
The Mortgaging of Sierra Online - D_Guidi
https://www.filfre.net/2019/07/the-mortgaging-of-sierra-online/
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chasingthewind
I grew up with Sierra adventure games in the 80s and they hold an incredibly
special place in my heart. I love reading these articles about what was
happening behind the scenes so thanks for posting.

Despite my extreme level of nostalgia for those old games (I installed KQ3 a
few weeks ago just to visit Manannan) I find them unplayable today. I think
the last Sierra adventure that I honestly enjoyed was probably KQV. When I
look at the list [0] of their releases I think the last Sierra adventure game
I ever bought was probably Dagger of Amon Ra.

By about 1991/1992 I was beginning to move on to other genres. When more open
games like Microprose's Darklands and Origin's Ultima 7, Ultima Underworld,
and Privateer were released I switched over and never looked back. I haven't
played an adventure game for more than a few hours since.

I often wish I could travel back to 1989 and sit down in front of my IBM PS/2
30/286 and fire up The Colonel's Bequest or KQIV and experience the enjoyment
that I felt with those games one more time.

[0]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Sierra_Entertainment_v...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Sierra_Entertainment_video_games)

~~~
jeffwmair
My feeling is almost exactly as you describe yours. I wish I could go back and
relive the enjoyment I had when I was young, playing on the Tandy 1000 in my
parents basement. I still feel very strong nostalgia and think about the games
quite a bit, but then if I try to play them I get bored nearly instantly or
start feeling guilty for not doing more important things with my time (wife &
2 kids). Oh well, I will always have the nostalgia I guess.

~~~
ljf
Years ago, I got really into (or at least taken with the idea) of amassing a
collection of vintage games machines.

It started with some Pong clones, and went on to various Atari machines and
then to NES.

But pretty quickly, I realised that I was taken with the IDEA of buying and
owning them. Actually owning them and actually playing the games wasn't that
fun.

I think I kept hold of the NES the longest and sold them all as consoles with
huge game collections (kickstarting someone elses hobby I hoped). I hope who
ever got them enjoyed them - but it turned out there are very few old games I
really enjoy playing for any length of time.

I think 'Blazing Lazers' is likely my favourite old game, and I still have a
romantic attachment to owning a NEOGEO to play it on, but in truth a fire it
up no more than once a month on my MAME, play it for 15 minutes at most and
turn it off again. I keep telling myself I'll build a MAME cabinet, but again,
I'm more interested in the idea of the cabinet than actually the pleasure I'll
get from owning it (and the 'space debt' it will add to my house).

~~~
BuckRogers
Count me in as another person on the same level of nostalgia for old games and
especially Sierra games as you and the parent comments..

I found the same thing you did on the experience. There are games from that
era that are still fun, but you really have to dig. I run emulators and sort
through them, and it's no surprise no one is trying to repackage and sell most
of them. No one would buy them. The IP is only valuable for respins.

One thing worth noting, I found the more simple the games were, the better
they aged. There was a time in the 90s when Atari 2600 games felt useless, now
I'm finding their simple arcade action aged better than genres that tried to
do more.

Adventure games themselves are timeless because they're at their core, puzzle-
oriented storybooks.

My favorite by far is Hero's Quest / Quest for Glory. Those were the crown
jewel of the Sierra lineup. The original creators are back at it, and recently
released Hero-U (it's on Steam and GOG). I've only played it a bit, but it
seems like as good as you can do to bring a traditional adventure game into
2019.

Hero-U is definitely worth checking out for any old Sierra-head!

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ex3xu
I'm just here to suggest that anyone looking for wholesome, intellectually
challenging games for kids should look into both the Dr. Brain and Incredible
Machine series. The later entries especially in both series still hold up
today as seriously amazing and entertaining puzzle games for kids to develop
critical thinking skills.

