I was a kid in the 90s which in my family meant M*A*S*H* reruns, Night Court, Nickelodeon and Sierra adventure games.  I remember sitting on my Dad’s lap while he played old DOS games like Eye of the Beholder and Hexen and being alternately frightened and fascinated by these games about dungeons and adventures.  My Dad grew up playing Dungeons & Dragons and listening to Pink Floyd so he thought nothing of exposing me to video games at the age of 4, but  my mom would decry the violence in the games my Dad played, worrying that I would be scarred or turn out to be a sociopath (which I didn’t, but I’m still terrified of the green dragons that shoot fire in Hexen by id Software)

Those Green Dragons were dicks.

The point of all this is, I grew up loving old school adventure games, and my favorite was and is Quest for Glory: So You Want to Be a Hero.

The Quest for Glory games were made by Sierra Entertainment, and Quest for Glory 1 was a VGA remake of Hero’s Quest (they had to rename it be cause of copywrite issues).  The thing about games in this series and Sierra games of that time is that they all had a clear, crisp, colorful aesthetic with off-color jokes and easy-to-learn gameplay, though some puzzles were quite challenging and obtuse.  You can choose to play as a fighter, mage or thief and depending on your class, you have access to different aspects of the game.  The story is misleading in its simplicity, and while I will not give anything away, it’s fun and tricky like any good fairy tale.  Also, the music is beautiful, they do some great things with MIDI in this game.

Gameplay wise, it’s a point and click interface, with a series of buttons above that you click on to change your cursor so you can interact with the world in different ways, which can lead to hilarious results when you say, click on yourself with the lockpick from your inventory.  The thing about these games is when you die, they make fun of you.  That doesn’t happen anymore, there are no more mocking text boxes saying things like:

“Unfortunately you push it in too far, causing a cerebral hemmorhage.  Guess you should have been practicing on less difficult locks” -When you click the lockpick on yourself.

And people wonder why I tend to have lots of save files… you never know what could happen… you could die from doing something really stupid because the Sierra folks thought it would be funny, and they were right!

If you are interested in checking it out, it’s hosted for free on Abandonia (make sure you get the VGA remake version).  Download DOSBBox, which is compatible with both PCs and Macs and allows one to play all of the old Dos games, being essentially an IBM PC.

Sierra made lots of great adventure games like the Kings Quest (Roberta Williams’s magnum opus), Police Quest, and Space Quest series (full of Hitchhiker’s guide jokes).  For what it’s worth, Ms Dos and the game it housed, from Jill of the Jungle to Xargon, was and is my NES.   I view games like Jazz Jackrabbit in the same way that other kids look at old nintendo games.

This might seem to come out of left field, all this talk of old PC games, but I enjoy going questing, and a game that lets me name my adventuring gent Balsak the Brave is A-Ok by me.

Battling in QFG 1

-amanda seamus

Както и предположих (тук), таймера на сайта на играта Prototype беше обвързан с появата на нов трейлър – ето го и него:

От трейлъра става ясно, че можем да очакваме играта през лятото на 2009г., а BTW в ДНК-то (клик) са оключени нови “връзки”.

Time to Meet the Mummy
Sierra Entertainment has announced that The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor video game is available in the North American market. It’s based on Universal Pictures’ epic adventure directed by Rob Cohen, scheduled to hit theatres August 1. Developed by Eurocom Studios for Wii and PlayStation 2, and by A2M for Nintendo DS, the game mirrors the fast-paced action and adventure found in the Mummy series…Full Article

Por si no hubiera suficientes nuevos lanzamientos se añaden un par de…íbamos a decir clásicos, pero mejor lo dejamos en simplemente títulos del Xbox Original. Estos son:

Guilty Gear X2 Reload

Publisher: Majesco

Desarrollador: Arc System Works

Género: Peleas

Jugadores: 2

ESRB: T

Fecha de lanzamiento original: Septiembre 14, 2004

XBP dice: 8.5

The Legend of Spyro: A New Beginning

Publisher: Vivendi Games / Sierra Entertainment

Desarrollador: Krome Studios

Género: Plataformas

Jugadores: 1

ESRB: E10+

Fecha de lanzamiento original: Octubre 10, 2006

XBP dice: 7

Ambos estarán disponibles a partir del lunes 16 de junio a un precio de 1200 MSP cada uno.

PlayrTV ha rilasciato un’anteprima di GhostBusters, titolo sviluppato da Sierra Entertainment. Il gioco si baserà sulle vicende narrate nelle trasposizioni televisive delle avventure degli acchiappafantasmi e, tramite l’uso del SixaxiS/DualShock3 avrà caratteristiche non  presenti nelle versioni per le altre consoles. Il gioco è atteso per la fine del 2008.

Last month, Microsoft rolled out two new additions to its Xbox Originals offerings: Ubisoft’s Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory and Vivendi’s Metal Arms: Glitch in the System. The two games augmented the slow trickle of what was initially planned to be a torrent of additions to Microsoft’s classic Xbox revival. Today, the publisher said two more titles have been loaded up for release next Monday. Wideload Games’ Stubbs the Zombie in Rebel Without a Pulse, Alex Seropian’s first game after leaving Bungie, leads next week’s offerings. The tongue-in-cheek action adventure was built off the Halo engine and features zombies doing what zombies do best: eating brains. Also hitting the Xbox Live Marketplace on Monday is Midway’s Gauntlet: Seven Sorrows. The critically panned dungeon crawler features the franchise’s traditional hack-and-slash gameplay as well as a smattering of role-playing elements. Both Stubbs the Zombie and Gauntlet: Seven Sorrows will hit Xbox Live on May 19. As with other Xbox Original offerings, both games have been priced at 1,200 Microsoft points ($15).

