuck it, I'm just gonna pull the fucking walkthrough back up again because, and I resisted that urge and I was so glad I did um because I just walked around the mansion for a minute.
00:09:08
Speaker
and I stumbled across a puzzle that I've seen a thousand times. And I was like, ah, whatever, I'm just gonna look at this puzzle again. And for some reason, at that moment, if anyone's played Lorelai and the Laser Eyes, it's the piano puzzle. For some reason, at that moment, it just clicked and I figured out the piano puzzle. so i I don't know. I don't know why and why. I tried that puzzle several times and just not been able to figure out what to do. And then suddenly it just made sense to me and felt super obvious. And then since then it's just been like, I've been making like mega progress. I think I might finish this game. Yeah.
00:09:45
Speaker
I think there's a such thing as ah as like adventure game puzzle burnout where you've done so many fetch quests that suddenly you don't know how items work and you forget you have certain inventory. And I really do think that because there have been times where I have forgotten that I have certain items or I lost the plot or I got involved in a different, I guess like a different part of the story. And I really do think it's like burnout. Do you do you think that's true? I do. Like, I just remember. I remember having very similar things happen in King's Quest six. I know I'm talking about King's Quest again, but please just like, bear with me. I know. And I was having like the same kind of thing happen where it's like, oh, I just kind of forgot that I had this. And I ended up looking at, you know, a walkthrough and be like, Oh,
00:10:42
Speaker
I could have figured that out. yeah But there's just so many puzzles in adventure games and Lorelai is more, that's logic puzzle, right? Yeah, and and it's one of those types of games where there's just hints scattered throughout the world and you combine them with the puzzles that are scattered in other places of the world. Sometimes they'll be like right next to each other. It's like there's a lock and right next to the lock, there's a ah weird picture on the wall and you have to you know you have to stare at that picture and figure out how it might be telling you the combination to this lock, right? yeah um But sometimes you know it's a book that you read five hours of gameplay ago on the complete other side of the house.
00:11:30
Speaker
is your clue to, I'm gonna say another lock. There's a lot of locks in the laser eyes. ah a Clue to like a padlock somewhere else. And yeah so that you do get like a sort of burnout because you're like, there sometimes you come across something and you're like, I know I saw something with this symbol on it before. I have no idea where. yeah i don't but Should I just walk around the entire, every part of the house every single screen
Hidden Object Games and Feline Themes
00:12:00
Speaker
again to see if we can find this. um I know, and I feel like we do that a lot in adventure games and that doesn't help either. There's a lot of backtracking. Right, and then you just feel so like exhausted by that that it becomes even harder to like spot the thing you're looking for. um And Lorelai in the Laser Eyes has this cool ah mechanic called, she's like she's got a photographic memory. So basically everything that you've, every pattern or, um
00:12:29
Speaker
letter or note or sign you've seen are recorded in a menu, but when you get 12 hours into this game, that menu is so full of stuff, too, that it's not like not saving you, oh, I'm 21 hours into the game, I just looked. It's a lot. and i' am eighty it there's It also tracks your percentage, and I'm 85% done. I wanna know how that game ends when you actually do finish it because i I'm not like super big on, these are definitely mad games, you know the the witnesses and the mists and things like that are more up your, maybe the Obra Dinn and you can maybe put that in there too. yeah um Those are more your type of games. And I'm always kind of fascinated by how a like a logic puzzle game will conclude. I also, you know, right.
00:13:26
Speaker
I was curious about this as well because a lot of the story in this game is like really weird and abstract and about like post-modernist art in a way. And um it's just, I couldn't find like a discernible story. I could, discover i like throughout a lot of this, I could kind of figure out like There are characters in the past that did things in the past and I couldn't figure out how it pertained to the current situation or anything I was like actively running into in the mansion besides just like thematically. yeah But now at about 85%, I'm starting to unravel real actual story. There's another game I want to talk to you about though that I have been sitting on for a couple episodes now.
00:14:22
Speaker
okay i um I almost don't wanna mention it because I'm a little afraid you'll hang up the podcast and just go start playing it. oh um it is ah but But I'm gonna i'm gonna try. okay All right, so you know how you love hidden object games? yes You know how you love cats? Have you ever heard of the game a castle full of cats? No. Or the game of building full of cats? No, I'm looking at them right now. Or the game an arcade full of cats? No. Or the game a tower full of cats? What
Q&A and Listener Interaction
00:15:00
Speaker
are these? games They are these games, they're these hidden, um I mean, hidden object a la Where's Waldo? Yeah. Where you end up in these, you're in these like, ah ah illustrated,
00:15:15
Speaker
like two color kind of like black and white, but not black and white. It's like blue and dark blue or whatever. Yeah. Like monochromatic monochromatic. Exactly. Yeah. You end up in these monochromatic, highly illustrated environments, like that are kind of like really cluttered illustrations. And there is like a hundred cats on the screen. Holy shit. And you just got to click around and and find all the cats. And some of them are hidden. Like some of them are like, you gotta click on like a drawer and a cat'll pop out of the drawer. yeah But a lot of them are just like, they are in plain sight, but still, it's like hard to see. That's so cute. It really does look really cute. It is very cute. So I played a tower full of cats a couple of weeks ago. um And it's, I think that's the most recent one and it is very, it's very cool. it
00:16:10
Speaker
has this like really interesting soundtrack that the ah the further you go up this tower, each level of the tower is a different um like time period. So it starts in like... okay BC and then moves to like ancient Egypt and then moves to like medieval, moves to like Greek, right? like it um And it's the same, it's like a really good theme song. It's a little repetitive, but one of the things that stops it from being annoying while being repetitive is as you move up the tower, the genre of the theme song changes and like new layers get added. So it's like the same melody,
00:16:53
Speaker
but done in the instruments or the style of each time period.
Game Development Challenges and Preservation
00:17:00
Speaker
And it's really cool, the way it just sort of blends. It looks so cute. Castleful of Cats is the one I most recently finished. But also, I think this is worth mentioning, an arcade full of cats is free. It's free to play. Did you know that? Oh, is it? No, I didn't know that. Castleful of Cats has like, ah
00:17:24
Speaker
I think I saw somewhere they called it a cat troidvania. Because there are objects you find throughout Castle Full of Cats that open new pathways in places you've already been. um But it is just clicking around and finding cats. That's amazing. I'm looking at all the, obviously I looked it up immediately, developer dev cats, publisher dev cats. Yeah, I will absolutely play this game or stream it or something for sure. It's very sweet. It's very soothing. Some of it is very funny.
00:18:03
Speaker
I mean, with the arcade one being free, why not? Also, there's a bundle. Buy a bundle full of cats.
00:18:13
Speaker
Yeah, they're they're really good. um And um the game has like a lot of ah animal rights messaging, right? It has a lot of messaging in it about like. ah you know, adopting instead of buying from pet stores or breeders. and You know, neuter and spay your pets. Like, oh like stuff like that that is nice. Well, thank you for that, Matt. Yeah, of course.
00:18:45
Speaker
I am very excited, and I see the devs also have a game coming out. It's to be announced called the Blue Cat, which looks to be not a hidden object game. It looks to be more or more of an adventure game. They also have like a ton of these games like on their way. right like They're working on Building Full of Cats 2 and Park Full of Cats. I mean, yeah, it's actually kind of brilliant, right? like Yeah. I'm excited now. I'm so excited now. Okay. This is what I was worried about. You know, we still have to record this podcast. I'm like so inspired.
