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This article is about the computer and video game genre. For the British children's television series, see The Adventure Game. The Adventure Game was a Game show, aimed at children but with an adult following which was originally broadcast on UK television channels BBC1

An adventure game is a type of computer entertainment program or video game, characterized by investigation, exploration, puzzle-solving, interaction with game characters, and a focus on narrative rather than reflex-based challenges. A video game is a Game that involves interaction with a User interface to generate visual feedback on a video device. A puzzle is a Problem or Enigma that challenges Ingenuity. In a basic puzzle one is intended to piece together objects in a logical way in order to A narrative or story is a construct created in a suitable format (written spoken poetry prose images song Theater, or Dance) that describes a sequence of It is important to note that this term is unrelated to adventure films, and adventure novels, and is not indicative of theme or subject matter. The vast majority of adventure games are computer games, though console-based adventure games are not uncommon. A personal computer Game (also known as a computer game or simply PC game) is a Video game played on a Personal computer, rather This article is about games played on consoles Video gaming is about this form of gaming in general Unlike many other game genres, the adventure genre's focus on story allows it to draw heavily from other narrative-based media, such as literature and film. Literature is the Art of written works Literally translated the word means "acquaintance with letters" (from Latin littera letter Adventure games encompass a wide variety of literary genres, including fantasy, science fiction, mystery, horror, and comedy. Fantasy is a Genre that uses magic and other Supernatural forms as a primary element of plot, theme, and/or setting Horror fiction is broadly Fiction in any medium intended to scare unsettle or horrify the audience Comedy (from the Greek κωμωδίαkomodia has a popular meaning (any discourse generally intended to amuse especially in Television, Film, and Notable adventure games include Grim Fandango, Zork, King's Quest, The Longest Journey, The Secret of Monkey Island, Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis, Sam & Max Hit the Road, Gabriel Knight, Myst, The Last Express, Snatcher, Policenauts, Shenmue, Shadow of Memories, Ace Attorney and Hotel Dusk. Grim Fandango is a graphic adventure computer game released by LucasArts in and primarily written by Tim Schafer. Zork was one of the first Interactive fiction Computer games and an early descendant of Colossal Cave Adventure. King's Quest is an Adventure game series made by the American Computer game company Sierra Entertainment The Longest Journey ( Den lengste reisen) is a point-and-click Adventure game developed by Norwegian Studio Funcom The Secret of Monkey Island is an Adventure game developed by Lucasfilm Games. Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis is a graphical Adventure game, originally released in 1992 and published by LucasArts. Sam & Max Hit the Road is a Graphic adventure Video game developed and published by LucasArts during their adventure games era Myst is a graphic adventure Video game designed and directed by the brothers Robyn and Rand Miller. The Last Express is a Video game created by Jordan Mechner and Smoking Car Productions, published in 1997 is a Cyberpunk -themed Adventure game published by Konami and originally written and directed by Hideo Kojima. is a cinematic Adventure game, with a hard science fiction storyline published by Konami, written and directed by Hideo Kojima. is an Adventure game developed by Sega-AM2 and published by Sega for the Sega Dreamcast, produced and directed by Yu Suzuki. Ace Attorney, known in Japan as, is a series of adventure / Visual novel games created by Shu Takumi and published by Capcom in which Hotel Dusk Room 215, released in Japan as, is a graphic Adventure game for the Nintendo DS. Nearly all adventure games are designed for a single player, since the heavy emphasis on story and character makes multi-player design difficult.

The adventure genre was quite popular during the late 1980s and early 1990s, and many considered it to be among the most technically advanced genres. The adventure game genre had some elements carry over into other genres. Games that fuse adventure elements with action gameplay elements are sometimes referred to as adventure games (a popular example is Nintendo's Legend of Zelda series). is a High fantasy action-adventure Video game series created by Game designer Shigeru Miyamoto and developed and published Adventure game purists regard this as incorrect and call such hybrids action-adventures. In Europe, games which fuse action and adventure elements are called "arcade adventure" games. The term "adventure game" is used with the same meaning in North America, Europe, and Japan, and is regarded as pure genre in all regions.

According to ESA[1] adventure games are 5. 8% of best-selling computer game super genres by units sold and five to eight adventures listed in Amazon's top 100 sellers games monthly list.

