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What game do you think re-defined the point & click adventure? 

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diego - 11 February 2016 10:52 AM
mart - 11 February 2016 06:55 AM

I don’t know if there’s any research to support it

We have a rock band in Serbia called Guybrush Threepwood FFS!! Tongue Really, there’s no a scientific research to support it, but in my experience, chances are some non-gamer or casual gamer will most probably hear of Monkey Island before some other adventure game.

Same goes of course for King’s Quest or Myst, or even The Journeyman Project (Facebook group). Sorry, but it is, as said, just guessing and rhetorics.

Moreover (this thread):

How many angels can stand on the point of a pin? Please be precise (no guessing).  Pan

     

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TimovieMan - 11 February 2016 06:44 AM
diego - 11 February 2016 06:01 AM

In the same universe where The Beatles defined the “British pop”, but were absolutely not the first band from Britain to play that kind of music. “First” doesn’t equal “define”. Wink

^ This.

Maniac Mansion already did the same as Monkey Island, and Deja Vu even before that. The game that “defines” it, though, is imo the one that truly popularizes it. And that was Monkey Island, imo.

This is almost objectively wrong. King’s Quest V came out a month later, and I’m sure it destroyed Monkey Island in sales (at that time). A large pet peeve of mine is that people now assume that LucasArts was “the king”, but all the evidence we have, including modern comments from people from both companies, indicates that Sierra was utterly dominant from a sales (and, therefore, popularity) standpoint.

People all look back fondly on Monkey Island now, but I doubt it made much of an impact on the genre’s direction at that time. It’s not anything different or better than what LA was already doing, and Sierra were the ones who everyone watched. King’s Quest V has a much better claim, no matter what you may think of the game now.

     
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Venkman - 11 February 2016 03:50 PM
TimovieMan - 11 February 2016 06:44 AM
diego - 11 February 2016 06:01 AM

In the same universe where The Beatles defined the “British pop”, but were absolutely not the first band from Britain to play that kind of music. “First” doesn’t equal “define”. Wink

^ This.

Maniac Mansion already did the same as Monkey Island, and Deja Vu even before that. The game that “defines” it, though, is imo the one that truly popularizes it. And that was Monkey Island, imo.

This is almost objectively wrong. King’s Quest V came out a month later, and I’m sure it destroyed Monkey Island in sales (at that time). A large pet peeve of mine is that people now assume that LucasArts was “the king”, but all the evidence we have, including modern comments from people from both companies, indicates that Sierra was utterly dominant from a sales (and, therefore, popularity) standpoint.

People all look back fondly on Monkey Island now, but I doubt it made much of an impact on the genre’s direction at that time. It’s not anything different or better than what LA was already doing, and Sierra were the ones who everyone watched. King’s Quest V has a much better claim, no matter what you may think of the game now.

If we want to keep with the musical metaphor, that’s like saying that My Way outsold whatever Beatles song was released at the same time. It’s irrelevant, because we’re talking about influence, not success. KQ5 used a mouse, but design-wise it’s a relic from a past era. MI (introduced and) popularized design conventions that broke away from a tradition that went all the way back to Colossal Cave, and those design conventions came to be associated in the public mind with “point-and-click adventures”—even though the control method was largely irrelevant to the matter.

     
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Kurufinwe - 11 February 2016 04:26 PM

If we want to keep with the musical metaphor…

Or, for that matter, motion picture metaphors….the Academy Award does not always go to the movie that broke ground for everything that followed. CGI/Industrial Light & Magic never won a best picture, Star Wars, only an award for special effects.

Nor does gross box-office sales seem to matter. If it did, Spielberg would have won for Jaws, and not have to wait almost two decades to win for Shindler’s List.

The first, the best, the most popular doesn’t always take home the prize.

     

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they toll for thee.

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Kurufinwe - 11 February 2016 04:26 PM

If we want to keep with the musical metaphor, that’s like saying that My Way outsold whatever Beatles song was released at the same time. It’s irrelevant, because we’re talking about influence, not success.

Hey Jude is one of the top-selling singles of all-time and as far as I’m aware My Way did not outsell it. For an equivalent example you’d need a band who was underappreciated at the time but is now widely praised and recognized as being influential. The Beatles were huge, as Sierra was in the adventure game space.

KQ5 used a mouse, but design-wise it’s a relic from a past era. MI (introduced and) popularized design conventions that broke away from a tradition that went all the way back to Colossal Cave, and those design conventions came to be associated in the public mind with “point-and-click adventures”—even though the control method was largely irrelevant to the matter.