00:19:27
Speaker
No, we can continue because we've got, we have to cause we promised and boasted a Q and a episode. So we're ya hey we're actually to be answering your questions today, guys. Yes, ah these are questions submitted by you, the listeners, to our email, mattandrosesatgmail.com. Well, I'm ready to, I'm ready to just, I mean, I want to play this cat game, but I guess I can wait. So I guess you should play Swanky Catamino. Swanky And then we'll come back and we'll answer your fan questions. Woohoo! Questions! Yay!
00:20:18
Speaker
Hey everyone, welcome back to Save Your Game with me pushing up roses. My co-host, Matt Aucamp. Matt, are you ready to answer listener questions? Oh, hell yeah yeah. Hell yeah, I wanna hear these questions from these listeners. We do wanna give some guidelines for people who are writing questions in. I don't know if we wanna do that at the end or if we should just do that now. We'll do it at the end. Okay, all right. Then let's just jump in. um Do you want me to grab the first one? Yeah, go right, go for it, grab it. Okay. Don't actually grab it. So this one is from Matt, and he asks about language puzzles in games. He says
Adventure Games: Survival Horror and Hybrids
00:21:00
Speaker
that we've mentioned Chance of Sinar, but he's also curious about Tunic, which I have played. Have you ever played Tunic?
00:21:10
Speaker
I have not, no. It's like a it's a zell it's just like a Zelda-like, but you were given the manual, and it looks like an old Zelda manual, only the entire thing is written in the language you don't understand. Okay. You kind of have to, as you go, figure out what this thing is saying to you, right? Like you have to like, based on things that you encounter in the world and based on the way that you,
00:21:41
Speaker
um
00:21:44
Speaker
ah like the symbols you see, you have to kind of just like figure out what what this manual is trying to tell you if you also find pages from the, more pages from the manual as you go along. um And so it's almost like, i yeah, one of these Metroid brainias, right? Like your progress is gated by the knowledge that you gain. i I don't, what do you think about language puzzles in games? so I mean, I have a lot of thoughts about how we use language in adventure games. I'm not sure if I have many thoughts on language puzzles. Something that springs to mind, I think real quick to to show how clunky they can be if they're not done right.
00:22:26
Speaker
is there's a little bit of ah a language, actually there's multiple kind of language-esque puzzles in Gabriel Knight's Sins of the Fathers, where you have to write in code on a tomb or you have to decipher rata drum ah rota drum rhythms, I guess you call them. yeah And I thought those were mildly clunky. And I think a lot of people would agree. ah But I also think about like, when I think about language in adventure games, I also think about things like dropsy, which is more of ah of a
00:23:01
Speaker
of the way they use language. So this might be a little bit off topic, but they are and they are asking about like language. So as long as we're on the topic, um Dropsy has been one of the most accessible games that I've ever played because the language, the dialogue are all pictures. There's ok there's no writing in that game. And I kind of love that. I kind of love how language can either make something very challenging or it can make something extremely accessible like drops. Yeah, there's no writing in drops. It is all based on little pictures that you get when you're talking about the Gabriel Knight thing. The problem with the language puzzles in those games was how um specific you had to be. Right. Yes. Another example is the tape player, the cutting and
00:23:49
Speaker
Yeah, oh yeah. In two, right? In two, yeah. um Recording people and cutting it up. It's like, you could get the message across, but if you didn't do it in the exact right
Identifying and Exploring Adventure Games
00:24:00
Speaker
way, yeah it wouldn't count. And it the same for when you wrote on the tomb. Yeah. um That one was just absurd. I mean, I have it drilled into my brain now, because I play it so much. But but looking back at it, you know, objectively, that is way too difficult. There definitely should be some leniency there. Yeah, it's um it's it's i I think it's impossible. I don't think you could do that without a walkthrough. I don't know how anybody ever did. There was also something like that in Laura Bow. There was a ah
00:24:36
Speaker
cryptogram in Laura Bowe, in Dagger of Amun-Ra that we just played. Yes, I was thinking about that too, yeah. And you don't really need to solve the cryptogram to beat that game. Even to solve the puzzle, you don't really need to solve the cryptogram. um But I did, because I didn't know. And the biggest problem was that the translation thing is like two screens away. Mm-hmm. like your um your alphabet is like two screens away from the thing you need to translate. right Like that it's really, really difficult to jump back and forth between them. um But i I actually really like cryptograms. um yeah Over time I've developed, I can get them done pretty quickly, yeah especially even if I don't have any,
00:25:31
Speaker
sort of hint, if I don't have any sort of starting place, you know, you can find a kind of like, um look for the word the, or look for the word yeah I, or an, or am, and then usually build out from there. yeah um
00:25:46
Speaker
But I remember one example, kind of like this, um was in the game, was it, it was Riven, I think. I can't remember if it was Riven or Mist, but I think it was Riven where you have to decipher their number system. ah sounds like It sounds like a Riven thingy. It was really, really brilliant. and um And it makes you feel like a genius, sitting down and just trying to figure out like, okay, this is a number system that is different than ours. Yeah.
00:26:25
Speaker
what could it possibly be? I think it's still in base 10, which ah made it easier, but still. So yeah, that's that's not exactly language, but it is, I don't know, a very cool thing. Yeah, I agree. ah Language-esque. Okay, wow why don't you give us our next question? Sure. Our next question comes from Agnes. Hi Agnes. um Let's see. What's up? What's up?
00:27:01
Speaker
ah So their their title here, their subject is development and canceled adventure games. My question is, what are some adventure games which you think had really interesting development, whether it was easy or a huge mess, and if the game is even finished? A game that comes to mind is the canceled Warcraft game ah that was discovered years back, which I learned about from Rose's video, my video. Yeah, the Warcraft adventure game. Yeah. ah Yeah. i I found the, I don i guess you could call it a demo or something. and I want to speak on that, actually. Yeah, please. I thought that game.
00:27:36
Speaker
i I think what happened now in my in my fascination is I'm morbidly curious being I am a Warcraft fan. I do like the Warcraft games and I do like, you know, the lore and the characters. And even though that game wasn't quite working in adventure game, I kind of wanted to see it finished. I wanted them to see it through. um Because it was just so fascinating. A Warcraft adventure game. I mean, I'm deeper. It sounds so fun, right? right beloved franchise and I guess we kind of we kind of passed that right because we have World of Warcraft now which is adventurey in its own right I don't know if we if anybody is you know you know wanting a warcraft point and click game specifically yeah I don't I don't know ah but that's actually the game I would have answered with they also mention about the adventure game hive swap um and
00:28:31
Speaker
I vaguely like was ah was was looking into Hiveswap. um And I don't quite remember what happened to it. But most mostly, I just think it's really sad when adventure games get go into development hell or get canceled. Because you know this is a genre both me and Matt really love. And we we would love to see everything come to fruition. But you know also, this is I think that just proves this is not an easy genre to to write and to promote.
00:29:04
Speaker
This is ah basically every Tex Murphy game after Under a Killing Moon. yeah that's right Clearly went through some kind of development hell because three of them turned into remakes of Mean Streets. Yeah, that's true. That is true. so after, after, am I getting the order right? Was it under killing moon, then Pan, or was it, it was Mean Streets? Under killing moon was four. Mean Streets was before killing moon. Mean Streets was number one, then Martian Memorandum, then Pandora Directive, then under killing moon, right? I don't remember where, I don't remember when Pandora Directive, I don't know where that is on the timeline. Okay. I don't know why, I just don't know where that is on the timeline at all.
