5 ms·

There was this one bit in KQ4, I think near the end, where I got stuck for weeks. A bunch of step stones going across a swamp, if I recall correctly, which nee

There was this one bit in KQ4, I think near the end, where I got stuck for weeks. A bunch of step stones going across a swamp, if I recall correctly, which needed to be navigated in order to get to the next screen. I repeatedly tried stuff like "jump on stone", "jump across", "swim". "YOU CAN'T DO THAT HERE" It took weeks to figure out that all I needed to do was type "jump" without any additional text. Oh, the good old days.

cperciva 3y ago
It was Space Quest 1 for my family and friends. "Insert disk into computer"? "Insert disk into drive"? "Use computer to read disk"? Nope, turns out the magic words were "Insert disk into slot".
- vkazanov 3y ago
  Now, imagine the same problem, but for a kid who didn't really have a lot of exposure to English in his daily life. I both loved and feared those moments in early adventure games: all good, moving on with the story and then... am I an idiot? Is this part of the game puzzle, or I have to iterate all the dictionary words again?
  - cperciva 3y ago
    I learned to spell by playing KQ1 and SQ1. Well, playing the games and having parents whom I could ask questions like "how do you spell 'search body'". It's not just kids without exposure to English who struggled with typed English interfaces!
    - vkazanov 3y ago
      On the brighter side: I lived through that period when the games transitioned from text-based interfaces to point-and-click ones. What a relief that was! I understand the nostalgia for Infocom games of people like Jimmy Maher - I also have a soft spot for beautiful and polished writing, but this definitely was a way forward for games in general.
      - cperciva 3y ago
        I hated the transition to point and click, because it turned into "hunt for the right pixel" -- with text based games you generally only needed to be in the vicinity of the object you were trying to manipulate.
        DavidNielsen 3y ago
        Absolutely, but precision was also a bit of a problem for the text based games. I remember Space Quest was the king of this, requiring frequent saving to make it past certain sections where a single accidental button press could cause you to fall off a ledge or step on something that just killed you. If you, say have a movement disorder, this happens all too often. Still I have so many great memories of Sierra’s games from my childhood that I can’t bring myself to hate all the foibles.
        vkazanov 3y ago
        My favourite pixel hunter was and still is Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis :-) Can't imagine myself playing that kind of game again but back then this semi-serious and comfortably safe (no real danger and no sierra deadends as well) gameplay felt right for the 7-8 year old. Oh, and Kyrandia..!
        DavidNielsen 3y ago
        Both games are classics, Indy 4 is one of my favorite games of all time.
        vkazanov 3y ago
        Yeah, the pixel thing... Not as bad as most parser-based games but still. But did the industry find a better way to tell a story without resorting to action-packed gameplay? I mean, Grim Fandango kind of slow story supplemented by visuals?
        twoodfin 3y ago
    - vkazanov 3y ago
      Thinking about it again... In the end of the day, these games are what made English easy for me. In the longer term this definitely worked well!
  - DavidNielsen 3y ago
    I learned English playing Leisure Suit Larry when I was about 6, with a dictionary next to me, painstakingly translating everything. This turned into a lifelong love of adventure games, with the Space Quest games being an especially fond memory. This was also how I learned the difference between ‘make knife sharp’ and ‘sharpen knife’, or ‘put can in bag’ versus ‘put can in bag’ (the latter of which actually worked if I recall correctly, with Larry stuffing the spray can and then dying, which frustrated me to no end for ages. I always kinda thought that this is more in the style of what an educational game should be like, exploring with aids and the tasks being somewhat unforgiving, at least that worked really well for me.
    - cpeterso 3y ago
      > or ‘put can in bag’ versus ‘put can in bag’ (the latter of which actually worked if I recall correctly Both commands above say “put can in bag”. :) What was the correct command?
      - DavidNielsen 3y ago
        And that will teach me to proof read, if I recall correctly then this was Larry 3 and it accepted both putting an air sick bag inside a spray can and the can inside the bag, the latter being the correct answer. It has been more than 2 decades since I last played the old Sierra games, so I might be misremembering, but it was all part of a really worrying suitcase bomb disposal puzzle near the end. Don’t ask me how Larry stuffed the bag inside the can, but there was the same animation and everything. I remember being extremely frustrated with that, since the Sierra games are otherwise quite flexible in terms of accepting input. This was also why it was useful for learning English, since you could tell it things like ‘look item’ rather than requiring it to be “look at item’ and so on. So I really loathed those cases where you had to be super precise, since they felt immediately off compared to the rest of the game. Regardless good times, I think the best Sierra game of that era is Space Quest 3, which had some decent puzzles, a fun story and a hero I really liked.
        cpeterso 3y ago
- jasfi 3y ago
  You often had to take notice of the terms they used, and be sure to use those terms. That's why looking around was so important. In some ways those text interfaces were similar to crossword puzzles. They made you think, even as you described what you wanted to do. The point-and-click UI was less frustrating, but there was also something lost compared to the text commands.
- ilaksh 3y ago
  It would be sort of interesting to put GPT-4 in front or something so it could determine if you were trying to do a valid action and then translate it to the correct command.
Zetobal 3y ago
Oh my... I called one of the helplines that existed at the time and asked for the solution to a puzzle in one of the LucasArts Indiana Jones adventures. Sounds so surreal in retrospect.