Microsoft has apparently attached a special significance to the number 10 million. Five months before the Xbox 360 launched in November 2005, the company’s head of the gaming business Peter Moore publicly stated that the console would sell 10 million units before the end of 2006. Just days into 2007, Microsoft used its CES keynote to announce that it had met that goal. Before and since, the company has publicly announced passing such milestones as 10 million Xbox Live members reached and 10 million pieces of content downloaded from the system’s Marketplace storefront. Today Microsoft added another public proclamation to the stack, saying that the Xbox 360’s US installed user base has reached beyond the 10 million mark. The company added that the 360 is the first current-generation console to do so, and stressed the importance of that. “History has shown us that the first company to reach 10 million in console sales wins the generation battle,” said Don Mattrick, the current head of Microsoft’s gaming business, in a statement. “We are uniquely positioned to set a new benchmark for the industry.” Worldwide, Microsoft said that the Xbox 360 is up to 19 million systems sold, which it initially claimed was “more than any other current-generation console.” After being directed to Nintendo’s latest financial results, in which the hardware maker revealed that it had sold more than 24 million Wiis to date, a Microsoft representative recanted the initial statement. “We apologize for any confusion. Xbox 360 has the largest global install base of any current-generation high definition [emphasis added] gaming console,” the representative said. Microsoft also updated the size of its online user base. Xbox Live now claims 12 million members according to the company, up from 6 million a little over a year ago. Representatives from Sony and Nintendo did not return requests for the latest figures on the US installed user bases of the PlayStation 3 and Wii.

What a difference a World of Warcraft expansion makes. Last January, PC gamers worldwide got their latest fix from Blizzard Entertainment in the form of The Burning Crusade. The title was the first expansion to the veteran publisher’s best-selling 2004 massively multiplayer role-playing game, which has shattered records both in terms of revenue and subscribers. Burning Crusade didn’t perform shabbily itself, selling 2.4 million units in 24 hours, the fastest retail movement of any PC game, before topping the 3.5 million mark in under two months. Today, the lack of a WOW expansion in 2008 was felt when Blizzard parent Vivendi SA announced its earnings for the quarter ending March 31, the first of its fiscal year. Overall, the multinational conglomerate, which encompasses the Universal Music Group, Canal+ television channel, and Vivendi Games, year-on-year saw revenues rise 5.2 percent to €5.28 billion ($8.16 billion). However, adjusted earnings before interest and income taxes (EBITA) slid 5.6 percent to €1.2 billion ($1.85 billion), compared to the year prior. Predictably, Vivendi Games, which includes Blizzard and Sierra Entertainment, saw a much steeper revenue decline. Year over year, its revenue slipped 24.1 percent from €291 million ($450 million) to €221 million ($342 million). The change was even more apparent in post-EBITA earnings, which went from €107 million ($166 million) to just €50 million ($77 million). However, Vivendi also pointed out that “excluding the allocation of [Games] Group overheads, Blizzard Entertainment’s EBITA was €99 million [($153 million)].” That figure was sharply reduced by a €34 million ($53 million) quarterly shortfall at Sierra, which Vivendi blamed on “higher costs related to increased investment in Sierra product development and accelerated royalties expense for released products.” The loss also included “continued start up expenses for the Sierra Online and Vivendi Games Mobile divisions.” Ironically, Sierra’s bumpy quarter may be one of its last. As part of the looming merger of Vivendi Games and Activision, the division is slated to be folded into the Guitar Hero publisher’s organization, based in Santa Monica. Under the terms of the $18.9 billion deal, which has already been approved by European regulators, Blizzard, based in nearby Irvine, will retain its current corporate structure within the new company, Activision Blizzard. Vivendi also used its earnings today to confirm the next World of Warcraft expansion, The Wrath of the Lich King, will indeed arrive later this year. (According to rumors, the game has already entered the alpha-testing stage.)The publisher is also prepping Starcraft II, a new installment in its celebrated real-time strategy series, for release on an as-yet undetermined date.

Mutaciones, poderes sobrenaturales, sangre y un mundo abierto a la GTA… ¡Sí por favor!

He aquí el primer video del juego corriendo de Prototype, mostrado en el Sierra Gamer’s Day 08

Sierra Entertainment, пуснаха в интернет генетичен вирус с кодовото название www.prototypegame.com
Или за чудещите се, web сайта на играта Protorype. Сайта е тежко флашовски, но и доста забавен. В него ще намерите схема на ДНК структура, и посредством нея можете да въвеждате различни кодово който ви дават достъп към бонус и бек граунд материали свързани с играта (например):

На всичкото отгоре се очаква в близкото бъдеще нови кодове да започнат да се появяват в рекламните матрЯли свързани с играта (филмчета, принтове и т.н). Аве забавно е, и ако и вие като мен чакате “прототипа” с интерес не пропускайте да фърлите едно око на сайта