00:30:00
Speaker
i' am going to I'm just pull up the Wikipedia here. Oh, Pandora Directive is the fourth. Okay, I thought Under a Killing Moon was the fourth. I am a dumb. Okay, no, no, no, it's fine. So i i Pandora Directives actually was a pretty solid entry, but then Overseer is like this weird mashup between like a sequel to Pandora, direct like Pandora Directive, It's been a while since I've played this, so some of this could be wrong. um But I think there is a there's a plot thread that's dangling that Overseer sort of picks up, but then retells the story of Mean Streets. Then text Tesla Effect is supposed to then, I think, pick up. like Tesla Effect was like then moving the story forward.
00:30:55
Speaker
right but then ended up being a remake of, and ah in certain ways. So yeah, seven years after Texan's love interests were attacked at the end of Tex Murphy Oversteer, seer the story starts as Tex suddenly awakes. Okay, yeah, that was a game that also started out really high production values, really, really good. And then just sort of like halfway through the game just falls into nothing. I remember, yeah, I remember you saying that, that you were like disappointed.
00:31:29
Speaker
and then they were supposed to release a another Tex Murphy game, and that turned into another remake of ah Mean Streets. And then died, right? like yeah it's The Murphy games have been just really, really bad. I think we just need to let that franchise go. Yeah, for for development. I think that's a good answer. Would you like to hit the next question? Yeah, so this person doesn't sign their email, so it won't say their name. This is a recommendation email, which we got a lot of, and I want to go through them. We're going to kind of rapid fire them at the end. This person recommends a very interesting game. ah They say, ah they they mentioned the game Arkane.
00:32:22
Speaker
online mystery serial and it's a series of episodic flash point and click games that ran for two seasons from 1999 to 2000. It's about a trio of paranormal investigators from 1920s England who run afoul of cult shenanigans. Probably more hassle than it's worth because of the death of flash. Yeah. But I think that's a really interesting suggestion. And I think, why don't I, I have like, again, as I said in an episode before, I have this like archive of old flash games all on this one console. So let's see if we can find it. Okay, I have two of these games. I have online, Arcane Online, Mystery Serial, The Stone Circle, and The Miller Estate.
00:33:09
Speaker
They look interesting, they definitely look Flash. They look like Flash games. Yeah, for sure. i'vet i mean I haven't played a Flash game in many years. Yeah, but I i might check these out. Okay. That seems interesting. i do We have talked about this once before, but I do think it's a real fucking shame the way so many cool Flash games have been lost. Yeah, it's rough. Yeah. Just not something you can predict, you know, with that with that kind of thing. Yeah. All right. So this next question comes from Michelle. Hi, Michelle. They want to know, have you ever heard of Andrew Plotkin's cruelty scale and a real they actually link us to ah to a source that says it. ah Yeah, i'm I'm clicking through it now. if you Are you looking at it? I am looking at the wiki for it. Yeah.
00:34:07
Speaker
No, I've actually have never heard of this, but it says it's a rating system devised by Andrew Plotkin to measure how difficult a particular work of interaction fiction makes it for the player to progress. That's really interesting. Right. ah The ratings go for merciful, which is you can never die or get stuck. It's always beatable. No progress can be lost. So that's like your LucasArts game. So there's a lot of point and click games that are like this. You never. You'll never be, there's no setbacks besides ah the time it takes you to solve a puzzle. yeah And then polite, you can die, polite is funny. You can die, but you cannot get stuck. Beatable as long as the player has at least one save, but some progress may be lost if the character dies and the most recent save is far back.
00:35:00
Speaker
No walking dead scenarios. Right, no soft locking basically. Yeah, what is, I know there's a thousand examples of this. Do you have one off the top of your head? Oh gosh, I would have to think. I think, oh, what about, I mean, what about Disco Elysium? You can die, but I think that. Oh yeah, you're always gonna. You can always go back and yeah. Yeah, you'll always finish the game. Yeah, that's a good one. That's a good one, yeah. Tough can get stuck, but at this is obvious beforehand. ah They give examples here. So like the player passes by a key, then arrives at a bridge. The game warns the player that the bridge is unstable. If the player crosses, the bridge falls and the player is stuck at the locked door without the key. That's kind of like a DM in ah in a Dungeons and Dragons scenario, right? Yeah, yeah. um Where your DM might be like, we'll try to strongly hint like ah you here,
00:35:53
Speaker
the sound of rustling on the other side of the door. yeah You see a bunch of skeletons laying around the flame along the floor. da good your you you yeah This It's like, are you sure you want to open this door with no weapons? And no and they do and then they die. And honestly, some of the later some of the later Sierra games made ah an effort to do that. King's Quest VI does that a lot. They'll be like, you sure? You sure you want to do that? And even ah the last game we talked about on the podcast, Dagger of Amun-Ra, there are obvious things that you should not do in this game. ah You mentioned the cheese being on a trap. That's obviously hooked up to like a machine gun. Maybe be careful around that. You know what I mean? Yeah. Yeah.
00:36:42
Speaker
Nasty, can get stuck, but this is obvious afterward. Beatable by saving frequently or arbitrarily. Yeah. Okay, yeah, so when it's obvious afterward, I'm trying to think of a good example. Okay, the cheese is another good example of that. I knew exactly, but if you gu if you get to the rats, you go, ah, I should have gotten the cheese. Yep, yep, exactly. you're It's not like, um It's not like ah King's Quest, one is it two? The bridal and the snake? Yeah, I believe that is two. Which would fall under the final ah rating, which is cruel. Can get stuck in this is not obvious afterwards, beatable by ah arbitrarily saving the multiple files. So this would be... That's that's the King's Quest. but i I don't know why I can't beat the snake. Nothing is helping me beat the snake. Yeah.
00:37:36
Speaker
I've used all my items on the snake and I can't figure out how I beat the snake. And then you look it up and it's like, oh, you had to pick up a bridle, which is- That was very hidden, by the way. That was very hidden. Yeah. And then use it on a snake. There's no point where you'd be like, oh man, if only I had a bridle. If only. Yeah, yeah. Because that comes to mind when you're up against a snake. This is interesting. Yeah, I like this cruelty scale. I mean, I obviously don't do videos on adventure games too much anymore. yeah But actually, this is that kind of inspires me to like do a themed one on cruelty and like use a cruelty scale to do it. yeah it's kind of like It's kind of like those tiers that people do. like They put things in like the A tier, the S tier, except this is a cruelty scale. Yeah, this is really cool. Thank you for directing us.
00:38:33
Speaker
Yeah, and thank you for thinking of us. That's really nice. Speaking of people just sending us things that are that are that are nice and and helpful. Yeah. Elle sends us a they ask us about if we're ever going to do how much do my pants weigh again? And ah they send us a spreadsheet they made. Okay, so ah based on Elle's calculations, how much do you think Guybrush Pete throughputs pants weight during? Like during Le Chucks, so where can you like tell me where about?
00:39:16
Speaker
ah this just see This just has all the inventory. Just all the inventory, oh my god, okay. I'm gonna go with like, oh my god, 200 pounds? Okay, actually a little less than that. Oh really? Heaviest items, because at one point he holds the heer ah figurehead of a ship. Right, exactly. I don't know how much that would weigh, but... And the horn of a ship, he holds ah two different monkeys. different monkeys of of course ah He holds a telescope, which is 10 pounds. He holds a shovel with just five pounds. yeah um And a big bag of parrot chow, which is five pounds. So El did this really cool thing where you can, oh my God, this is really cool. You can check, you can select the things
00:40:12
Speaker
Yeah. With a check mark. Yeah. in the In the column, currently in my pants. Currently in my pants? but That's amazing. So at any point in the game, you can take the, and say like, okay, at this moment, how much do my pants weigh? Yeah. That is very cool. I am...