I can assure you that the “public mind” does not associate point-and-click adventures with “those games where you can’t die and can’t ever get stuck” (they’re at least as likely to remember funny/frustrating Sierra deaths). You are hugely overstating the importance of that design philosophy, and you’re exaggerating its influence. There are companies making P&C games to this day that do not adhere to the no-deaths philosophy.

More importantly, Sierra, which never adopted that philosophy, continued along crushing LucasArts for at least 8 years after MI1 came out. Other companies also continued to make P&C games without adopting that philosophy.

A few people seem to be taking p&c to mean “all graphical adventure games”, in which case Monkey Island is especially indefensible. So let’s get out of the way that KQ1 “defines” the genre if that’s what the discussion is.

As RE-defining sure I can see the case for Monkey Island (but still disagree). As DEFINING, no, in that case you go with Maniac Mansion or ICOM (again this assumes specifically talking about mouse-driven).

For what it’s worth, I severely doubt that the no-deaths no-stuck philosophy has as big an influence on everyone’s love for LucasArts games as many of you seem to think. That’s just a tangible detail that you can articulate easily, because it’s more difficult and subjective to think and talk about other things the games do well like atmosphere and puzzles (both of which are almost certainly more important to your appreciation of the games than the no-death philosophy).

     
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Okay, having read this thread I have to say that I find the question a bit absurd (just like the Guinness record that sparked the question).

As far as I’m concerned the genre has never been defined nor has it ever been redefine, instead it has simply evolved in many different small steps. We can always discuss which game(s) has been the most influential and the most important for the genre, but that is far from the same as they defined or redefined the genre.

mart - 11 February 2016 11:00 AM

How many angels can stand on the point of a pin? Please be precise (no guessing).  Pan

Oh..oh a riddle, I love riddles! And I actually now the answer to that one.
The answer is Infinite! An infinite number of angels can stand on the point of a pin!

Or is it perhaps Finite?!? Either or, finite or infinite is the only two possible answers.

     

You have to play the game, to find out why you are playing the game! - eXistenZ

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Venkman - 12 February 2016 01:30 AM

I can assure you that the “public mind” does not associate point-and-click adventures with “those games where you can’t die and can’t ever get stuck” (they’re at least as likely to remember funny/frustrating Sierra deaths). You are hugely overstating the importance of that design philosophy, and you’re exaggerating its influence. There are companies making P&C games to this day that do not adhere to the no-deaths philosophy.

More importantly, Sierra, which never adopted that philosophy, continued along crushing LucasArts for at least 8 years after MI1 came out. Other companies also continued to make P&C games without adopting that philosophy.

A few people seem to be taking p&c to mean “all graphical adventure games”, in which case Monkey Island is especially indefensible. So let’s get out of the way that KQ1 “defines” the genre if that’s what the discussion is.

As RE-defining sure I can see the case for Monkey Island (but still disagree). As DEFINING, no, in that case you go with Maniac Mansion or ICOM (again this assumes specifically talking about mouse-driven).

For what it’s worth, I severely doubt that the no-deaths no-stuck philosophy has as big an influence on everyone’s love for LucasArts games as many of you seem to think. That’s just a tangible detail that you can articulate easily, because it’s more difficult and subjective to think and talk about other things the games do well like atmosphere and puzzles (both of which are almost certainly more important to your appreciation of the games than the no-death philosophy).

The MI design philosophy has absolutely nothing to do with “no death”—as you’d know if you had actually bothered to read Gilbert’s piece.

I really don’t want to have this conversation for the 10 billionth time on these forums. Think whatever you want to think.

     
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Venkman - 12 February 2016 01:30 AM

As RE-defining sure I can see the case for Monkey Island (but still disagree). As DEFINING, no, in that case you go with Maniac Mansion or ICOM (again this assumes specifically talking about mouse-driven).

For what it’s worth, I severely doubt that the no-deaths no-stuck philosophy has as big an influence on everyone’s love for LucasArts games as many of you seem to think. That’s just a tangible detail that you can articulate easily, because it’s more difficult and subjective to think and talk about other things the games do well like atmosphere and puzzles (both of which are almost certainly more important to your appreciation of the games than the no-death philosophy).

I don’t think you’re giving enough credit to Kurufinwe’s argument, which regardless of whether you agree or disagree, strikes me as much more nuanced than how you’ve characterized it. While I read FilmCritHulk and I think I know what you’re intending to say about tangible details, I don’t think it applies to Kurufinwe. Puzzle design and gameplay conventions are exactly why Kurufinwe cited the Ron Gilbert article to explain what he was saying. (I would also add that the Three Trials structure of Monkey Island, not mentioned in the Gilbert article, was an influence on other adventure games.)

