Reply To: Space Quest 3

[TigerQuoll]

#5433

So after playing the first three games, this is my general impression:
While the gameplay is definitely better in number 3, I like the story, atmosphere and “vibe” of the first two way better. I’ve always been a fan of star-wars-like, dirty, low-fi, lived-in space opera universes, and to me the chunkier graphics of the earlier games achieves this better. I do understand that this is totally my opinion, and I will admit I’m impressed by the quality of the EGA graphics in the 3rd game. I also appreciate that it now has proper music and sound (though I wish there could have been even more of it)

Now for the bad:
I’m probably on my own on this one, but I found the story, plot and setting of the 3rd game totally insufferable. The entire premise is based on a smug, self-referential in-joke, and we’re not given any actual in-game reason to care about the two dudes we’re supposed to rescue. It just feels completely un-earned that Wilco risks his life for two ungrateful strangers just because we as the audience know that they’re ham-fisted stand-ins for the game designers.
The first two games, despite the occasional postmodern joke thrown in, felt earnest and sincere. Pirates of Pestulon on the other hand was just about the epitome of insincere, self-satisfied, ironically ironic post-post-modernism.

(OK, re-reading that I realise I sound overly savage, hehe. But I stand by it. I do want to reiterate the gameplay was good and fresh with some great new ideas and there were some good locations and puzzles and sequences. It’s just the story and tone of the game taken as a whole that I don’t like.)