00:40:38
Speaker
um We got to bring that out we got to bring back. the We only ever did it once. It's such a good segment. It is a good segment. You know what we we should do is I would like to dress up that segment a little bit for the little bit of intro music. We'll put it in there like on purpose. That will quiz me. I'll do my best. how much do my pants weigh? And I'll have to off to find some examples where it's like, not that much. Because otherwise it's just gonna be like, you'll probably always guess 200 pounds. Oh my God, we've gotta start, we've gotta try King's Quest I because you've you go around carrying all these jewels. Just like random and just the most random stuff. Yeah, I guessed 200 and I think I did pretty good.
00:41:23
Speaker
I'm going to save this. Nice. You did do good. I'm going to download this. I'm going to save this to my computer and L we are going to use your spreadsheet and we are going to bring back how much to my face way. So thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you so much. David gives us some game recommendations which we'll talk about a little later. um David says, do you guys like seeing more than one style gameplay mechanics on point and click adventure games like platforming or combat elements? um I know you guys mentioned that point and click adventure games were limited by the media they were working on. So the amount of energy activity was limited. But now that technology has advanced, point and click adventure games could
00:42:06
Speaker
ah combined could combine different ah gameplay mechanics as well. Do you think this is possible to combine smoothly different gameplay mechanics or is the point and click adventure genre incompatible with other gameplay mechanics? Well, David, ah traditionally, historically, this has not worked very well. We did a whole video on a game that that attempted that, which is Harvester. where And now now keep in mind, Harvester
00:42:38
Speaker
It wasn't fully integrated into the whole game. So the first part of harvester was pointing click. And then the second suddenly had both pointing click and melee combat right elements. And I don't think that worked very well. However, I do think based on the mechanic, it can work. So I'm i'm currently playing a space for the unbound where it is an adventure game. You wouldn't call it anything else, but it has these very well done, very enjoyable quote, combat elements to it, ah where, yeah, so where suddenly you're, you're, you know, you're calm, you're fighting someone, you're, you're fighting a boss, let's say, but you're not actually doing anything, Mortal Kombat, you're just, um, it gives you like almost a dance dance revolution type of a thing where you hit up, down, left, right, Z, and then you hit them. And if you do it in time, you land a hit.
00:43:32
Speaker
And these are intertwined in the gameplay, they're not a separate section, ah just like, you know, harvester was. So I think it can work. I think it absolutely can work. I think it works well with games like adventure, action adventures like Zelda, right? Zelda is a really good example of adventure, adventure game feelings, puzzles, talking to people, but also there is pretty smooth combat. And it it does work depending on on the world. But if you're just... I think Matt and I have both run into adventure games where they do try to put in some kind of combat element, and it just doesn't work. It just doesn't work for like a variety of reasons, you know? Right. So I...
00:44:17
Speaker
I wanna point to some examples though, yeah where it does very much work. So Brock, the investigator, is a beat-em-up slash point and click, right? Where a lot of scenarios, you have the choice to solve puzzles or get into like a beat-em-up, double dragon-esque fight. yeah um And the combat's not amazing, but the it doesn't, make the, like, even if the combat's, even if you don't love the combat, it's not gonna make the game bad. The game is very good, even including this. And I think enhances the game. I think Brock the Investigator is really, really good. um Another one that I'll point to is Lair of the Clockwork God. That's a good one. That is like the ultimate, ah the ultimate example. And we've talked about it on the show before, but it's a Ben and Dan game where Ben,
00:45:16
Speaker
is happy continuing to be a point and click adventure. And so he just wants to keep ah finding inventory objects and combining them and having long conversations with people and solving obtuse puzzles. But Dan thinks they'll be more successful if they turn into a darling indie platform. Yeah, an indie darling. So he refuses to have inventory. and refuses to solve puzzles, and he just runs around and jumps and stuff. ah And ah Ben is so insistent about this, he won't even step over like a minor ledge. So there comes in just like one point. So it is it's combined only in the sense of you have to go back and forth between platforming segments with Dan, which admittedly aren't the most complex
00:46:04
Speaker
platforming in the world but right is smooth and is and really it does work and then ah Ben who has really good point and click adventure puzzles and sometimes in order to get to an inventory item that Ben needs you have to use your platforming as Dan and sometimes ah to ah let Dan pass by an obstacle you have to solve a puzzle as Ben and it's really cool if you've never played Lair of the Clockwork God you really you really should. It's got something for just about everybody. And it is honestly laugh out loud funny. Besides. It has a reputation for being a very genuinely funny game. I don't laugh at loud out loud at a lot of video games. I find myself ah smiling,
00:46:57
Speaker
maybe giving like a little. Right? but Yeah. This game I just absolutely, yeah I laughed out loud many, many, many times. I'll give one more example, which yeah is is in an interesting combination of things. It's the game Bulb Boy. Have you played Bulb Boy? I have not. It is just a point and click game, but it's a point and click game with a lot of intense boss fights in it. And the boss fights, like you solve them by doing puzzles, not by doing combat, but it has the effect of combat. And it's cute. You're literally a little light bulb boy and your house got invaded by monsters. But, ah
00:47:50
Speaker
It does combine genres in that way where, yeah, you feel like you're having boss fights, but you never feel like you know there's a ah twitchy skill challenge to it. Yeah. Uh, this next question comes from Tom and they say, I grew up with six adventures, uh, Lucas arts and Sierra, but happily crossed over into survival horror through alone in the dark. And I have no mouth and I'm a scream. Would you consider those games and more recent ones like amnesia adventure games or across breed? So I actually did. I actually did talk about this in a, in a very old video. I don't know if it is still a good video or not, but I did a video on a alone in the dark.
00:48:39
Speaker
And I did talk about, I, I decided in that, in that video, that survival horror is a sub genre, they do hold hands with adventure games. I'm kind of reminded of something like clock tower, which came out for the Super Famicom. And It is absolutely an adventure game. That is what you are doing. You are collecting stuff. You are looking through rooms. you are just It has a horror spin on it. And the horror spin, unlike the last question that we just answered, it's not really combat based, right? It's like running and finding things, but those are actually puzzle based. And that's why I think that they are more just a traditional adventure game
00:49:27
Speaker
than a crossbreed, because even in a clock tower, you are essentially, when you're hiding, that's a puzzle in itself. You need to know what to do, how to hide, push this against this thing. right you know What is the right answer? You can lose. ah So I think they are and they are adventure games in their own right. What do you think, Matt? Yeah, I think i think so too. i think they are I think they're basically like these walking simulator games with this tension building time limit on. Yeah. Right. It's like I guess you could say that the sneaking. Is a mechanic that is not that it is skill based. Sure. Like games with sneaking, maybe you can say are more like hybrid, but games where ah there's just a tension and you've got. You know, you maybe aren't actually in danger.
00:50:26
Speaker
of being killed at any point, or games where, like you said, ah the way to beat the monster is to hide, yeah or even just to wait, not like sneaking through the dark, but just wait. yeah That's solving, that's technically solving a puzzle. um The only difference between that and any other puzzle, like any other adventure game is that there are, you know, Uh, there are timers that if you don't do a thing in a certain amount of time, you die. And then yeah you just restart to usually just restart back like a couple of rooms or something. So, yeah um, I don't think we need to gate keep like ah the, Nate, like the genre of adventure game, right? Like, I think like, uh,
00:51:16
Speaker
If you feel like they're an adventure game, they're an adventure game. If they help you find other things that are similar to them, whether they're horror or not, then that categorization is going to be useful to you. But um I would start to feel like they get a little bit away from adventure games when they involve like collecting um like searching for weapons and ammo. Yeah, I would agree. Yes, I agree with that. And ah like if that's part of the survival and even searching for food, like when when it starts to get to to be a little bit more like, um I don't know. Well, like don't starve.
