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I can’t believe it! But it’s true! Read all about it here
We have just released a trailer for the first episode of The Exchange Student.
You can download the trailer HERE
Most of the dialogues featured in the trailer are not in the game (in order to avoid spoilers). The Exchange Student is an interactive sitcom featuring backgrounds from ex- Lucasarts and ex-Sierra artist Bill Eaken (Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis, Leisure Suit Larry 3, The Dig, Curse of Monkey Island) and animations by Dave Rigley (24 and a half webcomic, http://www.24andahalf.com). It is a point and click adventure
game that will appeal to those who enjoy TV cartoon shows like Johnny Bravo, games like Leisure Suit Larry and TV sitcoms like Friends, That 70s Show and Married with Children.
The story follows Emilio Carboni, a 22 y.o. Italian student who has never had a girlfriend in his entire life. His friend Vincenzo just came back from an exchange program in Sweden. Vincenzo was really satisfied with the program since he met a lot of very attractive ladies during his stay in Sweden. Emilio decides to follow his friend’s path. He travels to Sweden to spend a semester there, studying in a city of Sweden called Västerås. Fate however is not that kind with him.
Here is some additional reading for The Exchange Student:
English: Preview at Just Adventure , Preview at Bytten , Preview at Flash Valley
French: Preview at Factor News
German: Preview at Adventure Europe Germany
Portuguese:Preview at PT Gamers
Greek: Preview at Adventure Europe Greece , Preview at Adventure Advocate
The Exchange Student will be distributed online in the form of episodes and the first episode, called ‘First Day in Sweden’, is going to be released this Friday (18th of August) for PCs, while Macintosh and Pocket PC versions will be available in September. Further information and artwork can be found at the official website:Nice theory! But it may be the case too that the manufacturer changed styles or used different machines.
In the meantime my impression was confirmed by a former seller of Sierra games that in fact the first Sierra games with sleeve packaging didn’t have the folded shrink-wrap as is shown at Vintage Sierra. Only later-on Sierra changed its manufacturer or the manufacturer changed style.
Roberta can handle the kids and create games at the same time! Theres the WOW factor.
I have played Siberia I & II and found that the story and graphics were great. There was a lot of time walking from one place to another. But some times I would just stop playing and watch the birds flying around and listen to the sounds. The game is somewhat gloomy with little commedy that I loved in Sierra games.
I have also played the shooter ‘Battlefield 1942’. The game is better played with a group than an adventure game you can enjoy on your own. It is not very parent like when you are snippering with a head shoot and your kid is watching. This game could be better with some missions like getting the staff from a sleeping gypse to open a magic door to a treasure room like in KQ5. The style of Ultima allowed the ability to collect items and place them were you want so you can come back and get them. In Battlefield 1942 if I drive a jeep to a location and get out, the jeep will blow up on it’s own.
The Xbox’s and the like are designed for this start and stop casual game play. Does anyone know where the time went that we had to sit and play our Sierra games? Every time I get on the computer to play a game I can sence my wife’s anger growing as the kids drive her crazy. Helping my wife take care of the kids takes close to 10pm before they both get to bed. When we have time after that we are so exhausted we can only play a short game.
I would like to play the Longest Journey but I have not seen it for sale at Wally World.
‘If you build it, they will come…’ I don’t know. Himalaya built the Lost Mind of Something. How are they doing with that? Have people come to buy their adventure game?So, is the re-built house still there? Still owned by John? When I was in California earlier this year, I thought about taking a little
side-trip to Coarsegold and looking for the famed ”Roberta Williams House” and maybe stopping by to ask for a tour. Being that the plan seemed creepy and that Coarsegold was about 3 hours away, I passed.If I could buy the house, I would SO totally turn it into a museum and give tours like they do of the Hemmingway House! It would be cool taking a tour group through there, ‘This is the actual table where King’s Quest was written’ and ‘This is the kitchen where Roberta cooked a roast duck casserole which gave her the idea for Mixed Up Mother Goose’ 🙂
Is that the same house pictured in the Tenth Anniversary catalog where Roberta is sitting in a chair with the dog? There’s also one in the 1991 catalog of her out on the deck with a mist hovering over the lake.
-Tom.