Contents

History

Colossal Cave Adventure

Main article: Colossal Cave Adventure

In the mid 1970s, programmer, caver, and role-player William Crowther developed a program called Colossal Cave Adventure. Colossal Cave Adventure (also known as ADVENT, Colossal Cave, or Adventure) (Crowther 1976 Crowther William ("Willie" or "Will" Crowther (born 1936 is a Computer programmer and caver. Colossal Cave Adventure (also known as ADVENT, Colossal Cave, or Adventure) (Crowther 1976 Crowther An employee at Bolt, Beranek and Newman (BB&N), a Boston company involved with ARPANET routers, Crowther used BBN's PDP-10 to create the game. The ARPANET ( Advanced Research Projects Agency Network) developed by ARPA of the United States Department of Defense, was the world's first operational A router ('rautər in the USA 'rutər in the UK and Ireland, or either pronunciation in Australia and Canada is a Computer whose software and hardware are usually The PDP-10 was a Mainframe computer manufactured by Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC from the late 1960s on the name stands for "Programmed Data Processor The game used a text interface to create an interactive adventure through a spectacular underground cave system. Crowther's work was later modified and expanded by programmer Don Woods, and Colossal Cave Adventure became wildly popular among early computer enthusiasts, spreading across the nascent ARPANET throughout the 1970s. This is about the programmer For the meteorologist see Don Woods (meteorologist and football player see Don Woods (football player.

The combination of realistic cave descriptions and fantastical elements proved immensely appealing, and defined the adventure game genre for decades to come. Swords, magic words, puzzles involving objects, and vast underground realms would all become staples of the text adventure genre.

The "Armchair adventure" soon spread beyond college campuses as the microcomputing movement gained steam. microcomputer is a Computer with a Microprocessor as its Central processing unit. Numerous home-brew knockoffs and variations on Colossal Cave Adventure (which eventually came to be known as simply Adventure) appeared throughout the late 1970s and early 1980s.

Scott Adams

One of the many fans of the Colossal Cave was programmer Scott Adams. Scott Adams (born July 10, 1952) is the co-founder with ex-wife Alexis of Adventure International, an early publisher of games Upon his first introduction to Adventure, Adams spent almost ten days traversing the game before he achieved Grand Master status. Once he had completed the game, Adams began to wonder how a game like Colossal Cave Adventure could be developed on a home computer like his TRS-80. TRS-80 was Tandy Corporation 's desktop Microcomputer model line sold through Tandy's Radio Shack stores in the late 1970s and early The main obstacle was that home computers such as the TRS-80 did not actually have sufficient memory to run a large game like Adventure. However, Adams hit on the idea that an adventure game executable could be divided into code written in a high-level language and an interpreter, much like the way BASIC is often implemented. In computing a high-level programming language is a Programming language with strong abstraction from the details of the computer In Computer science, an interpreter normally means a Computer program that executes, i In Computer programming, BASIC (an Acronym for Beginner's All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code) is a family of High-level programming languages Furthermore, once an interpreter was developed, Adams realized that it could be reused to develop other adventure games. (For more information: Details of Adams's early work. )

In 1978, Adams founded Adventure International and produced twelve adventure games before the company went bankrupt in 1985. Adventure International was a Video game publishing company that existed from 1978 until 1985 started by Scott and Alexis Adams His first games were text-based and written in BASIC, but during his third game (Mission Impossible), Adams began programming in assembly language to improve the speed of his software. See the terminology section below for information regarding inconsistent use of the terms assembly and assembler

Graphical progress

The great advance which immediately followed was the introduction of images. With the use of machine language allowing shorter programs, and computer memory increasing, it became possible to use the graphical potential of a computer like the Apple II and some companies soon switched from producing pure text-based adventure games. Machine code or machine language is a system of instructions and data executed directly by a Computer 's Central processing unit.

Soon the clumsy basic vector graphics gave way to more aesthetic imagery drawn by professional artists. Vector graphics is the use of geometrical primitives such as points lines, Curves and shapes or Polygon (s which are all based Examples include:

The introduction of such high-quality bitmap graphics required more substantial storage capacity with many adventure games requiring several diskettes for installation, which would be the case until the CD-ROM made its appearance. In Computer graphics, a raster graphics image or bitmap, is a Data structure representing a generally rectangular grid of Pixels A floppy disk is an increasingly Obsolete data storage medium that is composed of a disk of thin flexible ("floppy" Magnetic storage medium encased CD-ROM (an initialism of "Compact Disc Read-Only Memory " is a pre-pressed Compact Disc that contains data accessible to but not writable