00:51:52
Speaker
right or um I was thinking like The Last of Us or something when it gets to me like digging through drawers looking for pieces of things to put together so that if you run into a monster you can shoot them like there's some of these games that are a little bit more not necessarily The Last of Us which is a little bit more action adventure game but like There's some of these survival horror games where that is an element. I think that's starting to get further away from it. And again, games where stealth is a part of it is getting a little further away from it. Yeah, I'd agree with that. This next question comes from Antonios. And he says, here is an easy one for you. What is the future of adventure games? Ah, the future. I think we're in it. I think, you know what? I don't know.
00:52:44
Speaker
I can't answer that. I can't answer anything about the future. I am just here for the journey and the evolution of it all. I can give you my hopes and like my dreams about what I think might happen. um Look, all I want, all I want is Grim Fandango 2. Well I want, that's my answer. I think Antonius is being a little coy here. Obviously this isn't a is an an easy question. Of course, yeah. and I don't think we, yeah, obviously we can't really answer this question, but I do think we're just gonna see a lot more of what we're seeing now. We're gonna see ah hybrids and
00:53:27
Speaker
We're gonna, yeah, we're gonna see different paths, right? We're gonna see hybrids in all different directions. Also, we're going to see people with a lot of nostalgia building games based around the no nostalgia. But I think what's gonna be interesting is that as time goes on, that nostalgia is going to be warped by a ah lack of personal experience. yeah um Like, there's a difference between playing ah Secret of Monkey Island on a DOS-based computer.
00:53:59
Speaker
bright with a two button mouse um and a big clunky keyboard and you know shitty old timey speakers. There's a difference between that and playing it now on a modern console with an emulator. yeah It's the same game, but the experience is very different. So I think even nostalgia games are going to
00:54:27
Speaker
continue to like evolve away from actually being similar to what they were in the past, and I think that's cool. I like that, and I don't, I'm not worried about it. um Oh yeah, me either. I think we are entering an era of where there's just, go there're already there's too many games that come out in a year to be for anybody to keep up with, and too many very good games that would, there's too many games that would maybe become our favorite games of all time for us to even play. I know, it's a problem. I know, I just think we are, I just think we're in just like a golden age and I just i think agree the future of adventure games is it's gonna fucking rule. Good answer, Matt. Thank you.
00:55:18
Speaker
I am going to take the next one, and this might be a short answer. um yeah it's not it's It's no offense to Tyler who's asking, but I think we kind of answered this in our last question, so I just want to put that out there. They actually want to know what characteristics or qualifications do games have to possess before they become an adventure game. you know They're kind of asking And I think you answered this very well, Matt, um you know, what mechanics disqualify it from being an adventure game. And I think you pretty much said, you know, it kind of turns away when there are more survival elements than adventure gaming elements.
00:55:58
Speaker
yeah There's a distinction there. I think it's skill, right? A lot of people play, and this is where the the genre distinction that I often like to throw away, um this is where it becomes useful. There's a lot of people who like to play adventure games because they do not have the motor capabilities to play skill-based games. Yeah. They don't have, you know, they're not They don't have very good fine motor function, or they're just not very good at it, right? It doesn't necessarily have to be a disability. They maybe just aren't very good at it. um And so they like to play games where ah the only thing they have to use is their mind. and i think So we think the more skill-based challenges you put in a game, the further it gets from an adventure game. Yeah, I agree. What does it need to have? I don't know.
00:56:51
Speaker
That's a different kind of question. I think at the very least, at the very least, it needs to have puzzles. And when we say puzzles, it's got to kind of fit either that fetch quest or a mist type of deal. That seems to be at least the common denominator with a lot of adventure games. there is There's a heavy puzzle element to it. I don't know, i would continue I would consider visual novels adventure games. That's true. No, that's a good point. Some walking simulators don't have puzzles. So i my the one thing I was going to say is the thing it has to have a story. Yeah, but a lot of older adventure games don't really have one. I know. And there's some more laser eyes. That doesn't really you don't quite know. um The witness doesn't have a story. I don't know. The witness doesn't have a story. Yeah, you're right. So there are a lot of puzzle games that
00:57:46
Speaker
don't have story, but that because there's exploration, fall more under. I mean, it's that, it's puzzle, exploration, and story are the three pinnacles of adventure games. And I think it's like, you gotta have at least two. There's some variation there, obviously, because genres have variations. But yeah, I would agree. And I think in exploration, that's a very big part of it. Baba is you isn't an adventure game. Correct, it's only a puzzle game. Yes, because it's only a puzzle game. It doesn't have any exploration and it doesn't have any story. But if Baba was walking around a world full of words and having to stumble into the solutions, it's an adventure game. And if um if each
00:58:33
Speaker
puzzle chapter unveiled a new part of a story, it would have been an adventure game, but because it doesn't have either, I think it is like two out of three. You gotta have puzzle, exploration, story, you gotta have two out of three. And I'm sure somebody could easily write in and point us to a ton of games that break those rules and that's fucking fine. yeah
00:59:01
Speaker
um Okay, next, this, I love this, and I i don't know if i we wanna encourage more of these questions. It seems like every um ah adventure game Reddit and adventure game Facebook, this is what they all, like Facebook group or whatever, this is what they all become full of. But it is very, it's very funny
00:59:30
Speaker
I don't know. Okay. Hi, Matt and roses. I'm driving myself crazy here trying to find an adventure game from when I was younger and was hoping you all could help, ah right? Like, uh, again, I love that this email came in, but again, I don't know if we want to encourage this. I feel like I, I feel like I'm never any help is the thing. Like a lot of the time, well, sometimes I can help. look I think you're going to, I think you're going to get this one. I think you're going to get this one. Uh, I got it. I got it immediately and I don't always get these, but I think you're gonna get these, this one. Okay. If I described the game, do you think you may recognize it? My friend had it back in the 90s, 2000s, at least before 2003. Everything was made of clay and stop motion animation ah hu and had a very odd world vibe. The character was like a dog with a white head and white arms and red chest, but like walked upright. Does this sound at all familiar to you?
01:00:27
Speaker
Well, yes, it does, Michael. I think that you are thinking and searching for the Neverhood. I'm sure this person is searching for the Neverhood. Yeah, the Neverhood is a very silly adventure game. Yes. Very very claymated, very artistic. Very abstract too, a lot of the puzzles are very weird and abstract. I don't even know if I like that game very much, quite frank, but it has a novelty to it for for sure. It's got a very strange soundtrack too, like it defies you to like it. I dare you to like this game, I dare you. There's a point in the Neverhood where there is a story
01:01:13
Speaker
like a backstory written on a wall. yeah And you can walk, I think like a hundred screens to the right and just keep reading this story. This is like somebody's like artistic endeavor. And there is not like a teleport at the end. You have to run all the way back. You know what? It's one of those games I saw heavily advertised on Home of the Underdogs. Yeah. And I really wanted to play it, but of course I couldn't get it running. And now it's been released. So you can play this game, ah Michael. It has actually been released. ah And I was like, oh, it's probably on GOG. It is on GOG, I'm pretty sure. But again, I was just kind of like, oh, OK. So it's. But that I'm very confident that that's what you're thinking of. I've never beaten Neverhood. No, either.