JT,
I think you misunderstood my statement about dumb kids with bottomless pockets. 😉
My point was, if the kid only has an X-Station or PlayBox or whatever they call them these days, and the game is only available for the PC, most likely that kid won’t buy it. After all, PCs are for MySpace and InstantMessenger, not playing games, haha. Which is why the game companies focus on the consoles and would freak out if a designer told them ‘this will only work on one platform’
the Sega Dreamcast seemed promising, with its keyboard and network adapter. But everyone has their own theory as to why that console failed. (Which, it didn’t really ‘fail’….)
-Tom.
I have a theory about this and maybe Ken can confirm or deny it:
The shrinkwrap style shown on vintage-sierra is most likely the way they were wrapped at the factory. (First Editions) Usually, there would be cards and/or offers inside the box that were dated materials. Possibly, Sierra sent out a memo to software retailers saying, ‘Hey, there’s an AdLib coupon in your SQ3 boxes that’s going to expire. Please remove it.’ and hence, the re-wrapping.
Anything that has the ‘Value Priced Merchandise’ sticker is also a re-wrap.
-Tom.
mxcoder,
i would still love to work on an adventure game too. but i dont have the time either. in fact, i have given up trying to do any side projects until i am out of college. i’ll be done in 2007 though, so thats not too far away.
another big reason i gave up on my side projects is that my computer’s drive failed and i lost EVERYTHING. i’m so stupid, why dont i back stuff up! i never learned that lesson i guess. all of my code is gone and i’m not really in the mood to recreate it all. i had a lot actually. my popcorn puzzle game, the blackjack game i was working on with julie (sorry julie 🙁 please don’t hate me), my half done 3d adventure game engine and my complete 2d sprite engine that was made in direct3d. i can’t believe i was so stupid not to back it all up.
if i had time i wouldn’t mind recoding it, but i barely have any time at all for personal projects. i’m married with 2 kids, i work and attend college. i have almost no free time.
Who is Bob Davis? I did a Wikipedia search and all it came up with is some Australian soccer player and this:
Other Bob Davis:
Bob Davis, born in Hamden, Ct, is the son of the devil and will consume all mortal souls???
-Tom.
I’m not really a big Nascar fan, but wasn’t 2003 the final year that Dale Earnhardt (sp?) was in it? That might explain the high asking price. I saw one going for $5 once and thought it would be a nice quick re-sell to fund my other game purchases, but within a day the auction was pulled and re-listed for $50 🙁
-Tom.
‘Could you honestly picture someone who’s used to playing Metroid having the patience to find out the name of some gnome so that you can take the magic hat to the wizard? Hardly. They’d be looking for a level-up so they can get a better gun to just shoot the gnome and steal the hat.’
i love metroid and real adventure games. i like almost all genres though, except shooters like doom. i know the recent metroid’s look like doom clones, but they aren’t. i do see what you’re saying though, i’m not the average metroid player.
‘To me, adventure games allow you to take a break and step into another world’
me too, i think that is the biggest alure of adventure gaming. and sierra did that the best. nintendo also does this well, and square-enix.
‘If they will only ‘work’ on a PC, what will the dumb kids with bottomless pockets do?’
you don’t need bottomless pockets anymore. one thing i have always thought about being part of the fall of adventure games is the falling price of pc’s. i think adventure games were a product for pc only because of the types of people that could afford pc’s back in there expensive days. back when sierra was king a decent computer would cost you at least 2 thousand dollars, if not 3 (my parents payed almost 3 for our super fast 486!). back then the only types of families that could afford that would be the better off ones whose parents were educated and saw the computer as a worthwhile machine for everything, not just gaming. this would suggest that those people also would enjoy to be intelectually challenged by a game rather than having a game that tests their reflexes, so games like sierra’s dominated. the falling prices of pc’s that have led to nice 500 dollar complete systems have made the pc almost ‘just another console’ to some people. i’m not talking a ‘high end’ system, but you can get a system for that price that will play 90% of all pc games. that has let the ‘uneducated average gamer’ into the pc game market, which means that companies are now catering to those people and not the ones that like to be challenged mentally. i know this sounds rude, but i dont mean it to be. keep in mind i like both kinds of games, twitch arcade style and adventure, just not shooters, i HATE shooters.
Why worry about the consoles? In my opinion (and this is just an opinion) you need a little more intellectual horsepower to play adventure games than the console generation has to offer. I think even most computer users today don’t have the brainpower or patience to complete adventure game puzzles. Could you honestly picture someone who’s used to playing Metroid having the patience to find out the name of some gnome so that you can take the magic hat to the wizard? Hardly. They’d be looking for a level-up so they can get a better gun to just shoot the gnome and steal the hat. Shoot, most of the people I watch play console games SKIP ALL THE DAILOG during the cut-scenes because they know all they have to do is shoot things, so whatever they’re saying is unimportant.
