"REAL adventure is waiting for you, DS."

I’m the type of gamer who mostly plays old Sierra and LucasArts adventure games. Some people might not even consider me a gamer at all, in fact. I didn’t have a console until very recently. My circa 2002 computer may be running like a champ, but it had some lagging problems running Psychonauts… in 2005. So, modern computer gaming is also out. I was lucky enough to be visited by the Wing Damage Fairy a while back, who blessed me with a DS.

I was excited about rumblings of the DS being the promised land of adventure gaming; I’d read on many a message board and blog that since the console’s point-and-click stylus interface was ideal for the genre I would have a bevy of adventure games to choose from once I had a look around. I was bummed to find out, however, that there is not, in fact, a whole lot of quality adventure games on the DS. At least not the kind I’m looking for.

Read after the jump to see my findings.

(more…)

Games can grip you for many reasons; good stories and characters, interesting gameplay, or a fun setting to name just a few. With their independent title, Machinarium, Amanita Design has combined a point and click adventure game with traditional puzzles and an entertaining story of lost love and robots.

(more…)

Hey WingerDamagees. (Is there a good phrase for the readers of this site yet?) This is MrColinP, taking a quick reprieve from my temporary Wing Damage exile to let you know about a series of LucasArts themed illustrations that I just completed for the great LucasArts and post-LucasArts centered news site MixnMojo.com. It’s been a dang eventful and joyous few months for MixnMojo and the fans of what they cover, what with the new Monkey Islands, the imminent arrival of Brutal Legend, the comparatively quiet release of A Vampyre Story and the just previewed DeathSpank.

MixnMojo is running a series of retrospectives on each of the classic LucasArts adventure games and were nice enough to let me do illustrations for three of them. Three of the best ones, actually. Links below the break.

(more…)

“Can I have that bucket?”

“Why?”

“Because it’s there.”

“Tales of Monkey Island: The Siege of Spinner Cay”, the second episode in Telltales new Monkey Island episodic series, picks up immediately where the first game left off. While most Telltale episodic games can be played out of order without leaving the player completely lost, this is not the case with Tales. These episodes are written along the lines of old movie serials.

(more…)

As I mentioned in my review of “Tales of Monkey Island: Launch of the Screaming Narwhal“, I am new to the whole Monkey Island franchise. Not to say I’m new to adventure games, I just somehow missed this series the first time around.

It was great to be able to catch up on a game that I’ve been wanting to play for several years. I also wanted to be able to be able to compare both the original and Special Edition, so I played through both versions. The original on PC and SE on the Xbox 360.

(more…)

"I Found Him!"

On a very special twenty-fifth episode of “Barrel Roll! A Video Game Podcast”, we are joined by our friend and yours, Ben Paddon of the Science-Fiction Comedy “Jump Leads” and returning guest Wesley Johnson. We spend a good portion of time talking about how much we all love adventure games, how glad we all are that they are back, and which games we would like to see made. But a lot of that is saved for when we talk about stuff in our most terribly named segment “Let’s Talk About Stuff.”

(more…)

Join us LIVE, tonight at 8pm Pacific for a very special episode of “Barrel Roll! A Video Game Podcast”.

We will be joined by our good friends Ben Paddon of Jump Leads and Wesley Johnson of InsulinFunk.net. We will be discussing what we’ve been playing, the gaming news of the week, and most of all the return of the adventure game.

Please join us in the live Ustream feed and join in on the conversation via the chat window. We will also be taking any questions you may have for Ben and Wesley.  See you there!

(more…)

"Here There Be Monkeys"

Can I first start by saying, seeing the Lucasarts logo at the front of an adventure game again really gave me a warm fuzzy feeling? Because it did.

Now it is time to come clean. While I love Lucasarts’ classic adventure games, pirates, and comedies, I have never actually played a Monkey Island game. This gave me a unique perspective going in to the new “Tales of Monkey Island: Launch of the Screaming Narwhal”, the first in a new episodic series from Telltale games.

In a way I’m glad, as the game did not have to live up to some high bar it’s predecessors have set for many gamers. I have played several of the Telltale adventure games already, so there is the second bar, another high one, that I’m sure many will be judging this game by.

(more…)

"Burn it all down, Colin..." "Yes, Colin. Make them all pay!"

I’ve been playing adventure games since I was pretty young, and I believe they’ve wired my brain to deal with obstacles in my everyday life in a unique and efficient way. Traditionally, this “adventure game logic” has helped me to solve simple tasks, but recently I’ve been confronted with a new adventure game that is making me wonder what other parts of my life this type of problem solving can be applied to.

(more…)

Welcome to a special bonus installment of our video game podcast, Barrel Roll.

Colin “MrColinP” Panetta, and Jonah “thespambot” Gregory got together to discuss one of their favorite video game series, Space Quest. This is an overview of the entire Space Quest series, and we have broken it up into two parts, for your convenience.

In Part One, we will be talking about how each of us found this series, and then moving on to focus on games one through three. Full show notes can be found after the break.

Download

RSS

iTunes

(more…)