01:02:04
Speaker
I've played it many times, like I try to go back to it. It's also, um we talk about lonely games. Yeah, that's a good one. It is a very lonely game. I don't exactly know why, but there's something about its vibe that is very, very lonely. I think it's aesthetic, the aesthetic choice. I think we do have something that's a little bit less detailed because you are working with clay and claymation stop motion is very, very involved. I did a little bit of it in college and
01:02:37
Speaker
Yeah, I think when you're kind of dealing with that, it's just got a vibe, just like this inherent vibe. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Okay. But yeah, neverhood. That is what you're thinking of. I am 99.5% sure. I think let's say if you guys really, really need the help, Feel free to write these questions in, we might be able to help, but again, I just don't want our inbox to become nothing but, just as I don't want our inbox to become nothing but recommendations, I also don't want our inbox to become nothing but can you identify this key? Yeah, I understand, absolutely. Okay, what's the next one?
01:03:16
Speaker
Let's see. Our next one is from, they didn't sign it. So I know I'm not going to say a name, but they say they love the show and they want to know if any of us have a play date. And when they say play date, they don't mean a dog play date, which we don't have. They mean the console, the little handheld play date. My God. I know Matt really wants one, i will so yeah but they're like a thousand. dollars How much are they? They're like $500. They're pretty this tiny little. Okay. If you guys don't know what a play date is, a play date is this tiny little, it's this handheld game system. Oh, they're only, they're only They're only $200. All right.
01:04:02
Speaker
They are a, yeah, there's this little monochrome ah Game Boy looking thing. ah They have a, a um what do you call it? Like a direction pad directional pad, and they have a B button and an A button, and they have a little crank on the side. Yeah, I love the crank. The crank is very cool. They've commissioned games from some really like cool ah video game developers, including Lucas Pope, whose new game is on the play date. Yeah, that's pretty wild considering it's such a small little, like little handheld. Yeah, he's got a game called Mars After Midnight that is very, that is like a silly version of um ah Papers, Please. Yeah. And it looks really sweet, really cool. I was, ah, man.
01:04:58
Speaker
I would love a play date. Oh man. Somebody getting mad a play date. Yeah. If you, if anybody in the audience has $200 free dollars to send your boy a play date, I'll review every play date. You hear it here. You hit it here. First folks that if you send Matt a play date, he will review the games on the play date for you. And I have no idea. Like what if every game on the play date is like $70? It's like, like it's screw they spent $200 for me to spend like ah like a thousand dollars. Yeah. That's funny. But no, I will, I will, I will review play date. I will review one. We can do Matt's play date corner. If somebody buys me fucking places sometimes I look at a play date.
01:05:46
Speaker
and I just wanna cry because I'm like, I'll never own this thing. We need to go to the next question before Matt starts calling. Okay, next question is from our good pal, Dana Brain, who asks about achievements in choice-based games. Basically, when games have long routes, that take many, many choices to get to and then you get achievements based on like parts, like mile markers on those routes. yeah How do you feel about that? So are you talking about in-game achievements or are you talking about like a steam achievement? Or is at the center we are we just is that the same thing at this point, I suppose? Because if, I'll i'll just say this, if we're talking about
01:06:36
Speaker
Like achievements that the devs put on Steam, you know, you got 14 out of 16 achievements. It really varies for me, but for the most part, I don't care until I actually get them. So I'm not exactly seeking out to play adventure games to get the achievements, but I will say I feel really good when I get them. Like when I stumbled upon them, it it actually does make me feel really good. And then at the end, I'm kind of looking through my achievements and seeing what I could get. I don't know if that would make me do a replay. You know, I don't know if getting achievements would make me, it would incentivize me to do a replay of the whole game. Let's say that. So Dana is actually saying that reading this question a little closer, Dana is saying that in the game Soma,
01:07:26
Speaker
ah The achievements come from story moments and not from choice. You do not get so you do not get achievements for story moment ah or sorry for choices and they think that this is intentional um on the first part so that you you have no, you don't you don't get rewarded or punished. for any choices you make. I think that's really smart and um I do find it frustrating when achievements are attached to choices because like yeah I don't want to play
01:07:58
Speaker
a seven hour game again, just to get different achievements, especially when there are certain games where like the story doesn't change all that much. Yeah. I think I'm more incentivized to do like a completionist route in non-adventure games. So one of my favorite games of all time, I replay it every now and then as Bajo Kazooie. Okay. That game is made for people who want to 100% a game. And I do. i Same with ah Mario 64. That is a game, you know, you collect every coin, you get every star, you do all the in banjos even more, you know, you collect every ginger or you collect every musical note.
01:08:42
Speaker
So I guess, I guess like adventure games, I don't notice as much whether it's, you know, whether it be story-based achievement in Soma or more of a choice-based achievement. I guess I don't notice it as much yeah unless it's like in those collect-a-thon games and then I'm more incentivized. I don't know why. I don't really get anything for doing it, you know, other than it's saying, you did it. and's like so But yeah. I just discovered something. I was like looking through my 100%, my perfect games on Steam, and i just like it reminded me of something. um So there is a ah visual novel hidden within, I don't even know if it's hidden. It's actually a very clever puzzle in a game that we were talking about earlier, which is Lair of the Clockwork God. OK.
01:09:34
Speaker
um It's called Devil's Kiss. And there's one achievement in the game. and And that achievement is called, basically read a book. And the description is clicked all the way to the end of the game. Which is a very funny burn on ah visual novels. Yeah, for sure. um
01:10:00
Speaker
Yeah. Okay. What's our next? I don't know if that fully answers Dana Brain's question, but we did it work work We got to rush through these last few because we're getting long. What's the next one? okay so The next question comes from Tim. Tim is wondering, would the two of you ever consider covering console exclusive adventure games? I didn't have a computer until I was a teenager. so I grew up in adventure games like the and NES port of deja vu, Princess Tomato and Salad Kingdom, which is a banger and a classic.
01:10:31
Speaker
and Scooby Doo mysteries for the Genesis, which is also a very good adventure game. I would love to hear your take on those or any of the Japan exclusives. So I actually have a covered console adventure games on my own channel on the Pushing of Roses channel. I haven't played a lot of them, but the ones, because I grew up on a computer, I'm the opposite of you, Tim. I grew up with my computer and then later on I had my consoles, like I had my Genesis and I had my N64. But as you can probably tell from the last question, it was mostly for platforming and and things of that nature. So I have done Scooby-Doo. Matt, I think that'd be a great game for us to cover. I don't know if you have you played it? I've not played Scooby-Doo. I've also not played the Salad Kingdom one.
01:11:17
Speaker
Okay, those are, like I mean, Princess Tomato is a classic. Scooby-Doo is just like a surprisingly good adventure game. I have heard that. I've heard that about it. They're both very good. But I've also covered- Deja Vu, I have played and I liked a lot. Yeah, I like deja vu as well. I've also covered like if you go to the pushing up roses channel, I covered um cosmic spacehood, which is a very interesting ah little hybrid adventure game where there's some some side scrolling but mostly point and click adventure and that was on the Genesis as well. so So I don't think we're opposed to that at all. I think we could if if Matt is willing to, we could do Scooby Doo or are definitely Princess Tomato. I think that's a beloved game.