When you say that Maniac Mansion or ICOM define the (mouse-driven) point and click adventure, I would actually contend that that argument is being far more pre-occupied with tangible details (the game interface) than Kurufinwe was being. Which is fine, if we’re intending to be literal about “define” and “point-and-click,” it’s just . . . odd to then say that Kurufinwe’s the one thinking about tangible details instead of more nuanced stuff.

What Kurufinwe was saying is that a lot of early graphic adventures do not play very differently from text adventures. Colossal Cave set down a bunch of structural and gameplay conventions that many later games more-or-less adhered to (including games like Deja Vu). Kurufinwe is arguing that Monkey Island became the standard bearer of some new gameplay conventions that made many point and click adventures play differently from earlier games, thus “defining” point-and-click adventures as something subtly different than either previous graphical adventures like King’s Quest or previous text adventures like Colossal Cave.

You may disagree about how wide Monkey Island’s influence was, but I think Kurufinwe’s argument is at least thoughtful enough to be treated with respect, instead of it being mischaracterized as him not understanding that LucasArts games weren’t blockbusters, or him thinking their “no deaths” philosophy changed everything. Neither is what he was saying.

Even amongst Sierra games, for example (and they are pertinent because they dominated the genre sales-wise), there is a noticeable difference in the design of earlier Sierra games like King’s Quest 1 than in later Sierra games like King’s Quest 6, Gabriel Knight, or Phantasmagoria. Whether we think Monkey Island had anything to do with that design shift during the point and click era is debatable, but it’s those gameplay nuances I think Kurufinwe wanted to talk about, as it’s arguably more interesting than just the mouse-driven interface itself.

All this being said, it is true that LucasArts games sold only a fraction of what Sierra games sold. And it is true that Sierra tends to get undercredited these days for its design. (Here is an interesting video that argues that the Space Quest series was a key pioneer of visual puzzles that could not have been done in a text adventure, whereas the original King’s Quest had fewer such things than you might expect.)

On a side note that has nothing to do with Kurufinwe or Venkman’s comments, this thread in general has reminded me of a recent Ken Williams interview where he implies that thinking about the point and click interface as being an important characteristic of the genre will only lead to the genre’s ultimate death. I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with the point and click interface (or direct input with a controller or whatever). It works fine in a world where we don’t yet have widely available better ways of interacting with objects and NPCs.

But I think emphasizing point and click is exactly why we have a hard time answering the question of what re-defined the point and click adventure. Imagine if someone asked “what re-defined the RPG with menu-driven combat a la Bard’s Tale or Final Fantasy,” instead of “what re-defined the RPG?”

     
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Thanks a lot Caliburn for being more patient than I could ever be and pretty much articulating what I had in mind. If I had to sum up the MI design philosophy in one sentence, I’d say it’s not specifically about death, or dead-ends, or puzzles: it’s about changing the designer/player relationship from adversarial to collaborative.

One objection, though: you regularly mention KQ1 as some sort of poster child for the Colossal Cave tradition, and I have to disagree with that. KQ1 is a tremendously innovative game that broke many of the design conventions of the time. Frankly, design-wise, it’s much closer to the first act of MI than to Colossal Cave, or Mystery House, or Time/Zone.

But the reason why I don’t think KQ1 was genre-defining is because it wasn’t followed up on—not even at Sierra, not even by Roberta Williams. As a matter of fact, that’s one of the weirdest things about Roberta Williams: she regularly had some brilliant design ideas, but instead of following up on them, it’s like she got scared and always ended up cowering back to the darkest and dankest recesses of the colossal cave. KQ1 was extremely innovative, but then she made KQ2 with its idiotic puzzles, its dead-ends and the fucking bridge. KQ3 was a breath of fresh air, but instead of building up on it she then made the tedious KQ4. And The Colonel’s Bequest was brilliant and explored some design space that remains to this day largely uncharted—but then she went back to the most antiquated design principles she knew and made KQ5.

The design ideas behind MI, on the other hand, were a company policy that was theorized, written down, enforced, and communicated to players in the games’ manuals. And so those ideas had a huge influence on the genre—even at Sierra. (Seriously, just compare KQ5 vs. KQ6, LSL 2-3 versus LSL 5-6, or even SQ4 vs. SQ5. The change is pretty striking.)

(Interestingly enough, there’s one Sierra series that wasn’t much affected: Quest for Glory. The reason for that being that the Coles didn’t need to wait for Ron Gilbert to come up with design principles that any decent dungeon master had been aware of for ages.)