To me, adventure games allow you to take a break and step into another world. You can walk around and explore as you wish, look at things, talk to people… you were IN Daventry, Xenon, Spielburg, Lytton, Lost Wages… these were REAL places, not ‘Zone 1, Level 2’ Console games on the other hand expect you to work. You have to run faster, shoot harder, whatever, (translated into, ‘push the button faster’) just to progress the story if there even is one. People talk about ‘beating the game’ these days as if it’s a race instead of embracing the game world and the characters. Hell, most of the time in the first-person shooters, there are no characters to care about but yourself.
That’s probably why the console game producers don’t really concentrate on a story or character development rather than making the explosions look more realistic, or how much bass they can pump through your sound system when you fire a gun.
It’s sad, because it makes me feel old talking about games ‘back in my day’ but even the Atari systems were 90% ‘move and shoot’ games. The puzzle-solving aspects of the adventure games is what takes the brain power and patience. I think if some kid today was on the game for a third day in a row and still couldn’t get the door to the castle unlocked, the game would be in the ‘suck pile’ and they’d be at the store begging mom for the next ‘shoot-the-aliens’ game.
Another problem is the way the industry as a whole views success. I read in another thread about Sierra doing backflips over a ‘million seller’ whereas today, that would be considered somewhat of a failure for a game. (ONLY one million copies??) So that’s probably why companies are so afraid of adventure games. If they will only ‘work’ on a PC, what will the dumb kids with bottomless pockets do?
As far as the ‘future’ of adventure gaming, I saw this video a couple days ago and it seems like a really cool concept. A full 360-degree movie that you have camera control over. The characters in the scene ‘behind you’ progress whether you’re looking at them or not. Check it out!
http://www.atomfilms.com/af/content/atom_1279Okay, rant over 😉
-Tom.JT, I would still love to work on an adventure game! With the help of the web I have figured out most of the 24bit and 256 color file format. What to do with it is another question?
As far as adventure game making from the fans, there is one reason that we haven’t made a game. We are all too busy. I found out that my daughter has diabeties(sp?). This has turned my world upside down. Most of us that know something about programming (1) don’t know game programming and (2) have families that need our attention.
There is http://www.agidev.com and freesci (google) that have some fan game to play.
I hope we can make a fan game!
There is, of course, The Silver Lining, the fan-made King’s Quest game that has been approved by Vivendi.
The demo (as well as an important patch for it) can be downloaded from http://www.tsl-game.com/trilogy
Michael A. Bright
PR & Web Assistant
The Silver Lining Development Team
Phoenix Online Studios
http://www.tsl-game.com
michael.bright@postudios.com‘I’m not asking for a sequel for any of them(albeit QFG.I hope my import disk can serve some use).’
i do agree there, a sequel to qfg would be nice (it was my favorite series), but they wrapped it up well with 5.
‘And who do you speak for? The only reason adventure games are not sold anymore is you need a CPU to play one. To play a true adventure, you at least need a mouse. What platform console has a mouse, let alone, a keyboard.’
i dont claim to speak for anyone but myself. i’m a computer science major who is hoping to break into game dev after graduation. i have been a pc and console gamer since the mid 80’s. these are just observations and opinions i have made over time by studying the industry that i want to become a part of. i didn’t mean to offend you. as for the console question, the nintendo DS already does have original (albiet simplistic) adventure games on it. the xbox has the longest journey and the siberia games (probably more), and even the ps2 has the last monkey island game. and in case you haven’t been following the next gen stuff, the new nintendo wii will have a precision remote pointer that can be used exactly like a mouse by pointing it at the screen. it would allow for just as much control, it is pixel perfect. adventure games would work well on that system. keyboards haven’t been a nessecary part of adventure games for years, but they can be used on new systems anyway. the ps2, xbox, and xbox 360 all can utilize a usb keyboard and the wii will have usb ports for that as well.
‘If I had a nice chunk of change right now, say 10K, I could probably get something worthwhile going.’
that would not even buy you the harware and dev software needed. unless you went the indie route, which is being done all the time with adventure games as it’s currently the only real option for a new adventure game. but you wouldn’t start the ‘return of adventure games’.