Infocom

Main article: Infocom

In 1977, two friends Dave Lebling and Marc Blank, who were students at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Laboratory for Computer Science, discovered Crowther and Woods's game Colossal Cave Adventure. Infocom was a Software company, based in Cambridge Massachusetts, that produced numerous works of Interactive fiction. P David Lebling (born 1949 was an Interactive fiction Game designer, or Implementor, at Infocom. Marc Blank is an American Computer game designer and Game programmer. After completing the adventure game, they were joined by Tim Anderson and Bruce Daniels and began to develop a similar game. Tim Anderson is a Computer programmer who helped create the Adventure game Zork, one of the first works of Interactive fiction and Their first production, Zork, also started on a PDP-10 minicomputer and spread quickly across the ARPANET. Zork was one of the first Interactive fiction Computer games and an early descendant of Colossal Cave Adventure. Its success was immediate, and the game, which would reach the size of a megabyte, enormous for the time, wouldn't be updated until 1981. A megabyte is a unit of Information or Computer storage equal to either 106 (1000000 Bytes or 220 (1048576 bytes depending on

On graduation, the students decided to stay together and to form a company. Tim Anderson, Joel Berez, Marc Blank, Mike Broos, Scott Cutler, Stu Galley, Dave Lebling, J. C. R. Licklider, Chris Reeve, and Albert Vezza created Infocom on 22 June 1979. Infocom was a Software company, based in Cambridge Massachusetts, that produced numerous works of Interactive fiction. Events 217 BC - Battle of Raphia: Ptolemy IV of Egypt defeats Antiochus III the Great of the Seleucid kingdom. Year 1979 ( MCMLXXIX) was a Common year starting on Monday (link displays the 1979 Gregorian calendar) The idea of distributing Zork came to mind very soon, but the game was too big to port to the microcomputers of the time: the Apple II and the TRS-80, the potential targets, each had only 16 kb of RAM. They solved this problem by breaking up the game into three episodes.

They wrote a special programming language called ZIL (Zork Implementation Language), which could function on any computer by using an emulator (the Z-machine) as an intermediary. The Z-machine is a Virtual machine that was developed by Joel Berez and Marc Blank in 1979 and used by Infocom for its text adventure games The Z-machine is a Virtual machine that was developed by Joel Berez and Marc Blank in 1979 and used by Infocom for its text adventure games

In November 1980 the new Zork I: The Great Underground Empire was made available for the PDP-11; One month later, it was released for the TRS-80, with more than 1,500 copies sold between that date and September 1981. Zork I The Great Underground Empire is an Interactive fiction Computer game written by Marc Blank, Dave Lebling, Bruce Daniels The PDP-11 was a series of 16-bit Minicomputers sold by Digital Equipment Corp TRS-80 was Tandy Corporation 's desktop Microcomputer model line sold through Tandy's Radio Shack stores in the late 1970s and early That same year, Bruce Daniels finalized the Apple II version and more than 6,000 additional copies were sold. Zork I would go on to sell over a million copies.

Douglas Adams produced two games with Infocom, the first based on his popular Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series and a lesser known venture game titled Bureaucracy after his attempt to go on a vacation. Douglas Noël Adams (11 March 1952 &ndash 11 May 2001 was an English author comic Radio dramatist The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is a science fiction comedy series Bureaucracy is an Interactive fiction Computer game released by Infocom in 1987 scripted by popular comic Science fiction

The company continued developing text adventure games even as it opened a department for the development of professional software, a department which would never be profitable. High-quality games, with massive, intelligent plots, unequaled syntax analyzers, and meticulous documentation as integral parts of the game, succeeded in all genres. However, with the power of microcomputers increasing and the demand for graphics (which it refused to include in its games), Infocom saw sales decline and in 1989, it had shrunk to a mere 10 employees, compared to 100 employees at its peak, and games developed after 1989 would have no link with the original team.

Sierra

Main article: Sierra On-Line
Mystery House for the Apple II was the first adventure game to use graphics in the early home computer era.
Mystery House for the Apple II was the first adventure game to use graphics in the early home computer era. Sierra Entertainment Inc is a Worldwide American Video game developer and publisher founded in 1979 by Ken and Roberta Mystery House is a 1980 game for the Apple II by Roberta and Ken Williams. A home computer was a class of Personal computer entering the market in 1977 and becoming common during the 1980s

At the end of the 1970s, Ken Williams sought to set up a company for enterprise software for the market-dominating Apple II computer. Ken Williams (born October 1954 is an American Game programmer and co-founder with his wife Roberta Williams of On-Line Systems which later became One day, he took a teletype terminal to his residence to work on the development of an accounting program. A teleprinter ( Rummaging through a catalogue, he found a program called Colossal Cave Adventure. He and his wife Roberta both played it all the way through and their encounter with Crowther's game would have a strong influence on video-gaming history. Roberta Williams (born February 16, 1953) is a retired computer game designer.