01:12:08
Speaker
Yeah, I might do one of those. It might be fun to check out um the n NES versions of some of the LucasArts games, too. Yes, I've actually checked out a few versions of the Sierra games. Those are also on my channel. So, you know, King's Quest 5 on the I think it was the NES. Oh, I hear that's really bad. Yeah, I do not recommend that at all. It is you know an abomination. Do you remember the game, the and NES game Boy and His Blob? but Oh, yes, I do, yeah. You feed the blob jelly beans and it turns into different items. Yeah, that's a classic. Yeah, I wonder like what you would classify that game as. Is it just like a puzzle platform? Is it an adventure game? Is that a puzzle platformer? Is it a metroidvania? The side scroller, right?
01:13:02
Speaker
I mean, kind of, it's kind of a size. Yeah, no, you can go back. Yeah. Cause you can go back and forth. Like, you know, it's one of those mysteries like toe jam and Earl. We don't you have to unlock new jelly beans, right? Yeah. Yeah. It's like toe jam and Earl. Yeah. Maybe that would be a fun, that would be a fun episode too. Covering these like weird, like, yeah. Toe jam and Earl and boy in his blob. Oh, that would be a great double feature for a future episode. ah to him and ear And boy in his blob. What are these? What is this game, really? OK, this is our last real question. I do want to also highlight something that Dana Brain points out ah because we've been talked about game preserv preservation several times in the show. um ah Dana Brain directed us to ah the Stop Destroying Games initiative um by Ross Scott.
01:14:00
Speaker
It's just ah something, something worth checking out um and supporting because I do think this is a serious problem. Yeah. And we, as retro adventures, but especially in adventure games where there's so many that really get lost to be honest. Yeah. That's something we very much care about. um But okay, this is last question comes from a old buddy of mine. this I used to do comedy with this guy in Philadelphia. ah Sorry to call you out. His name's Pete Rambo, which ah is a cool name. That's a miracle very cool name, Pete. Well done. His question is, what's your pick for worst non-adventure game mechanic or gameplay element of an adventure game?
01:14:48
Speaker
ah He points out that Quest for Glory-esque fight towards the end of Conquest of Camelot and the spaceship fight in Space Quest III. Man, I can almost hear the gears going in Matt's head because I think I know what you might say. ah For me, and I don't know if this is the worst or not. I'm going to put it out there. But I think the stealth things in Quest for Glory V are horrendous and don't work. Like at all. i I was so excited. See, when I play Quest for Glory, I always, I'm always a thief. I always like to stealth whenever I can. But and for for whatever reason in Quest for Glory 5, it didn't seem to matter. Anytime I tried to stealth, like sometimes I could get away with it. But for the most part, I was just a thief fighting everybody. That is how I played Quest for Glory 5. I don't know if that's just broken or if I don't know what I'm doing.
01:15:48
Speaker
but I'm gonna go out on a limb and say that Matt might be veering towards a monkey combat. Monkey combat! Monkey combat is the worst thing that's ever been in a game. In any game ever made. I'll tell you one thing that ah annoys me a little bit is really low effort skill based challenges in games and by which I mean, um The best example, I know this is in a lot of games, but one of the best examples of this is this is a game I reviewed for adventure gamers back in the day. It's called Almost My Floor. Okay. um And again, this is a thing you see sometimes, and especially indie adventure games, um where it's like a
01:16:41
Speaker
a timing base, you click at the exact right time, you you know you have like a little reticle bouncing back and forth, and you have to capture it at the exact time it's over the red spot. Do you know what I mean? Yes, I do, yeah. You see these sometimes as just like added like weird little skill challenges in indie adventure games, and to me it always just feels like the laziest way yeah to do some kind of action
01:17:13
Speaker
also anything um aiming-based, like a... If you have to aim something in an adventure game, like get out of here. Yeah, no. No, and that's not that's not why we're playing this. Adventure games are pretty much the opposite of like doom. So if you anything that has a doom-like anything that has any element that reminds you of a first-person shooter, it's like you are in the exact opposite end.
01:17:44
Speaker
of the video game spectrum right now, friend. It's interesting you say that because there actually are a lot of aiming elements in Quest for Lore five where I have to like aim a spear or like aim a dagger. And I'm like, what am I doing? Yeah, that's true. Yeah. and So clunky. All right. So. We're going to end this Q and&A segment with just we're going to just do a quick fucking rundown. Yes. of recommendations, and we'll just say whether we've played them, if we have any quick thoughts about them, and if we're interested in them. All right. and Okay. All right, we got speed run this. Dreams in the Witch House. No. If not played it, looks cool. If on a winter's night for travelers. No, and that's the longest title I've ever heard, what the heck.
01:18:31
Speaker
I have not played it. It looks very cool. That is one that I really want to check out. ah The Zero Escape series, Nine Hours, Nine Persons, Nine Doors, Virtues Less World, and Zero Time Dilemma. I'm not even familiar. At least I was familiar with the other ones. Damn, guys. ah zero ive i I've tried to play Virtues Last Reward on my Nintendo DS, and I got really confused. And then I was like, ah maybe I needed to play 999 first, and then I just never have. I don't know if I'll ever get back to Zero Escape. Five Day Detective. No, but you have my attention. Yeah, ah this is a game that was recommended to, this is this person says that it
01:19:17
Speaker
is a is definitely a map game, they find. Oh, OK. um Well, thank thank you for letting us know. Solving multiple murder cases. um It is a looks like a cartoon. It's my crunchy fried games. It's ah i'm hungry. Sorry. go Sorry. Go on. It's not out yet. It's release date is 2025, but I believe that there is a demo and it ah is a little bit cartoony graphics. I don't know. Looks interesting. It'd be interesting to check out. um Yorkshire Gubbins.
01:19:59
Speaker
so
01:20:02
Speaker
ah ah Sorry, I don't know why my reaction was so ah visceral to that. Yorkshire Gubbins is like a really chunky pixel art um point and click game. ah Very glowy. I love chunky pixels. I think it's supposed to have like a very silly British. sense of You don't say. The Yorkshire Gubbins. I've never played it. It sounds like it's definitely ah it could be a Sarah game, though. Yeah, it could be. Oh, fuck. so of Sorry. Say it again. So starting with, it sounds like it sounds like it could definitely be a roses game, though. Yeah, I'm looking at the screen caps and I love those chunky pixels. They're my jam.
01:20:49
Speaker
Hypnospace Outlaw. I own this game if not played it. How about you? I have played it. ah Not a big fan. It's not a roses game. But okay I do think that a lot of people will like it. I'll say that. They did ask in the email if it if it qualifies as an adventure game. What do you think? well That is a loaded question. I don't even know. how That's kind of one of those Toe Jam and Earl situations. Okay. Okay. Triple feature. Toe Jam and Earl Boyd is blocking it. No space out. Okay. What remains of Edith Finch? Yeah, I played it. yes We both played it. And I think we've talked about it. So I think so too. is Life is strange. Yes. I have not played it. What do you think?
01:21:30
Speaker
I liked it. Yeah, I liked it a lot. um It was one of those times where I played on a console. ah I didn't play that on the computer. don' we I don't know what consoles it's on, but I really, I did enjoy it though. It's very story rich. So if you like story rich games, ah check it out. Yeah, I haven't played that, but it did play tell me why, which is another don't nod game. And I really, really liked that. So at some point I'll play life is strange. um The journey down. No. I own all three chapters of it. It is one of the rare examples of a adventure game with a black protagonist. um And I would love to play it. I just have not yet. that's It's definitely on my list. ah Voodoo Detective.
Opinions on Games and Future Features
01:22:14
Speaker
no I have played Voodoo Detective. It's pretty good. It's not great. It's pretty good. Another black protagonist. So that's good too.
