Articles

The State of Misadventure Gaming - April Fool's Day, 2004

By Randy Sluganski

I Hope They Didn’t Have Corn For Dinner

In a surprise announcement that rocked the adventure community, Lucas Arts this morning announced the development of three new adventure titles: Sam n Max 2 ½: Animal Control Cops; Grim Fandango 2: Is There Sex After Death & Monkey Island 6: Poop Ahoy. Monkey Island 6 will feature an arcade sequence similar to Monkey Kombat as Guybrush Threepwood must avoid deadly monkey poop hurled at him by archrival LeChuck and his band of sinister simians.

Later that same day, in an unprecedented move, Lucas Arts then cancelled all three titles claiming that releasing so many adventure games at once would flood the market and hurt sales.

What’s the Rate of Interest on $5?

In a related story, industry insiders have informed us that Lucas Arts needs only $5 to complete the development of Sam n Max 2. Lucas Arts has been seriously considering floating a loan to put the finishing touches on the game and then selling the rights to a smaller publisher with less distribution channels. The low sales generated by the reduced market exposure would then prove Lucas Arts supposition that the adventure market will not support a big-budget game and restore their stellar reputation.

He’s Chewing Gum & Kicking Ass and He’s All Out of Gum

Sierra, in a bold move, announced a return their adventure roots. The first game to come from their new development team (whose jobs have been outsourced to India) is the highly anticipated Gabriel Knight 4: Twenty Bucks a Trick. The beloved Gabriel Knight series will take on a harder, grittier edge as Gabe will go undercover as a pimp with Grace as his ho as they attempt to uncover the identity of a Jack the Ripper style serial killer who mysteriously seems to just disappear at the end of the game. Gabriel will have a full arsenal of weapons at his disposal including an AK47, an upgradeable flamethrower and a M4 Carbine.

That Explains His Squeaky Voice

Rumors are also afloat that the next game to be announced is King’s Quest IX: A Queen in Search of a King as King Graham undergoes a sex-change operation and then scours the kingdom of Daventry looking for his perfect mate. There will reportedly be an arcade-like sequence in which you must guide the scalpel while operating on King Graham’s genitals.

All of Our ‘Letters to the Editor” Are Written in Crayon

Dear Randy (King of all Adventure)

I read at one of the smaller adventure sites where someone named Stinker claimed JA is the Evil Empire. Why do people say these mean things? I think they are just jealous because I saw a picture of you and you’re one hot adventure gamer!

PS – Since I said nice things about you, can you send me a free game, I live in Poland and it is hard to get games here.

Pierogi Boy

Dear Pierogi Boy,

What you read is true, in fact my raspy breathing has caused many people to mistake me for Darth Vader. We purposely award good reviews to mediocre games in the hopes that we encourage developers to flood the market with more mediocrity. Our theory may need rethinking though as our reviews praising Syberia & The Longest Journey did not seem to stimulate like quality products - Randy.

Somebody Call Ripley’s!

Rumors are surfacing that a recent release from The Adventure Company was actually played through to completion without one bug surfacing. When contacted about this situation, a TAC representative (who asked to remain anonymous) responded, “Hey, how did that happen?” and promised to recall the bug-free game.

Just Be Glad There’s No Code To See Me Nude!

In response to decreasing pc sales, adventure game publishers have decided to follow the lead of many console games and insert nude codes into their most popular games. These codes, when entered correctly, allow the player to see their favorite character nude:

• Kate Walker – On your keyboard type, ‘No Need To Go Down There,’ and then press Insert and Enter.
• Nancy Drew – Type “Jailbait” and then press Escape.
• Gabriel Knight – Type “Van Glower’s Toy Boy” and press Shift.

The Passion of the Money Grubbers

Considering the recent success of the box-office smash, ‘The Passion of the Christ’, we thought we would reprint our scoop from last year’s April Fool’s edition:

Hot on the heels of the announcement that he is bastardizing reinterpreting another children’s classic – The Wizard of Oz - into an action game, we have discovered that American McGee is now secretly at work on a first-person-shooter based on the events in The New Testament. In the aptly named JC & His 12 Disciplez, Jesus will be able to pray at certain locations to obtain special spells such as ‘Walk on Water’ which will allow the player to plan unorthodox attacks, ‘Water Into Wine’ to help restore health points and the aptly named ‘Raise the Dead’.

Each disciple will have an assortment of weapons that will be hidden throughout Jerusalem. Some to look forward to: The Judas Gun, a machine gun-like weapon that pellets your enemies with pieces of silver and The Shepard’s Crook, a seemingly harmless instrument that can quickly castrate the meanest Roman soldier. The castration scenes can be viewed in slow-motion thanks to the cutting edge technology of Penis Time.

Asked why he would distort the New Testament into a first-person-shooter, American nervously twisted his knit cap in his hands and mumbled, “Hey dude, the bible is already one of the most violent books ever written, I’m just giving my peeps what they want.”

Right on brother, right on. This industry needs more visionaries like you.