Having finished Colossal Cave Adventure, they began to search for something similar, but found the market underdeveloped. Roberta Williams liked the concept of a textual adventure very much, but she thought that the player would have a more satisfying experience with images and began to think of her own game. She thus conceived Mystery House, the first graphical adventure game, a detective story inspired by Agatha Christie's And Then There Were None. Mystery House is a 1980 game for the Apple II by Roberta and Ken Williams. Agatha Mary Clarissa Lady Mallowan, DBE (née Miller; 15 September 1890 &ndash 12 January 1976 commonly known as Agatha Christie, was an English And Then There Were None is a work of Detective fiction by Agatha Christie first published in the United Kingdom by the Collins Crime Club

Ken spent a few nights developing the game on his Apple II, and in the end they made packets with ziploc bags containing the game's 5¼-inch disk and a photocopied paper describing the game. They sold it via a local software shop and to their great surprise, Mystery House was an enormous success. Though Ken believed that the gaming market would be less of a growth market than the professional software market, he persevered with games. Thus, in 1980, the Williamses founded On-Line Systems which would become Sierra On-Line in 1982. Sierra Entertainment Inc is a Worldwide American Video game developer and publisher founded in 1979 by Ken and Roberta The company would be a major actor in the video-gaming of the 1980s.

King's Quest I used colorful graphics which were much more immersive than the line drawings of the earlier adventure games. Below the image the command prompt can be seen, waiting for a command by the player.
King's Quest I used colorful graphics which were much more immersive than the line drawings of the earlier adventure games. King's Quest is an Adventure game series made by the American Computer game company Sierra Entertainment Immersion is the state of Consciousness where an immersant's awareness of physical self is diminished or lost by being surrounded in an engrossing total environment often Below the image the command prompt can be seen, waiting for a command by the player.

Sierra soon took things further. Until this point adventure games were in the first person; images presented the décor as seen through the eyes of the player. Williams's company would introduce a new feature in the King's Quest series: a game in the third person. King's Quest is an Adventure game series made by the American Computer game company Sierra Entertainment Taking advantage of the techniques developed in action games which had progressed in parallel, Ken introduced an animated character who represented the player in the game and whom the player controlled. With the 3D Animated Adventures, a new standard was born, and nearly all the industry latched onto it. The commands were still entered on the keyboard and analyzed by a syntax interpreter, as with text adventure games.

Soon after, Sierra had multiple successful series of adventure games running, including King's Quest, Police Quest, Space Quest, Leisure Suit Larry, and Hero's Quest (Quest for Glory), with each containing numerous games. King's Quest is an Adventure game series made by the American Computer game company Sierra Entertainment Police Quest is a series of Computer games produced and published by Sierra On-Line between 1987 and 1993. Space Quest is a series of six Science fiction Computer games that follow the adventures of a hapless Janitor named Roger Wilco as he campaigns Leisure Suit Larry is the title character of a series of adult Adventure games written by Al Lowe and published by Sierra On-Line Quest for Glory is a series of hybrid role-playing / adventure Computer games designed by Corey and Lori Ann Cole. A few years after these series had started, the classic graphics above the command cursor was fully replaced with "point and click" game-play and VGA graphics. Other notable series include Phantasmagoria and Shivers; Sierra's last and most critically acclaimed series was the Gabriel Knight series, which began in 1993 and ended with Sierra's last adventure game in 1999.

Sierra would develop new games and push the boundaries of adventure gaming until its purchase by Cendant in 1998. Cendant Corporation was a New York -based provider of business and consumer services primarily within the real estate and travel Then in 1998, Cendant sold off their entire interactive software branch for $1 billion to Havas Interactive, a subsidiary of Vivendi Universal. VIVENDI is a software package for care management and staff organisation published by the German software company CONNEXT and introduced in 1995

Sierra pursued technologies for their games (such as hand-drawn backgrounds, rotoscoped animation, and in-game video) that were more advanced than most other genres at the time. However, the release of the Sony PlayStation marked the end of the adventure game era; as 3D became the dominant graphics format, the mostly 2D adventure market began to shrink. The PlayStation (abbreviated PS, PSone, PS1, or informally as PSX) is a 32-bit fifth generation Video game console

Through its almost 20 year involvement with the adventure game business, Sierra employed several notable game designers, including Roberta Williams, Jane Jensen, Al Lowe, Scott Murphy, Jeff Tunnell, and Lori Ann and Corey Cole. Roberta Williams (born February 16, 1953) is a retired computer game designer. Jane Jensen (b 28 January 1963 in Palmerton Pennsylvania) is the game designer of the popular and critically-acclaimed Gabriel Knight Al Lowe (born July 24 1946) is a Musician and Game designer / programmer who developed several Adventure games mostly Jeffrey Tunnell is a Computer game producer, programmer and designer.