     

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Kurufinwe, I apologize for simplifying your argument.

I have now read the whole Ron Gilbert article. I’d first disagree that no-deaths no-stuck has nothing to do with the philosophy, as he states those pretty strongly. I don’t really like a lot of what Gilbert says and has said elsewhere. In the intro he points out the Old Man Murray article which I think is awful. Adventure games didn’t die because of weird puzzles, and I’m not going to give your thinking on the genre that much credit if you’re pointing to that article as gospel.

Anyway, I haven’t played MI in a long time, so it’s hard for me to judge. I know that when I played it, in the midst of playing many other games by other companies, it didn’t particularly stand out to me, it wasn’t a watershed moment. Is it that different than LSL3 or SQ3 from the standpoint of having more clearly directed goals? Is it that much more special than Maniac Mansion (imo it’s the opposite)?

I also think that Gilbert is harping on factors that just weren’t really major factors for people who were casual players, as opposed to game designers like him or fanatics like us.

Finally, the frustration thing is overstated. Monkey Island 1-2, like other later LucasArts games, like almost ALL adventure games, were frustrating at times. This supposedly brilliant new puzzle design philosophy doesn’t change the fact that you still get stuck and frustrated.

     
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Good points all around. Thanks for interesting replies from both of you. Lots I could say, but I’ll just clarify two things.

Kurufinwe - 12 February 2016 11:09 AM

One objection, though: you regularly mention KQ1 as some sort of poster child for the Colossal Cave tradition, and I have to disagree with that. KQ1 is a tremendously innovative game that broke many of the design conventions of the time. Frankly, design-wise, it’s much closer to the first act of MI than to Colossal Cave, or Mystery House, or Time/Zone.

Heh, I can see why what I wrote came across as dismissive of King’s Quest 1, but for what it’s worth, it wasn’t my intent.

Incidentally, now that you compare KQ1 to the first act of Monkey Island, I recall that KQ1 has three treasures you need to find in whatever order you choose, so it’s actually a predecessor to MI’s Three Trials. (Quite possibly some text adventure did this earlier than either of them?)

Anyway, basically what happened is that while acknowledging the design contributions of Sierra games, I guess the first thing that came into my mind was to share that Space Quest video that talks about the gradual evolution of more visual puzzles. In hindsight it was veering off-topic, but in my defense I was writing quickly before heading to work. Smile

Since I figured people might assume that King’s Quest 1 (being the first graphical adventure) did all this right out of the gate, I added a qualifier to my sentence that was meant to indicate that the video author was talking about how the first two Space Quest games did something more puzzle-y with their visual elements than what King’s Quest 1 had already done. But of course King’s Quest 1 established the basic toolset (a moving protagonist, environmental hazards, sequences that require precision like climbing the beanstalk, etc.), defined the graphic adventure, and also had plenty of its own interesting design aspects.

Anyway, going back to pre-point-and-click graphic adventures is a different era, so I don’t mean to take us off-topic.

Venkman - 12 February 2016 12:03 PM

Is [Monkey Island] that much more special than Maniac Mansion (imo it’s the opposite)?

Maybe not, Maniac Mansion is an historically important game too (by the way, there’s a nice GDC Post-Mortem by Ron Gilbert here). I can totally see why we might consider it as a better contender than Monkey Island for defining the point-and-click adventure era, even if we’re talking about more than just the interface. Obviously no one game influences the direction of a genre single-handedly.

I played Maniac Mansion after Monkey Island, and played both well after their initial release, so from the point of view of personal feeling, I can’t answer which game felt like a watershed moment at the time. I like Maniac Mansion and while I like Monkey Island, I don’t like it as much as many people seem to. But I guess Maniac Mansion feels a little bit like it has one foot in the past, one in the future, if that makes sense; whereas Monkey Island feels to me like it has both feet in the future. (I guess that is actually an argument that Maniac Mansion is a transition point.)

The gameplay of Maniac Mansion doesn’t feel quite as refined a representation of Gilbert’s eventual design philosophy with the shift from an adversarial to collaborative desinger/player relationship that Kurufinwe was talking about, it’s more like Gilbert finding his way into that approach. He says he and Gary Winnick didn’t map things on a puzzle dependency chart like he would later do. So it seems like Gilbert took some lessons learned from Maniac Mansion and applied them to Monkey Island. And I think even for the player who has no idea of the behind-the-scenes stuff, that player still receives some of the end result in terms of a smoother experience. You’re quite right that frustration was by no means eliminated, though, and probably never will be.

     

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