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Can Nintendo Save the Adventure Game Genre?
Gamasutra is running an editorial wondering whether the Wii can save the adventure game genre. With the intuitive nature of first-person control and interaction the Wiimote/nunchuck combination provides, it's been an open question since the console's concept was announced whether or not the Nintendo could revive a much-beloved but sadly absent game genre. Scott Nixon writes of the future for point-and-click titles, talking about their hearty success on the DS (with Hotel Dusk and Phoenix Wright) and the requirements of design such games would make of the Wii. With word that a Wii developer for the Sam and Max series is being sought, the question isn't if but when adventure titles begin appearing on the system. Here's hoping they get a warm reception, from an audience ready for their reintroduction. Update: 02/07 01:03 GMT by Z : Fixed the link. Sorry.
I played Maniac Mansion when it was brand new (I was a kid) and it kicked off and defined a golden era of adventure games that lasted from the late '80s well into the '90s. Something like Broken Sword: Angel of Death is the spiritual successor in our present day for this genre.
Shh.
I hear this sentiment echoed all over the place these days. I seem to be the only one left who does not share it. The truth of the matter is that it's the customers who have taken the industry down this so called "headlong dive". Go look in any bargain bin and you'll find countless gems like Psychonauts or Oddworld or Darwinia that did not hold to the status quo of GTA rip-offs, medieval RPGs, or Sci-Fi/WW2 shooters. The problem is that nobody buys them. You can hardly fault a publisher for not making games that nobody will buy.
The truth is that there have been many companies in the industry to take a stand only to get run over by the rush to pick up "Japanese RPG #25". The only reason that Nintendo gets any credit is because they have a rabidly loyal fanbase that even Steve Jobs would envy. For some reason they can put out a console supported pretty much by mini games and a 20 year old franchise and their fans hail it as a rebirth of the industry. They can produce a single adventure game for their hand-held platform and they "saving the genre".
Hotel Dusk is a fantastic game, as are a myriad of other games for both the DS and the Wii. Why can't they just stand as that? Why do they always have to be saving something or taking a stand for something?
In this day and age, Myst-like games have a lot of trouble getting through to the mass... The mass simply doesn't like hard games. They want to be spoon fed, and they don't want to have to think. The only real challenge you'll ever see involves button mashing in the right order, and aiming well, and while they require a lot of skill (more than I have!) in their own right, it is a different skillset entirely.
Puzzle games that make you think don't have a place anymore, in a world where if there's no walkthrough or FAQ about a game, it is considered "frustrating and impossible".
No discussion of adventure games is complete without Old Man Murray.
I miss Old Man Murray.
Not a typewriter
I agree 100%. I never understood the whole fascination everyone had with Myst. Okay, the pictures were pretty... And? It was not fun.
Do not anger the worm.
I take your point, but I would argue that 'action' adventure is a natural evolution. As game worlds become more immersive it is logical that players be given more freedom of action. As such, whereas in an old style point-and-click adventure there might be one single way to solve a given problem (i.e. solving a 'puzzle'), in more modern games it is possible to give the player the freedom to solve the problem as though it were real. One way of solving it might involve violence, but another might involve traditional adventure game-style puzzle solving.
For instance, it is possible to complete Deus Ex by killing few, if any, of the hundreds of potential enemies. Virtually every problem in the game has a non-violent solution if the player chooses to pursue it.
Perhaps what will 'save' adventure gaming is games like DX and Oblivion, but ones in which weapons are not absolutely ubiquitous and in which violence has realistic and immediate consequences. As such the limitations on violent problem solving would reflect those found in reality, but the player would not be artificially constrained in their choices as they would be in an old-school adventure game.
(PS - I am playing devil's advocate to a certain extent, I miss the golden era of LucasArts and co as much as anyone).
Read Pynchon.
With the introduction of the Wiimote, Wii can bring back point-and-click interface gaming.
Games like Myst were appealing to a wide range of players; the beautiful graphics, interesting puzzles, and simple play style (no spells to memorize, just use your brain) made it a hit seller.
I think that could happen over again on the Wii. While it doesn't have the best graphics of this generation, I don't think it will be a stretch to move the graphics of the various Myst games to the system, since much of it, to my knowledge, is pre-rendered.
It would also be another way for Nintendo to reach out to the "non-gamer" audience. Myst doesn't involve frantic violence, movements, sexuality, or most of those other things games are usually chided for. It's simple point-and-click, point-and-click, point-and-click. A great game for parents or grandparents, aside from those nostalgic for days of yure.