LucasArts

Main article: LucasArts

In 1987, when nobody seemed able to overcome Sierra's power, a programmer named Ron Gilbert working for the company Lucasfilm Games — which has since become LucasArts — created the script-writing system SCUMM which used a point-and-click interface similar to ICOM Simulations' MacVenture games first introduced in 1985. LucasArts Entertainment Company LLC is an American Video game developer and publisher. Ron Gilbert is an American Computer game designer, programmer, and producer, best known for his work on several classic LucasArts Lucasfilm Limited' is an American Film production company founded by George Lucas in 1971, based in San Francisco California LucasArts Entertainment Company LLC is an American Video game developer and publisher. SCUMM ( Script Creation Utility for Maniac Mansion) is a scripting language developed at LucasArts (known at the time as Lucasfilm Games to ease development Point-and-click is the action of a Computer user moving a cursor to a certain location on a screen ( point) and ICOM Simulations was a software company based in Wheeling Illinois. The MacVenture games is a series of four Adventure games introducing a characteristic Point-and-click interface Instead of having to type a command to the syntax analyzer, this system was controlled by means of text icons. To interact with his environment, the player clicked on an order, on an icon representing an object in his inventory, or on a part of the image. This approach was first used by LucasArts for the game Maniac Mansion to great effect. Maniac Mansion is a graphical Adventure game originally released in 1987 by Lucasfilm Games (now known as LucasArts)

LucasArts would come to differentiate itself from its main competitor, the giant Sierra, by rethinking certain adventure game concepts to improve playability. Gone was the possibility to die during the course of the game and everything was done to ensure that the player was never completely stuck. Finally, LucasArts abandoned the system of points indicating the player's progress in the adventure. Many adventure games from other companies followed LucasArt's lead in these changes.

Gilbert's attempts, Maniac Mansion and Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders, however, remained in 16 colors (though the FM Towns version of Zak was 256 color), and the point-and-click engine still had vestiges of text parsing, since the player would still have to construct sentences using clickable keywords combined with objects in the game. Maniac Mansion is a graphical Adventure game originally released in 1987 by Lucasfilm Games (now known as LucasArts) Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders is a graphical Adventure game, originally released in October 1988[http //web The FM Towns (commonly spelled FM-Towns, FM TOWNS, or FM-TOWNS) system is a Japanese PC It was The Secret Of Monkey Island that was finally a complete work, with 256 colors, a more modern point-and-click engine, a dialogue system with optional responses, puzzles solved with items, original graphics, atmosphere music, and a characteristic sense of humor. The Secret of Monkey Island is an Adventure game developed by Lucasfilm Games. Above all, the script was written as for a film (which could be done in-house) and the dialogue and inventory served the needs of the script. The 1993 release of Day of the Tentacle, a remarkable success, began a line of cartoon-style games, including the very influential Sam & Max Hit the Road as well as the acclaimed Full Throttle, which also heralded the beginning of the end of the Golden Age of adventure games. Maniac Mansion Day of the Tentacle (often simply referred to as Day of the Tentacle, or abbreviated as DoTT) is a graphical Adventure The word cartoon has various meanings based on several very different forms of Visual art and Illustration. Sam & Max Hit the Road is a Graphic adventure Video game developed and published by LucasArts during their adventure games era Full Throttle is a Computer Adventure game created by Tim Schafer.

Steven Spielberg collaborated with LucasArts in the creation of The Dig — a science fiction adventure game that the director had envisioned turning into a film. The Dig is a graphical Adventure game developed by LucasArts and released in 1995 and a novel based on the game written by Alan Dean Foster.