01:22:23
Speaker
yeah that is good ah Loom. Yes, of course. Loom, what an interesting short game. It's very short. It is very short. Yeah. I wish they had made more Loom games because that song, um it's like ah it's kind of like in Ocarina of Time ah much later, how you would basically cast spells yeah um by playing your Ocarina. Yeah.
01:22:56
Speaker
playing certain combinations and notes. You would do that with your staff. yeah You'd weave notes into the loom of like the cosmic loom or something. And it would cast spells. And it was really, really cool. Yeah, it's kind of ah an innovative little little game for the time. But yeah, only one loom game, very short, but a nice experience. So I would i would recommend it. Absolutely. I play it every, I don't know. I play it like once a decade and I just like blow through it. It's really fun. ah Day of the Tentacle, come on. Guys, come on. Get the fuck out of here. Yeah, it was one of the best point and click adventure games ever made. ah Tangle Tower. Nope. I have not played it.
01:23:41
Speaker
i know that it is a absolute modern classic. People absolutely people fucking love this game. And okay um and ah yeah, I definitely do want to play it and it has a deducted deduction element in it. Nice, nice, nice. Okay, there is no game, wrong dimension. No, I wasn't sure where you were going with that when you started saying it. Oh, my God. Have you played either of the There is No Games? No, no. Oh, my God. roses You have to play this. This is on and our next recommendation episode. You got to play There is No Game. um It is a very odd. I don't even know if I want to tell you about it.
01:24:30
Speaker
Okay. I don't wanna, no. Listeners, stay tuned in a future episode. Roses will play this. I'm going to force her. It looks like I'm playing a game. I do, real quick, I just wanna say I have played Detective Grimoire, which is ah SFB Games, which did Tangle tinle Tower. Oh yeah, yeah. I actually looked it up. I'm like, oh, I recognize the art style. Like immediately. Right. Yeah. um ah But yeah. but ah Check back in because I don't wanna describe There Is No Game to Rose's, especially knowing that she will play it. So I think you're just going to be, I just need you to be surprised. I have no idea what you're in for. I will do that and you guys will get my reaction on podcast. Oh God, you're going to have so much fun. Okay, The Looker, which is a parody of The Witness. Okay.
01:25:24
Speaker
That's it. It's really good and really funny and really clever. I have played the looker. It is just it's just making fun of it's making fun of how serious ah the witness takes itself. Yeah. um Was that like a like a pissed situation? Missed pissed. Yeah, kind of only pissed is just like a bullshit not game. um The Looker actually is a real game. Nice. um And it's like, it's like actually thought provoking. yeah um And there's a giant dick in it. ah You draw a giant dick to solve one of the puzzles. Nice. Favorite last time of mine.
01:26:15
Speaker
Okay, ah the Sludge Life games, I've never, okay, we're getting into like a series of games that I've never fucking heard of. I'm just gonna run down them and we're just gonna say yes or no. And we'll revisit them later, yeah. ah The Sludge Life games, no. no Dr. Langaskov. No. No. Boro Oaken Reality. No. ah No. Norwood Suite Betrayal at Club Low. No. What are these long ass titles? you know ah ah The true fear, forsaken souls. No. Nope. Midnight mysteries. Nope. Nope. The unheard. No. No. The aching. No, but I do want to play it.
01:26:58
Speaker
Me too, yeah. ah Weirdly, somebody wrote in about it, but also the dev wrote in. um Yeah. And gave us codes. So I am, yes, I do really wanna play it. Dustball. No. No. The Master of Dimensions. No. No. D, the game. What? No, wait, D, the game? That thing? I've played that monstrosity. Really? Yes, I have. Holy, what is it? Uh, it's a monstrosity. It's a 3d quote horror adventure game. Uh, yeah, no, I don't. I think it's more like a cult classic at this point. um But yes, I have tried to play it. It's basically full motion video sequences. um I want to say like mid 90s. So like 95. OK. I don't even know if you can play it. on I didn't play it on a computer. I think I played it on like a Saturn. um But yeah, I have played D the video game.
01:28:03
Speaker
ah Good luck trying to get it to run. That's all I got to say about that. um Okay, Gregory Horror Show, Soul Collector. No. No, Silver Load. No. No, a World of Horror. No. ah So World of Horror, I do, it's been on my Steam Wishlist for a really long time. It's this ah monochromatic, um it's got it's got kind of this Junji Ito. Oh yeah, I've seen i've seen this, yep. That is one that, yeah, maybe I will play at some point. Yeah, same. It's definitely, it's been, one that I've been interested in. Lorelei and Laser Eyes, they must have written this before I started talking about it every episode. Who are you in luck?
01:28:50
Speaker
um And then finally, Techno Babylon. Yes, that's a yes for me. I have not played Techno Babylon yet. Honestly guys, it's been a long time since I played it, but I do know that I loved it. I i very much remember liking it, but I have played so many other adventure games since techno Babylon that, that have maybe taken its place. Okay. But I did like it. I will, I will say that.
01:29:17
Speaker
Whoo, and we are done. It's a wrap. It's a wrap. Yeah. I so assume we'll have a recommendations episode coming out in a couple and maybe a month or so after we things get a chance to play a couple of these games you recommended. Yeah. Not all of them. Not all of them, you guys. But I guarantee one of them is going to be, there is no game. And I think, Roses, you might have to play both of them. I think you might have to play, there is no game, and there is no game wrong dimension. OK. I can do that. They're not long games. There is no game. The first one is very short, and then wrong dimensions a little bit longer. OK. Woo hoo.
01:30:04
Speaker
ah Thank you guys for your questions. um One thing we're going to ask for the future is please put your, if you have, we love to read your feedback. We love to read your thoughts. um And also we love to read your recommendations. But if you have a question, please put it at the top of the email. Yeah. Not because we're ignoring your, your feedback. It's just when we do Q and A's, we like to be able to find them immediately. Yeah. Yeah. When just it's for sorting purposes for later on, it would be really, really helpful. And if you would like your question read on the show, you're going to have a better chance if you include it at the very top of the email. True. That is true. Could call Matt.
01:30:53
Speaker
Um, and again, as far as like recommendations, uh, they're fun, but we probably don't need this many because we're never going to get to all of them. Um, we're not so if you get one, that if you have a game that you're really excited about, again, feel free to recommend them to us. And also don't forget the fun game. Tell us whether you think it's a Mac game or a roses game. I do like that. I do like that game. Um, Do you want to say some of our goodbye stuff?
Community Engagement and Future Plans
01:31:25
Speaker
Sure. Uh, we just like to mention that we are a part of adventure game hotspot and Matt is going to be at the adventure game fanfare very soon. Representing us both, repping us both. So if you have a question for me, just ask Matt and he'll like, he'll call me up and be like, Hey, are you free? And I'll be like, yeah. And then I'll just answer your question. I'll tell you, I'll, I'll, I'll love that.
01:31:49
Speaker
I'm gonna love if I walk around a convention and everybody comes up to me and asks me about roses. You know, there's nothing weird and parasocial and rude about that at all. So how about everybody, you know, just do that. Just do that. Just be like, hey, how's roses doing? I heard about her teeth.
01:32:09
Speaker
ah Yeah, if you're interested in that, go check out eventregamehotspot.com. You can email us at mattandroses at gmail dot.com if you have any further questions for a future Q and&A. And I think that's a wrap, so I really only have one more thing to say. Oh, ah sorry, wait, I have to interrupt you here, because I've got something I think a little more important and whatever than whatever it is you're about to say. What is it? Podcast is art. Matt, you are such a copycat. You stole my outro. What? That was ah what I was going to say is podcast is art. And art is suffer. It's sufferable.