~~~
mikepurvis
The Incredible Machine 3/4 does indeed hold up well. I recently grabbed "Crazy
Machines 3" off of the steam sale to try to scratch that itch and it just
wasn't the same.

~~~
playworker
FYI Wikipedia suggests that GOG.com has the originals and that a game called
Contraption Maker on Steam is a spiritual successor by the original developers

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mikepurvis
Yup:

[https://www.gog.com/game/the_incredible_machine_mega_pack](https://www.gog.com/game/the_incredible_machine_mega_pack)

[https://store.steampowered.com/app/241240/Contraption_Maker/](https://store.steampowered.com/app/241240/Contraption_Maker/)

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zeveb
I absolutely love these write-ups! Every time one comes out I read it
immediately.

This doesn't jive with my recollection, though:

> The monochrome cargo vans of 1985 had improbably become the multimedia
> sports cars of 1993, all whilst sticking to the same basic software and
> hardware architecture.

I don't really believe that this was true until after the adoption of Windows
95 (and remember, Windows NT retained the older Windows 3.1 look for longer;
well into the late 90s my college labs' Windows machines looked ancient). At
the time, the Mac was the closest thing to a multimedia sports car (with Amiga
being the hand-crafter multimedia Rolls Royce, to carry the metaphor too far):
it was attractive and ran well. Those of us who used Macs back then look at
Windows 3.1 and thought it was a joke; we didn't even think DOS was worth
noticing.

In retrospect, I actually have a lot more respect for DOS now than I did then:
given what it was, it wasn't actually bad, and it enabled some neat programs.
If I were teleported back in time, I might get a DOS box. But there is no way
I'd want to use Windows 3.1 again — give me a System 7, 8 or 9 Mac anytime!

~~~
empath75
Soundblaster and vga cards came out before windows 95 did. You had games like
Wing Commander and Doom and such that came out well before windows gaming
existed.

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bluedino
People forget that originally, Windows 95 was a resoure-hogging, performance-
robbing, disaster of a gaming environment until Windows 98 or so.

3D accelerators and internet play finally killed off DOS.

Even in the days of Windows 95, you had to drop down to 320x200x256 to get any
decent performance on the average PC.

~~~
rleigh
Even in the Windows98 era, it was common to boot into DOS for many games.

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Razengan
Sierra and LucasArts' games were my vindication for getting an "IBM PC"
instead of the Commodore Amiga I had been lusting after in magazines.

I'm glad there has been a resurgence in point-and-click adventure games lately
(like Thimbleweed Park, Broken Age, Samorost, Machinarium etc.) and I hope
they become more popular again.

~~~
CalRobert
I think tablets have paired extremely well with Point and Click adventures.
The Journey Down was very enjoyable, for one.

~~~
golyi
Agreed. I have been revisiting a lot of these old school adventure games and
even playing them in their entirety through ScummVM for Android. Haven't had
that much luck with ResidualVM which tries to emulate 3D adventure games like
Grim Fandango and Escape from Monkey Island, here's hoping they get it to a
more stable state.

~~~
CalRobert
For what it's worth, DoubleFine put out a great version of Grim Fandango for
mobile.

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lordleft
Fans of this should check out MetalJesusRocks' channel on YouTube. He was a
former Sierra Online employee and is one of the biggest figures in the YouTube
retro gaming scene. Great video where he reminisces with a former employee
here:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qmNCFtAlYN0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qmNCFtAlYN0)

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liberte82
Let's not forget The Realm, Sierra's entry into the exploding MMORPG genre at
the time. Believe it or not, it's still alive and well, after having changed
owners quite a few times. It hasn't changed much since the late 90's. This was
my first MMORPG experience and I sunk many many hours into it!

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kevingadd
Anyone else seeing all the 9s in this article replaced with em dashes? It's
really confusing me.

~~~
jfk13
I believe you have an old (and broken) copy of the Lucida Grande font
installed for some reason.

See
[https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1542644](https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1542644).

