Adventure Games Museum

Started by Gribbler, Thu 24/04/2014 22:16:53

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Gribbler

Years ago I had an idea to write a blog called "Adventure Games Museum" where I wanted to write about adventures of the past, with photos of given game front and back cover, it's box contents, trivia and whatnot. You know, like in a display in the actual museum. I guess I wanted to show the young adventurers how the games were being released in the old days, before the age of digital distribution: no "soulless" downloadable keys, no lame DVD boxes, no pretty box covers (it's about you Innocent Until Caught box cover ;) ). The blog didn't really work out. I posted 2 or 3 games and abandoned it due to lack of time. Also, it was in my native language and only about 3 or 4 people read it :( I thought why not make a collaborative effort out of it, right here in the forums. If you have an old adventure game (in a good museum quality shape of course :) ), post some pictures in this thread, write a few words. I implore you! I can't be the only freak who marvels at this things... Well, even if I am, worry not, I will be posting games myself. :P


Oh, and I don't do this to boast about my games collection. Not AT ALL! Nooooo, sir!

So, my first game is Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. Why? Because it belongs in a museum!

List of Museum Exhibits (plus contributors) so far. I will try and keep it updated:
Spoiler

Exhibit #1: Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (Gribbler)
Exhibit #2: Random floppy disks (monkey424)
Exhibit #3: The Secret of Monkey Island (Gribbler)
Bonus Exhibit: Myst (Babar)
Exhibit #4: Return to Zork (out of the plastic bag) (monkey423)
Exhibit #5: Sam & Max Hit the Road (selmiak)
Exhibit #6: The Colone's Bequest (Gribbler)
Exhibit #7: The Black Cauldron (Arj0n)
Exhibit #8: Monkey Island 2: LeChuck's Revenge (Gribbler)
Exhibit #9: Beneath a Steel Sky (Chicky)
Exhibit #10: Official Sierra & Lucas Arts Magazines (Arj0n)
Exhibit #11: Loom (Gribbler)
Exhibit #12: Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis (Gribbler)
Exhibit #13: Hare Raising Havoc (monkey424)
Exhibit #14: The Scoop (Arj0n)
Exhibit #15: Gold Rush! (Gribbler)
Exhibit #16: Toonstruck (monkey424)
Exhibit #17 Dark Seed (Gribbler)
Exhibit #18: Day of the Tentacle (Gribbler)
Exhibit #19: Conquests of Camelot: The Search for the Grail (Arj0n)
Exhibit #20: Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure (Arj0n)
Exhibit #21: Cruise for a Corpse (Gribbler)
Exhibit #22: Emmanuelle: A Game of Eroticism (Arj0n)
Exhibit #23: Rise of the Dragon (Gribbler)
Exhibit #24: Dinotopia (monkey424)
Exhibit #25: Leisure Suit Larry 5 (Gribbler)
Exhibit #26: Hero's Quest: So You Want To Be A Hero (Arj0n)
Exhibit #27: Quest for Glory 1 (Gribbler)
Exhibit #28: Dick Tracy: The Crime-Solving Adventure (Arj0n)
Exhibit #29: Dizzy Collection (monkey424)
Exhibit #30: King's Quest 5 (Gribbler)
Exhibit #31: Duck Tales: The Quest for Gold (Arj0n)
Exhibit #32: Commander Keen: "Goodbye, Galaxy!" (Arj0n)
Exhibit #33: Flight of the Amazon Queen (Mods)
Exhibit #34: Gabriel Knight: Sins of the Fathers (Cassiebsg)
Exhibit #35: Ripley's Believe it or Not: The Riddle of Master Lu (Cassiebsg)
Exhibit #36: Shadoan (Cassiebsg)
Exhibit #37: Microsoft Adventure v1.00 (Arj0n)
Exhibit #38: Space Quest 1 VGA Remake (Gribbler)
Exhibit #39: Shivers (Cassiebsg)
Exhibit #40: Kingdom O' Magic (Cassiebsg)
Exhibit #41: STAR TREK - 25th Anniversary (Cassiebsg)
Exhibit #42: STAR TREK - Judgment Rites (Cassiebsg)
Exhibit #43: Versailles - 1685 (Creamy)
Exhibit #44: Broken Sword: The Shadow of the Templars (Creamy)
Exhibit #45: Broken Sword II: The Smoking Mirror (Creamy)
Exhibit #46: SPQR: The Empire's Darkest Hour (Creamy)
Exhibit #47: Waxworks (Gribbler)
Exhibit #48: Grim Fandango (Gribbler)
Exhibit #49: EcoQuest 1 (Gribbler)
Exhibit #50: The Dig (Gribbler)
Exhibit #51: Police Quest 1 VGA (Gribbler)
Exhibit #52: Sanitarium (evildustmite)
Exhibit #53: The Incredible Toon Machine (evildustmite)
Exhibit #54: Police Quest 2 (Gribbler)
Exhibit #55: Police Quest 3 (Gribbler)
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EXHIBIT #1: INDIANA JONES AND THE LAST CRUSADE

Front and back cover:
 

What's inside the box - Henry Jones' diary, Hint Book, six 5,25" really floppy disks, copy protection sheet with special glasses, bunch of leaflets.