‘There are more people than you know, who would like to play these games. I played KQ3 again, in VGA, with MIDI, for my first time. This was a groundbreaking engine.’
it was groundbreaking, 15 years ago. it’s archaic now. only people like us (fans of the classic adventure games) would bother with a game that looked like that now days. besides, kq3 wasn’t in vga was it? i only remember it in cga. those games had amazing soundtracks, you’re right there. i think that is one of sierra’s most enduring contributions to video games, they really pushed music on the pc.
‘I saw Sierra go from awesome to suck in one year. It started with KQ8. I’d even be willing to play kq7 at this point,’
we all did, that’s why we come to this site. i recently went back and played kq8 all the way thru for the first time and i really enjoyed it a lot this time. i have long since gotten over the ‘oh my god, a 3d action/rpg kings quest’ shock. its really a great game. as for kq7, i recommend you do play it. it’s awesome. one of the best in the series. actually, it’s one of my favorite sierra games all together.
i have heard the opposite about the longest journey. i was told that it has way too many non-adventure gameplay situations in it. but thats just what a friend told me.
the only worthwhile adventure game i have played since sierras demise it Runaway. it’s a great game. pure adventure and all original characters and puzzles. a sequel is also coming out soon. i forgot all about that until just now. now i have two games to look forward to.
While I’m not looking to Sierra/Vivendi to put out great new adventure games like they did in the past, I still have hope for the adventure gaming industry. The Adventure Company and a few others have released some fine adventure games that are challenging and engrossing. I recommend Still Life, Syberia (and its follow-up, Syberia II) and The Longest Journey. Post-Mortem, the game that Still Life was based on, is also supposed to be good, but I haven’t played it yet. Dreamfall, the sequel to The Longest Journey, is out now, too, and is supposed to be very good. You can find reviews at http://www.justadventure.com/Reviews.shtm, and it’s not a bad idea to look there, because there are a lot of poorly made adventure games along with the good ones, and this site can help you avoid wasting your money on those.
I still like to go back and play my old Sierra games, but that’s not all there is out there now. There really are some fantastic games to try, even for this old-school adventure gamer. I hope you find something that you can enjoy!
-Kristen
I don’t think the rumors of Blizzard turning their other franchises into mmorpgs are true and the reports and basing it on misinformation from a presentation by VU. And Blizzard is denying that it’s true. And I’d doubt it’s true just because Blizzard has no reason to saturate the market with more massive online games when it already has the market cornered and it would be smarter for them just to keep expanding Warcraft.
the game business has become too bloated for adventure games. there really isn’t a demand for them anymore. while sad, it’s the truth. while in the days of old sierra it was a HUGE accomplishment to sell 1 million copies of a game, now that is considered commercially average, or even a failure in certain cases. i think i read a statistic somewhere that said ALL of the larry games together only sold 4 million copies (could be wrong though). compare that to a single halo or zelda game and it’s really pathetic. companies today try to recreate the successes they or other companies have already had. the easiest way to do that is with a sequel. there is no room anymore for original ideas. and sadly, the majority of gamers dont seem to care. i feel your pain, i’m also tired of doom clones and final fantasy rip offs (in fact i cant believe we are STILL playing doom clones after so many years), but what can we do about it? stop buying all these sequels and clones i guess, but everyone else will still buy them.
the cost is the other problem. ever since the mid nineties the production costs of games have become staggering. back in 97 the total cost of final fantasy 7 was more than 50 million dollars. i cant even begin to imagine what it is now. no indy developer or start up can compete with that. i think that game could be considered the main influence of the sequel obsessed companies. i hate what it has done to the industry, even though i love the game.
the only company i see trying to innovate right now is nintendo, but for me they are doing it the wrong way. they are starting to cater to the non-gamer or casual gamer, which is honestly a great idea, but i’m a hardcore gamer that wants innovative AAA titles. at least they are doing something different though. as gimmiky as the wii controller is, and even though its not the first of its kind; it still looks really fun to play around with. the wii would be a perfect platform for an adventure game since it’s controller could be used as a mouse like input device. but then again so was the ds, and honestly the ds adventure games (trace memory and pheonix wright) are both not in depth or hard enough for people like us who are used to the adventure games of way back.
maybe its time we all moved on. although i would love to see a new high budget, professionally developed, pure adventure game, i do not want another sequel. the thoughts of kq9, sq7, and even ll8 dont even spark interest in me anymore. what has me excited though is Al Lowes new Sam Suede game; even though it’s not an adventure game, it’s an original idea. i hope it makes it and is finally released.
