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The End of Sierra as We Knew It, Part 1: The Acquisition

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Re: The End of Sierra as We Knew It, Part 1: The Acquisition

#101

Post by wileydragonfly »

alexey-salmin wrote: post #74
canucker2016 wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And from Steven Levy's Hackers, she was one of the women in the hot tub for the cover and ad for the game Softporn Adventure, published by the company that was soon renamed to Sierra On-line. see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Softporn_Adventure Interesting to read the link to the Leisure Suit Larry game.

There are a couple more photos from that photoset https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2014/12/the-o...

I always found those photos deeply unsettling. None of the women look particularly happy about being there. “If I don’t do this, Timmy doesn’t get that operation” vibes. The photo in the advertisement was bad enough, the outtakes are worse.

Re: The End of Sierra as We Knew It, Part 1: The Acquisition

#102

Post by ViktorRay »

sys32768 wrote: post #10

Old Man Murray wrote a great peace in 2000 about who killed adventure games, the answer to which I won't spoil since it's an easy read: https://www.oldmanmurray.com/features/77.html

I miss this style of internet humor. It used to be dominant whenever there were gaming forums and it was dominant also on Reddit even up through 2015 but I feel like it has mostly disappeared since then.

Re: The End of Sierra as We Knew It, Part 1: The Acquisition

#103

Post by hibikir »

acomjean wrote: post #60
KerrAvon wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Important context that's come to light since then https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cat_hair_mustache_puzzle

I mean its a bad example, but not the only example of obtuse puzzles in games preventing forward progress in game. Dead ends and not being able to finish if messed up a previous steps were real problems. This was a bigger issue when the internet wasn't available to help out. I like adventure games, but even still they can be difficult and frustrating (although maybe I'm not great at them) Puzzle Dependency charts in…

Sierra's early catalog was basically a large collection of dead-man-walking situations. A key item for the endgame of Space Quest 1 stops being available 5 minutes into the game. Kings Quest II has a bridge that can breaks down every time you cross it, and you must do the right thing on every single crossing, as one superfluous crossing alone will end the game. Even as far as 1991 they were still making games where you could put yourself in an unwinnable scenario by missing an item hours before, sometimes in what you thought was a non-interactive cutscene!

Very few modern adventure games bring any of that back.

Re: The End of Sierra as We Knew It, Part 1: The Acquisition

#104

Post by gopher_space »

ViktorRay wrote: post #102
sys32768 wrote: post #10

Old Man Murray wrote a great peace in 2000 about who killed adventure games, the answer to which I won't spoil since it's an easy read: https://www.oldmanmurray.com/features/77.html

I miss this style of internet humor. It used to be dominant whenever there were gaming forums and it was dominant also on Reddit even up through 2015 but I feel like it has mostly disappeared since then.

The whole "bright guy writes like he's an idiot" schtick attracted an element that wasn't going to parse sarcasm. Seanbaby's entire oeuvre assumes you went to high school with a bunch of racist assholes and hated them. It was safe for him to do that at the time because the internet was still mostly cool people.

Re: The End of Sierra as We Knew It, Part 1: The Acquisition

#105

Post by gopher_space »

wileydragonfly wrote: post #101
alexey-salmin wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are a couple more photos from that photoset https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2014/12/the-o...

I always found those photos deeply unsettling. None of the women look particularly happy about being there. “If I don’t do this, Timmy doesn’t get that operation” vibes. The photo in the advertisement was bad enough, the outtakes are worse.

These aren't slice-of-life photos you can deconstruct like this, it's a professional shoot with amateur models. Professional models are paid to look happy to be there after hour three under hot lights. Amateur models thought you were going to snap a few pictures.

It's entirely possible that everyone in the photo needs to pee.

Re: The End of Sierra as We Knew It, Part 1: The Acquisition

#106

Post by tekla »

throwup238 wrote: post #37
TheBlight wrote: post #28

People don't strictly want to play games as much as they want to experience alternate realities. That's why Doom/Quake resonated. People want these simulations to be as realistic as possible.

> People want these simulations to be as realistic as possible. What do you mean by that? Do you mean in the context of that era? IME people what games to be fun because every single genre has a multitude of conceits to make the game playable and technologically feasible. The ones that eschew (most of) those conceits like ARMA and flight simulators are very niche or like Dwarf Fortress and Factorio, complexity is the…

You clearly have never played Hearts of Iron. Basically Factorio for history buffs.

Re: The End of Sierra as We Knew It, Part 1: The Acquisition

#107

Post by sc2862 »

JKCalhoun wrote: post #3

> Forbes first became associated with Sierra in 1991, when he agreed to join the company’s board. Ken Williams, Sierra’s co-founder and CEO, considered this a major coup... And then: > “Have you and Ken ever thought about selling Sierra?” asked her out of the blue one day in the lobby of the Paris hotel. > “No,” Roberta answered shortly. “We’re not interested.” > “But if you ever were, what sort of price would you be…

Apologies for my lack of understanding of business, but who was better business person? Was it Roberta because she wasn't interested?

Re: The End of Sierra as We Knew It, Part 1: The Acquisition

#108

Post by the_af »

Gareth321 wrote: post #84
timpark wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The guys who created Space Quest kickstarted another sci-fi comedy adventure game... 13 years ago. It went (and is still going) poorly, and Kotaku just posted about the ordeal today: https://kotaku.com/spaceventure-space-quest-kickstarter-stea... I backed the project, but at one of the lowest levels, so I'm not really mad. It's just kind of sad.

I’ve been waiting 13 years and just received a Steam early access code a few days ago. Someone did some regression analysis a while back based on average kickstarter demographics and estimated that 25% of the people who kickstarted the project are already dead. 13 years feels like a lifetime ago. I’m grateful they kept chipping away at the game instead of walking away, but it has been disappointing.

The money must have run out ages ago, right? So it has to have been a huge burden for the Two Guys. I don't envy them. And it seems the Early Access game they finally released is broken and not very good.

I've read an article that guesses they must have attempted changing Unity versions at least a couple of times, partly because they couldn't figure out how to solve a savegame bug (still not working right!).

Somehow this reminds me of Duke Nukem Forever.

Re: The End of Sierra as We Knew It, Part 1: The Acquisition

#110

Post by cyberlurker »

sc2862 wrote: post #107
JKCalhoun wrote: post #3

> Forbes first became associated with Sierra in 1991, when he agreed to join the company’s board. Ken Williams, Sierra’s co-founder and CEO, considered this a major coup... And then: > “Have you and Ken ever thought about selling Sierra?” asked her out of the blue one day in the lobby of the Paris hotel. > “No,” Roberta answered shortly. “We’re not interested.” > “But if you ever were, what sort of price would you be…

Apologies for my lack of understanding of business, but who was better business person? Was it Roberta because she wasn't interested?

It’s generally a bad idea to ask someone to name their price. And the right answer to that question is “A lot”.
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