Taking advantage of advances in action games and integrating an engine similar to those of first-person shooters, the company took a new turn in 1998 with the game Grim Fandango, where it abandoned the cartoon style and its SCUMM scripting environment for a new 3D game system named GrimE. A first-person shooter ( FPS) is an action Video game from the Shooter game The initial development of Maze War Grim Fandango is a graphic adventure computer game released by LucasArts in and primarily written by Tim Schafer. GrimE (Grim Engine is an Adventure game engine, created by Bret Mogilefsky at LucasArts using the Free software scripting language

Japanese adventure games

See also: Visual novel
Hideo Kojima's Snatcher (1988) was one of the earliest Japanese adventure games.
Hideo Kojima's Snatcher (1988) was one of the earliest Japanese adventure games. A is an Interactive fiction game featuring mostly static graphics usually with Anime -style art is a Japanese video game designer originally employed at Konami. is a Cyberpunk -themed Adventure game published by Konami and originally written and directed by Hideo Kojima.

One of the earliest Japanese adventure games and visual novels was Enix's murder mystery game Portopia Renzoku Satsujin Jiken (The Portpia Serial Murder Case) in 1985. For a topic outline on this subject see List of basic Japan topics. A is an Interactive fiction game featuring mostly static graphics usually with Anime -style art The was a company that produced Japanese Video games and Manga. Crime fiction is the Genre of Fiction that deals with Crimes their detection criminals and their motives It is usually distinguished from is a Japan-exclusive Adventure game designed by Yuuji Horii and published by Enix (now Square Enix) Hideo Kojima's classic Snatcher (1988) and Policenauts (1994) games were for a long time, the highest regarded Japanese adventure games in the West, and it is only in recent years that visual novels were released in the West in any significant number, particularly on the Nintendo DS console with mystery-solving titles such as the Ace Attorney series (which began on the GameBoy Advance in 2001) and Hotel Dusk: Room 215 (2007). is a Japanese video game designer originally employed at Konami. is a Cyberpunk -themed Adventure game published by Konami and originally written and directed by Hideo Kojima. is a cinematic Adventure game, with a hard science fiction storyline published by Konami, written and directed by Hideo Kojima. The is a dual-screen Handheld game console developed and manufactured by Nintendo. Ace Attorney, known in Japan as, is a series of adventure / Visual novel games created by Shu Takumi and published by Capcom in which The Game Boy Advance (often shortened to GBA) is a 32-bit handheld video game console developed manufactured and marketed by Nintendo. Hotel Dusk Room 215, released in Japan as, is a graphic Adventure game for the Nintendo DS.

Prior to the Nintendo DS, there were also several other Japanese adventure games on the DreamCast and PlayStation 2 which were released in the West, such as Sega's Shenmue (1999) and Konami's Shadow of Memories (2001). The is Sega 's most recent Video game console and the successor to the Sega Saturn. is a multinational Video game Software and Hardware development company and a former Home computer is an Adventure game developed by Sega-AM2 and published by Sega for the Sega Dreamcast, produced and directed by Yu Suzuki. () is a leading developer and publisher of numerous popular and strong-selling toys Trading cards, Anime, Tokusatsu, Slot machines However, these were not visual novels but were instead 3D third-person adventure games, unlike most other adventure games at the time which were either in 2D or in 3D first-person view. 3D computer graphics (in contrast to 2D computer graphics) are graphics that use a three-dimensional representation of geometric data that is stored in the computer 2D computer graphics is the Computer -based generation of Digital images mdashmostly from two-dimensional models (such as 2D geometric models text and digital In video games first person refers to a graphical perspective rendered from the viewpoint of the player character

While most Japanese adventure games are graphical, there have also been several text-based ones. One such example is Radical Dreamers: Nusumenai Hōseki (1996), which served as a gaiden (side story) to the Chrono series of console role-playing games. is a Japanese Video game produced by Squaresoft (now Square Enix) in 1996 for the Satellaview add-on for the Nintendo Super Famicom (a Japanese-language word often translated as " Side story " or "tale" is used to refer to an Anecdote or supplementary biography of A side story in fiction is a form of narrative that occurs alongside established stories set within a fictional universe The Chrono series is a Video game franchise owned by Square Enix (formerly Square) A console role-playing game is a video game genre that has its origin rooted in Video game consoles and includes game mechanics and frequently settings derived

First-person 3D adventure games

Myst used high-quality 3D rendered graphics to deliver images that were unparalleled at the time of its release. It became so popular that for many years it was the greatest selling computer game of all time, until it was dethroned by The Sims in 2000.
Myst used high-quality 3D rendered graphics to deliver images that were unparalleled at the time of its release. Myst is a graphic adventure Video game designed and directed by the brothers Robyn and Rand Miller. 3D computer graphics (in contrast to 2D computer graphics) are graphics that use a three-dimensional representation of geometric data that is stored in the computer It became so popular that for many years it was the greatest selling computer game of all time, until it was dethroned by The Sims in 2000. A personal computer Game (also known as a computer game or simply PC game) is a Video game played on a Personal computer, rather The Sims is a strategic life-simulation computer game developed by Maxis and published by Electronic Arts.