Intricate spoil-proof hint system! Copy protection worked the same way so you could not xerox it.
 

Beautiful handwritten Henry Jones' diary which you had to consult to solve puzzles in the game. Really cool stuff!
 

kaput

That is so cool to see again. I loved how they included so many goodies with the game. Made you feel so involved in the adventure. Really ground breaking, I don't care what anybody says. My old original boxed ag's got thrown in the car boot for sale, years back. Still a bit pissed off about it lol. Anyway, post more!

Esseb

You're just doing this to brag about your adventure game collection, aren't you?

(I'm missing The Last Crusade in mine)

Ghost

Ooo, I have a cardboard box of Fate somewhere- with the original disks even (though those are well past their shelf date). Will go and dig it out the weekend!

Gribbler

#4
Quote from: EssebYou're just doing this to brag about your adventure game collection, aren't you?

(I'm missing The Last Crusade in mine)
Yep, you got me, I want you all to drool all over this thread!

Quote from: GhostOoo, I have a cardboard box of Fate somewhere- with the original disks even (though those are well past their shelf date). Will go and dig it out the weekend!
You might be surprised - these old Indy floppies still work. Some time ago I bought 5,25" disk drive and plugged it to my old tower PC, and they work just fine. It's an amazing feeling to unbox the game and install it from it's original disks and play it. A real time machine - woooosh - and it's 1989 again. :)

frenzykitty

I have a ton of these in a box in the garage (shameful, I know) :~( Will definitely dig a few out for a sexy photo shoot. (laugh)

Fitz

5,25" is not hipsterish enough anymore! Punch cards -- now THAT would be something ;)

As luck would have it, Indiana Jones was of my first PC games -- but I got Fate of Atlantis (full talkie on CD) as an OEM version bundled with my sound card. The first boxed games I got were Little Big Adventure and All New World of Lemmings. But the biggest box I've ever seen was for AD 2044 (anyone know/remember that one?)

Gribbler

Quote from: FitzBut the biggest box I've ever seen was for AD 2044 (anyone know/remember that one?)
I certainly do remember the game (even it 8-bit Atari version :) ) but not the box. Was it like Schizm big?

Giraffadon

So are the hints printed under the red writing, which is cancelled out by the red plastic?

I like stuff like this, kind of reminds me of a secret agent playset i had as a kid. <nostalgic smile><looks towards ceiling>

Gribbler

Quote from: GiraffadonSo are the hints printed under the red writing, which is cancelled out by the red plastic?
Exactly. So you wouldn't spoil a puzzle other than the one you search the soultion for. And copy protection sheet was, literally, copy protected as there were no color photocopy machines back then. :)

bicilotti

Thanks for having opened this Gribbler, so cool to see floppy disks which are actually floppy.
Will there be a chapter #2?

Fitz

Quote from: Gribbler on Fri 25/04/2014 18:03:07I certainly do remember the game (even it 8-bit Atari version :) ) but not the box. Was it like Schizm big?

I think so, yeah :) Although I got a Schizm/Reah bundle. But AD was their biggest game at the time, and probably the most spectacular thing made in our neck of the woods -- so I'm not surprised they tried to sell it BIG! That intro blew me away back then (especially the early trailer with Blade Runner end theme). The graphics didn't age well at all, but back in 1996... it was something. Or maybe I'm just a sucker for good retro CGI :)

monkey424

EXHIBIT #2: RANDOM FLOPPY DISKS

Sorry Gribbler, I couldn't find any old game boxes, which probably do still exist somewhere (I think in my parent's attic). But I dropped in at my parent's house this afternoon and Dad retrieved these curious artifacts..

I can't remember "Super Secret Spell Adventure", but I'm sure it's exciting and educational.

Sleuth is there too!

     

     

    

Babar

#13
I don't have Last Crusade, but I have that diary in a box somewhere. Was cool to read.
Since this is license to show off, here let me present a few :D. The only floppy disk stuff I have is ancient software which I keep around for some reason. Most of mine are from the CD era ("newest" was from 95). Even though I have all the boxes (I liked having the box to store the game stuff on the shelf), they were heavily used, so its definitely not "mint condition" or anything. Click the images for the full size.. I dunno why I took such large pictures, but I guess it allows you to see details if you want (or if you want more pics of some specific thing feel free to ask).