I think Blizzard will be around for a long time, especially after I seen this news story…
Reports have debuted online regarding plans for World of WarCraft developer Blizzard to turn its other major game franchises into massively multiplayer online (MMO) games over the next few years, following the major success of World Of WarCraft.
The rumors appear to have emanated from MMO blog website F13.net, which claims that a recent presentation given by Blizzard owners Vivendi Games to select Wall Street investors indicated that “all” Blizzard franchises would be turned into MMOs over time. The assumption by fans has been that real-time strategy StarCraft and action role-playing game Diablo, neither of which have seen a full sequel in over six years, would be the likely first candidates for any such policy.
According to the F13.net story, the Vivendi presentation also discussed a new development model which allowed for new MMOs to be created within three years at a cost of $50 million. The publisher also allegedly plans on organizing games into one of two camp – those that can be played for short periods of time, and those which encourage longer play sessions. Korean developed title Freestyle Street Basketball, already signed by the new Sierra Online division, is used as an example of the former.
Although neither Vivendi nor Blizzard has commented on the rumors officially, if true they could have a significant effect on the MMO market – which is already dominated by World of WarCraft and its six million subscribers. The only circumstantial evidence for the rumors is Blizzard’s now long running attempts to increase its employee levels, as evidenced by a number of job postings on Gamasutra itself.
—
Plus they have a movie in the works…
Warcraft coming to the big screen
Blizzard and Legendary Pictures, producers of Batman Begins and the upcoming Superman Returns, are teaming up to produce a live-action film based on Blizzard‘s Warcraft universe, with Legendary acquiring the movie rights to the Warcraft franchise.According to Blizzard‘s CEO Paul Sams, ‘We never met anyone that really understood our franchise, that got what we do. With Legendary, we found a company that specializes in building a small number of big movies. It’s very similar to what we do. Blizzard only makes a small number of games; we focus on making big, meaningful games. It’s a very similar mentality.’
Hm……. thats too bad because a lot of folks really like the business talk threads. Most of it goes over my head, but a lot of folks get into them.
[quote]What pisses me off the most is that there is no adventure market whatsoever. There is a big fricking demand, but no supply.[/quote]
Based off of what? A few thousand fans petitioning to have new adventure games made? Not good enough, companies create games that are designed to sell hundreds of thousands of copies. And why shouldn’t they? They are in it for the money, like it or not. I will be quiet about this now, as I do not want this thread to be to take an ironic turn to ‘business talk.’ 😉
As far as Ken and Roberta, they are enjoying a great retirement. They gave us a lot, and its cool that we have this board to talk about it on.
For adventure game fixes, The Silver Lining is gonna rock, and we have Sam and Max to look forward to. Brighter days are ahead, my friend!
Take a deep breath and count to 10. Exhail, Ahhhhhhh : )
Oh well, I tried.
Ken and Roberta do not own King’s Quest period. I don’t think VU would give them the ‘get out of jail free’ card that they did with TSL (KQIX).
Ken offered to consult with Sierra at one time. For Ken and Roberta Williams, this is what we call ‘The American Dream’ and God bless them for living it.Nothing is going to happen to Blizzard. Every one of their games have been smash hits and they have improved upon every game and seem to create classics with each new game. They’re probably the most well-received company today. Probably the only company that can compare to them is Bungie. It’s almost disgusting to think how much money they must be making from WoW. I haven’t played it yet, but I’ve thought about it and I’m sure I’d enjoy it, but I just refuse to pay a monthly fee for any game.
I know what you mean. I wasn’t keen on paying a monthly fee either. But, I got to try the game as a betatester and I really got into it. I couldn’t stop playing. A couple of months after WoW was released I decided to buy the game because some of my friends were playing it. They started a guild for real life friends only and it is so cool to play with them 😛 The monthly fee is just 13 euro’s and you really don’t miss that kind of money.
Try it! 😛 You’ll love it!
Yeah……. I don’t think Blizzard is gonna go anywhere either. World of War Craft is huge! If they did a War Craft 4, Diablo 3 or Star Craft 2, you bet your bottom dollar that it would be as equally well recieved. I have been a fan of Blizzard since War Craft 2 came out. They may take for ever to come out with games, but they are always good quality. You get your monies worth. That being said, I haven’t tried WOW yet because I am not keen on pay by month online games.