In the early 1990s, some independent adventure-game makers began taking advantage of the greater storage capacities of CD-ROMs to create games with pre-rendered three-dimensional graphics. These were usually first-person, unlike the third-person games created by Sierra and LucasArts, and more photorealistic than games with two-dimensional graphics. This gave them a greater emphasis on immersing the player in the virtual environment. The earliest examples of this type of adventure game include The Journeyman Project and Myst, both released in 1993. The Journeyman Project is an adventure Computer game developed by Presto Studios. Myst is a graphic adventure Video game designed and directed by the brothers Robyn and Rand Miller. As computer hardware became more powerful, later adventure games containing real-time rendered three-dimensional graphics were possible, giving the player more freedom of movement.

Myst, in particular, was a highly atypical game for the time. It was highly successful, and therefore had a profound influence on many adventure games that came after it. Myst and games like it have little personal or object interaction, and a greater emphasis on exploration, and on scientific and mechanical puzzles. Part of the game's success was because it did not appear to be aimed at an adolescent male audience, but instead a mainstream adult audience. Myst for many years held the all-time record for computer game sales (it sold over nine million copies on all platforms), a feat not surpassed until the release of The Sims in 2000. The Sims is a strategic life-simulation computer game developed by Maxis and published by Electronic Arts.

There is debate among adventure gamers as to whether or not Myst and similar puzzle games should be considered at all a part of the adventure genre, as their focus on abstract puzzle solving and exploration in the place of character interaction and development sets them apart from what previously characterized adventure games.

Most adventure games today have three-dimensional graphics, but how much they adhere to the Myst tradition varies. Some, like the Journeyman Project series, have more practical puzzles and more object interaction. The Journeyman Project is a series of award-winning First-person Science fiction Adventure games created by Presto Studios and released Others, like those created by LucasArts and Telltale Games, are still third-person, with a more cartoonish style. Telltale Incorporated is a Video game developer based in San Rafael California and founded in June 2004

Types of adventure games

There are many types of adventure games, depending on the criteria. Adventure games vary in their subject, interface, setting or plot. A definite categorization can't be done since some of them may belong to 2 or more of the below mentioned 'types'.

Text based

Main article: Interactive fiction

The first adventure games to appear were text adventures (later called interactive fiction), which typically use a verb-noun parser to interact with the user. For English usage of verbs see the wiki article English verbs. In Computer science and Linguistics, parsing, or more formally syntactic analysis, is the process of analyzing a sequence of tokens to These evolved from early mainframe titles like Hunt the Wumpus (Gregory Yob) and Adventure (Crowther and Woods) into commercial games which were playable on personal computers, such as Infocom's widely popular Zork series. Mainframes (often colloquially referred to as Big Iron) are Computers used mainly by large organizations for critical applications typically bulk data Hunt the Wumpus is an early Computer game, based on a simple Hide and seek format featuring a mysterious monster (the Wumpus that lurks deep inside a network Gregory Yob ( 18 June 1945 – 13 October 2005) was an American Computer game designer. Colossal Cave Adventure (also known as ADVENT, Colossal Cave, or Adventure) (Crowther 1976 Crowther William ("Willie" or "Will" Crowther (born 1936 is a Computer programmer and caver. This is about the programmer For the meteorologist see Don Woods (meteorologist and football player see Don Woods (football player. A personal computer ( PC) is any Computer whose original sales price size and capabilities make it useful for individuals and which is intended to be operated Infocom was a Software company, based in Cambridge Massachusetts, that produced numerous works of Interactive fiction. Zork was one of the first Interactive fiction Computer games and an early descendant of Colossal Cave Adventure. In recent years, a vibrant and creative community of interactive fiction authors has thrived on the internet. An author is defined both as "the person who originates or gives existence to anything" and that authorship determines responsibility for what is created The Internet is a global system of interconnected Computer networks Some companies that were important in bringing out text adventure games were Adventure International, Infocom, Level 9 Computing, Magnetic Scrolls and Melbourne House, with Infocom being the most well known. There are many types of business entity defined in the legal systems of various countries Adventure International was a Video game publishing company that existed from 1978 until 1985 started by Scott and Alexis Adams Infocom was a Software company, based in Cambridge Massachusetts, that produced numerous works of Interactive fiction. Level 9 was a British computer Adventure game company which produced some of the most advanced games of the 1980s Magnetic Scrolls was a British Computer game developer during the mid 1980s and early 1990s Krome Studios Melbourne, formerly Melbourne House, is a video game development studio owned by Krome Studios and based in Melbourne Australia