MYST:
The box:

The goodies:

The journal has the first page telling you to write your thoughts, and the rest are just lined. The manual was inside the CD case, and the little leaflet was there to explain how to get it working in Windows 3.1. It also included a poster of the island. I was never much of a fan of Myst, which is probably why all this stuff survived so well. Trying to get it to run now it required some archaic version of Quicktime which I couldn't get working, and since, as I said, I was never much of a fan, I've not bothered with messing around in a VM to get it to work.

King's Quest Collection


As you can see, this one saw a lot more use. Was a double CD pack. The manual included copy protection stuff, and spells for KQ3 (which I still never finished). The KQ Companion was pretty cool,  it was like a hintbook, except written as a first person narrative, with the protagonists thoughts and all, not "I did this and then I did that", so it was fun to read in its own right. The leaflet explained that some of these games were "Digital Antiques", so don't be mad if they sucked :D.

Also for your viewing: Lord of the Rings- Fellowship of the Rings, but it was more an RPG, though.


Box with slidey cover, manual, CD, reference card, instructions to get it to work on Windows 3.1 and small map.

Like someone else who mentioned it here, quite a few of the great games I got were part of a soundcard package, so while I have the manual and CD (as well as the occasional goodie), I have no box: Monkey Island, Loom, Wing Commander 2/Syndicate/Ultima VIII/Strike Commander combo pack. I have Indiana Jones FoA CD version with the box and manual and hintbook as well, but I can't find the CD envelope (I might've let it get lost since I had the same as part of one of the LucasArts archive volumes).
PS: Apologies for the large size of the images, I think I just added 10Mb to this thread.
The ultimate Professional Amateur

Now, with his very own game: Alien Time Zone

Ghost

Quote from: Gribbler on Sat 26/04/2014 00:12:40
And copy protection sheet was, literally, copy protected as there were no color photocopy machines back then. :)

Yeah I remember that. I think Zak's copy protection codes were similar, with gray swirly patters under the letters to make a copy so hard to read you'd rather go and not bother.
Didn't stop us from spending whole math classes writing down the stuff :-[

nihilyst

You could, however, just buy a red transparency film, put it on the page and b/w-copy that. I have a copy of the fingerprints from The Colonel's Bequest here that was produced the same way. Worked fine -- although in the case of TCB, it wasn't necessary at all because you got a 1 to 12 chance to guess the copy protection.

Gribbler

Many thanks to first museum contributors (especially Babar for beautifully preserved Myst) but, guys, I think we could use some rules here, we don't want it to get messy. This is our beloved genre! Could you please respect following while posting:

1. Post ONLY adventure games. We want it to be ADVENTURE games museum after all. :)
2. Post one game at a time and give your exhibit a proper number.
3. Post only boxed editions of games. DO NOT post cd-only, or cd in sleeve, or a pile of disks wrapped in a manual in a plastic bag or something like that. C'mon, who would want to look at that?
4. If it's possible, make a photo of front cover, back cover and what's inside the box.
5. It would be great if your game was in good condition (Babar's Myst was great, King's Quest Collection not so much)


I'm sure many of you have a golden age adventure game somewhere in a garage, back of the closet, or in the attic or cellar. Dig it up, do a sexy photo shoot and let us admire it! :D

Gribbler

Next game is a game that started it all for me. My first adventure game. My dear dear SoMI. I didn't speak English at the time so I had to finish it with a solution. Regardless, I fell in love with the game and the genre. Right after finishing the game I restarted it to live through the experience once again. True story!

EXHIBIT #3: THE SECRET OF MONKEY ISLAND

Front and back cover:

Excerpts from back cover:
"Eye-gouging 3D graphics", (I love this one!)
"Ear-pearcing reggae music"
"No typing - point & click interface". (haha in your face Sierra! :) )
"Average playing time: 30 hours. (No way!)

What's inside the box: eight 5.25" floppy disks, manual, Dial-A-Pirate wheel and a bunch of leaflets.

Code-wheel copy protection, in which you had to mix and match several pirate's faces and assemble their names. Almost 25 later - it still works!

Ghost

This is starting to bring tears to my eyes. So beautiful. Will need to dig through some boxes in order to contribute. Well done Gribbler. Serious nerdy retro tears from a Ghost. You DID IT.

monkey424

EXHIBIT #4: RETURN TO ZORK (SECOND HAND COPY)



(I took it out of it's plastic bag).

Sorry Gribbler, I'm being facetious. I DO have games that ONCE came in a box! Believe me! Whether the boxes still exist is another question, but when I get a chance I'll have a good search for them!

Lovely Monkey Island post btw. That's the first time I've seen the 'Dial-a-Pirate' wheel in colour (I'd only ever seen a photocopied version).

And kudos to Babar on the Myst post. I have located my Myst CD, but the bloody box has gone walkabout!  :~(
    

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