Cool adventure games

[Nostromo]

One of the best Adventure game I played was 'Riddle of Master Lu'. Well, last night, I tried a game that may give it a run for its money. I downloaded it from the place that must not be named. The game is called 'Sanitarium'.



Here's a description:

Doubtless one of the very best "serious" adventure games ever made. In this psychological rollercoaster ride, you find yourself a patient in a strange sanitarium, with no memory of who you are. Slowly but surely, as the game progresses, you gather clues and insights into the past that give you the whole picture. I don't want to ruin your enjoyment of the game, but in general, each new chapter represents another step in Max's search for his sanity. A true classic, and must-have for every adventure gamer, especially fans of psychological thrillers.

Unfortunately, there's a bug on the second chapter. I'm basically locked out of buildings in Chapter Two. So I'm basically stuck there

[DrSpike]

I remember that game - it has a cool atmosphere.

[Spaced Cowboy]

Unfortunately, initial shipments of Sanitarium have hit shelves with a heinous bug. It's possible to get totally locked out of buildings in Chapter Two, thus preventing you from progressing. What makes this worse is that you may not notice it for a while, thinking instead the game is telling you you're done there. There's already a patch at ASC's web site, but because of the nature of the bug, you'll still have to start the game from the beginning even after installing the patch. Hopefully, this will be fixed in later copies of the game. The same cannot be said of the spotty voice-acting - Sanitarium is pretty much stuck with uneven performances that run from very good to fairly bad. Sadly, one of the worst is the main character.

[Wiglaf]

There's no such thing as a cool adventure game.

[Nostromo]

Yeah, Spaced. I heard about that patch. But I'm not sure I can install it on the game I downloaded. Its a CD rip. I'll try it. Maybe I'll buy the game. Its fairly cheap, after all. The voice-acting can be bad, but it doesn't ruin everything, IMO. Despite all that, the game is still great... so far The game's atmosphere reminds me of 'Planescape: Torment'.

[FrostyBoy]

I love adventure games, but only a few are worthy of playing.

Wiglaf, you have never played Monkey Island, Zak Mckracken or The Longest Journey?

MI is arguably one of the greatest games of all time, it is definitely in the top 10.

[Nostromo]

Riddle of Master Lu was really cool.

One of my most favorite adventure games ever, Riddle of Master Lu stars Robert Ripley, explorer extraordinaire and author of famous syndicated cartoon, as he sets out on a perilous journey to find the tomb of Qin, China's first emperor. The game shines with gripping plot, optional paths, intuitive interface, and lush graphics. But it is the fieldishly difficult but fun puzzles that make it a true classic. The lab puzzle in this game joins the Babel fish puzzle in Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy as one of the best-conceived and most aggravating puzzles ever devised to stump all but the most experienced players. Two thumbs up!

And try out Sanitarium. A very good game, IMO. Its still looks good, IMO. But your such a graphics whore, I'm not sure you'll like it

[FrostyBoy]

Thanks for the info nostromo, am getting it now. It's been a while since I last wrapped my head around challenging puzzles.

[Nostromo]

So far, Sanitarium isn't that hard. But I'm stuck on chapter 2 because of that damn bug.

However, the lab puzzle in 'Riddle of Master Lu' is very hard.

[Adagio]

Sanitarium was interesting, played it a few years ago

My favorite adventure games are The Longest Journey (one of the more serious adventure games) and Grim Fandango (comedy gold)

Another adventure game I like is Still Life, unfortunately it's starforce protected. The no-cd "crack" files are to be found in the demo to the game AFAIK
The game is about a serial killer you have to find and has a nice dark atmosphere... unfortunately a few of the puzzles are meaningless (e.g. at one point you have to bake a cake after some weird old recipe written in codes... baking this cake has nothing to do with the serial killer, it's just because your dad wants some cake)

[Cort Haus]

Originally posted by Sn00py
Wiglaf, you have never played Monkey Island, Zak Mckracken or The Longest Journey?

Monkey Island - all time classic Well, the first three. Four lost the atmosphere.

Grim Fandango and the Broken Sword series were some of my favourites.

Nothing beats the old Infocoms though.

[Hueij]

Originally posted by Adagio
Sanitarium was interesting, played it a few years ago

My favorite adventure games are The Longest Journey (one of the more serious adventure games) and Grim Fandango (comedy gold)

Another adventure game I like is Still Life, unfortunately it's starforce protected. The no-cd "crack" files are to be found in the demo to the game AFAIK
The game is about a serial killer you have to find and has a nice dark atmosphere... unfortunately a few of the puzzles are meaningless (e.g. at one point you have to bake a cake after some weird old recipe written in codes... baking this cake has nothing to do with the serial killer, it's just because your dad wants some cake)

If you like Still Life (too many machine puzzles for my taste) you should try Post Mortem. The protagonist is Gus McPherson, Still Lifes' Victoria's grandfather. Paris in the 1920's.

[Mike Breitkreutz FIRAXIS]

Originally posted by nostromo
So far, Sanitarium isn't that hard. But I'm stuck on chapter 2 because of that damn bug.

Try restarting the level. I'm pretty sure there's a sequence of events that triggers the bug (though I don't remember the sequence) so you may get around it by starting over. Also, the bug only occurs in chapter 2 so you don't need to worry about it occurring later in the game.

And it does get a little more difficult later in the game but the idea was to make it easier to play so that it was fun rather than frustrating (like some adventure games are). Early versions of the game during development were far more difficult.

--
Mike Breitkreutz
Programmer
(formerly) DreamForge Intertainment

[Mike Breitkreutz FIRAXIS]

Some of my favorite adventure games:

- Day of the Tentacle
- Monkey Island (all 4 of them even though the last wasn't as good, it was still fun)
- Grim Fandango
- Full Throttle
- Psychonauts (Technically this is a platformer but it feels like an adventure game when you're playing it -- if you like adventure games and have an Xbox, I highly recommend this)
- The two old Star Trek 25th anniversary games (I forget the actual names) -- and I'm not even a Star Trek fan; the games were just good

More action-oriented but still fun for an adventure gamer that's not reflex-challenged:

- Beyond Good and Evil (Xbox)
- Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem (Gamecube)

[Nostromo]

Nice to hear from you, Mike

You worked for DreamForge Intertainment? Didn't know that. Did you work on Sanitarium? If so, great work! Isn't there a patch that fixes the bug? I like the game a lot so I think I'll buy it. Anyway, its cheap and I'll get the music and cutscenes...

'Psychonauts' and 'Beyond Good and Evil' are available for the PC, BTW. You can get the first one on Steam and the other one on direct2drive.