cperciva 3y ago

It was Space Quest 1 for my family and friends. "Insert disk into computer"? "Insert disk into drive"? "Use computer to read disk"? Nope, turns out the magic words were "Insert disk into slot".

vkazanov 3y ago
Now, imagine the same problem, but for a kid who didn't really have a lot of exposure to English in his daily life. I both loved and feared those moments in early adventure games: all good, moving on with the story and then... am I an idiot? Is this part of the game puzzle, or I have to iterate all the dictionary words again?
- cperciva 3y ago
  I learned to spell by playing KQ1 and SQ1. Well, playing the games and having parents whom I could ask questions like "how do you spell 'search body'". It's not just kids without exposure to English who struggled with typed English interfaces!
  - vkazanov 3y ago
    On the brighter side: I lived through that period when the games transitioned from text-based interfaces to point-and-click ones. What a relief that was! I understand the nostalgia for Infocom games of people like Jimmy Maher - I also have a soft spot for beautiful and polished writing, but this definitely was a way forward for games in general.
    - cperciva 3y ago
      I hated the transition to point and click, because it turned into "hunt for the right pixel" -- with text based games you generally only needed to be in the vicinity of the object you were trying to manipulate.
      - DavidNielsen 3y ago
        Absolutely, but precision was also a bit of a problem for the text based games. I remember Space Quest was the king of this, requiring frequent saving to make it past certain sections where a single accidental button press could cause you to fall off a ledge or step on something that just killed you. If you, say have a movement disorder, this happens all too often. Still I have so many great memories of Sierra’s games from my childhood that I can’t bring myself to hate all the foibles.
        vkazanov 3y ago
        My favourite pixel hunter was and still is Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis :-) Can't imagine myself playing that kind of game again but back then this semi-serious and comfortably safe (no real danger and no sierra deadends as well) gameplay felt right for the 7-8 year old. Oh, and Kyrandia..!
        DavidNielsen 3y ago
        Both games are classics, Indy 4 is one of my favorite games of all time.
      - vkazanov 3y ago
        Yeah, the pixel thing... Not as bad as most parser-based games but still. But did the industry find a better way to tell a story without resorting to action-packed gameplay? I mean, Grim Fandango kind of slow story supplemented by visuals?
        twoodfin 3y ago
  - vkazanov 3y ago
    Thinking about it again... In the end of the day, these games are what made English easy for me. In the longer term this definitely worked well!
- DavidNielsen 3y ago
  I learned English playing Leisure Suit Larry when I was about 6, with a dictionary next to me, painstakingly translating everything. This turned into a lifelong love of adventure games, with the Space Quest games being an especially fond memory. This was also how I learned the difference between ‘make knife sharp’ and ‘sharpen knife’, or ‘put can in bag’ versus ‘put can in bag’ (the latter of which actually worked if I recall correctly, with Larry stuffing the spray can and then dying, which frustrated me to no end for ages. I always kinda thought that this is more in the style of what an educational game should be like, exploring with aids and the tasks being somewhat unforgiving, at least that worked really well for me.
  - cpeterso 3y ago
    > or ‘put can in bag’ versus ‘put can in bag’ (the latter of which actually worked if I recall correctly Both commands above say “put can in bag”. :) What was the correct command?
    - DavidNielsen 3y ago
      And that will teach me to proof read, if I recall correctly then this was Larry 3 and it accepted both putting an air sick bag inside a spray can and the can inside the bag, the latter being the correct answer. It has been more than 2 decades since I last played the old Sierra games, so I might be misremembering, but it was all part of a really worrying suitcase bomb disposal puzzle near the end. Don’t ask me how Larry stuffed the bag inside the can, but there was the same animation and everything. I remember being extremely frustrated with that, since the Sierra games are otherwise quite flexible in terms of accepting input. This was also why it was useful for learning English, since you could tell it things like ‘look item’ rather than requiring it to be “look at item’ and so on. So I really loathed those cases where you had to be super precise, since they felt immediately off compared to the rest of the game. Regardless good times, I think the best Sierra game of that era is Space Quest 3, which had some decent puzzles, a fun story and a hero I really liked.
      - cpeterso 3y ago
jasfi 3y ago
You often had to take notice of the terms they used, and be sure to use those terms. That's why looking around was so important. In some ways those text interfaces were similar to crossword puzzles. They made you think, even as you described what you wanted to do. The point-and-click UI was less frustrating, but there was also something lost compared to the text commands.
ilaksh 3y ago
It would be sort of interesting to put GPT-4 in front or something so it could determine if you were trying to do a valid action and then translate it to the correct command.

Zetobal 3y ago

Oh my... I called one of the helplines that existed at the time and asked for the solution to a puzzle in one of the LucasArts Indiana Jones adventures. Sounds so surreal in retrospect.