The State of Misadventure Gaming
2001 April Fool's Edition

By Ydnar Iksnaguls

PC Data Sales Figures (As Supplied by PC Gamer)

All figures are copies sold in thousands for the month of March 2001 and do not include online or overseas purchases:

A Rose by Any Other Name

In a not totally unexpected move, Dreamcatcher has announced that it will once again be changing the name of its adventure titles for North American release. Pompeii, which had been renamed Timescape for North American release, will now be known as Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Faust, which had been changed to Seven Games of the Soul, will now be know as Pompeii. A Dreamcatcher spokesperson, who asked to remain anonymous, said that the name changes were not made in order to trick customers into purchasing extra copies of games they already owned.

The Myst Splatters in Your Eyes

Citing dissatisfaction with the initial 500,000 pre-orders, an unnamed Presto spokesperson today announced that Myst 3 has been reprogrammed as a first-person-shooter. As quoted from the unofficial press release, "In an attempt to appeal to bloodthirsty, mindless action gamers who would not recognize a sense of humor if it crawled up their butts and died, we have decided to appeal to the lowest common denominator and turn the peaceful islands of Myst 3 into a bloodletting orgy of violence." Our prediction: if Myst 3 is a best-seller, then for the next ten years magazine editors will be blaming the death of first-person-shooter games on the profusion of Myst 3 clones that later flooded the market.

Don't Bogart That Geritol

No longer welcome in an industry that worships at the unwashed feet of twenty-something action gamers, adventure game legends Roberta Williams, Jane Jansen, Al Lowe, and Josh Mandel--now all in their forties (which is closer to eighty in computer gaming years)--today held a press conference to announce the formation of their new development company--Productions of Old Farts (P.O.O.F.)--and promised to change the industry. They immediately announced their first title in what is expected to be a ten-part series, Leisure Suit Larry Goes on a Space Quest for Glory and Is Questioned by Police After He Becomes a Queen in a King's Quest for Love.

When Doves Cry

In a totally unexpected announcement, it has been confirmed, through anonymous sources, that the entire staff of Computer Gaming World--with the sole exception of Jeff Green--has been let go and replaced by the staff of Just Adventure. Veteran editor Jeff Green is rumored to be ecstatic to no longer be the oldest person on the staff and in fact welcomes the opportunity to have new Editor-in-Chief Randy Sluganski lead Computer Gaming World backwards to the halcyon days of adventure gaming. We are still investigating reports that former Editor-in-Chief George Martin has been asked to stay under the condition he wear a dress and write all his columns under the byline "Scorpia."

Monkey Madness

LucasArts today announced that they will release a yearly sequel to Monkey Island for the next twenty years and compared the success of Monkey Island to their phenomenal Star Wars franchise--except that tens of millions more people will see the Star Wars movies than will ever play the Monkey Island games. In keeping with their policy of making their adventure games user-unfriendly by requiring keyboard input, it has been announced that the next installment of Monkey Island--Dammit Guybrush, I'm a Monkey, I'm Not Your Wife--will be shipped on 456 floppy disks.

When Pigs Fly

Just Adventure today announced that advertising revenue was at an all-time high as major software companies seem to have suddenly discovered the wisdom of advertising their adventure products to its niche audience rather than to the action gamer populace of gaming magazines and IGN. An unnamed spokesperson for LucasArts was heard to say, "We never realized how many more tens of thousands of our product could be sold simply by advertising on Just Adventure. If only we had utilized this webzine when Grim Fandango was released!" An unnamed marketing spokesperson for Ubi-Soft was quoted as saying, "Advertising on Just Adventure increased our bottom line and saved my job. Thank God for Randy and his dedicated staff members at Just Adventure."