Graphic adventure

Graphic adventure games were introduced by a new company called On-Line Systems, which later changed its name to Sierra On-Line. Sierra Entertainment Inc is a Worldwide American Video game developer and publisher founded in 1979 by Ken and Roberta After the rudimentary Mystery House (1980) they established themselves with the full adventure King's Quest (1984), appearing on various systems, and went on to further success with a variety of strong titles. Mystery House is a 1980 game for the Apple II by Roberta and Ken Williams. King's Quest is an Adventure game series made by the American Computer game company Sierra Entertainment

A number of games were released on 8-bit home computer formats in the 1980s that advanced on the text adventure style originated with games like Colossal Cave Adventure and, in a similar manner to Sierra, added moveable (often directly-controllable) characters to a parser or input-system similar to traditional adventures. Eight-bit CPUs normally use an 8-bit data bus and a 16-bit address bus which means that their Address space is limited to 64 KBs This is not a "natural A home computer was a class of Personal computer entering the market in 1977 and becoming common during the 1980s Examples of this are Gargoyle Games's Heavy on the Magick (1986) which has a text-input system with an animated display screen, and the later Magic Knight games such as Spellbound (1985) which uses a window-menu system to allow for text-adventure style input. Gargoyle Games was a British Software company founded in 1983 by Roy Carter and Greg Follis in order to publish their first game Ad Heavy on the Magick is a Computer game for Amstrad CPC and ZX Spectrum published in 1986 by Gargoyle Games. Magic Knight is a Computer game character created by freelance programmer David Jones in his 1985 game Finders Keepers for the Mastertronic Spellbound is a computer game that was designed and programmed by David Jones with music by Rob Hubbard and released in 1985 for the

In 1984 a new kind of adventure games emerged following the launch of the Apple Macintosh with its point-and-click interface. Macintosh, commonly nicknamed Mac is a Brand name which covers several lines of Personal computers designed developed and marketed by Apple Inc First out was the innovative but relatively unknown Enchanted Scepters the same year, then in 1985 ICOM Simulations released Deja Vu that completely banished the text parser for a point-and-click interface. Enchanted Scepters was an early possibly the first Point-and-click Adventure game, released in 1984 ICOM Simulations was a software company based in Wheeling Illinois. Déjà Vu is a "point-and-click" adventure game set in the world of 1940s Hard-boiled detective novels and movies In 1987 the well-known second follow-up Shadowgate was released, and LucasArts also entered the field with Maniac Mansion - a point-and-click adventure that gained a strong following. Shadowgate is a 1987 " point-and-click " adventure Video game originally for the Mac and is the most popular LucasArts Entertainment Company LLC is an American Video game developer and publisher. Maniac Mansion is a graphical Adventure game originally released in 1987 by Lucasfilm Games (now known as LucasArts) A prime example of LucasArts' work is the Monkey Island series. Monkey Island is the collective name given to a series of four graphical Adventure games produced and published by LucasArts, originally

CRPG-like

Adventure games are similar to computer role-playing games (CRPG's), except that the game play is more focused on problem-solving rather than combat and statistics. A computer role-playing game ( CRPG) is a broad Video game genre originally developed for personal computers and other home computers For the television channel see GamePlay HD. Gameplay includes all player experiences during the interaction with game systems especially formal Problem solving forms part of thinking. Considered the most complex of all intellectual functions problem solving has been defined as higher-order Cognitive In general, games that involve the management of player attributes and statistics are considered to be CRPG's, while those that focus solely on puzzles and narrative are considered to be part of the Adventure category. It should be noted, however, that this distinction is an extremely loose one, and many games blur the line between the two categories. In particular, the status of what are sometimes called action-adventure games as members of the category is largely in doubt, with adventure gaming purists (and, to a lesser extent, action gaming purists) labeling action-adventure games as belonging to neither the action nor adventure genres rather than to both.

Some adventure games rely equally on the common adventure elements, but also on the 'character building' of RPGs. A role-playing game ( RPG; often roleplaying game) is a Game in which the participants assume the roles of Fictional characters. The main character(s) usually has a certain "Hit point" meter and a chart of skills. Health is a Game mechanic used in computer and Video games to give value to characters, enemies NPCs, and related objects Some puzzles and feats need a minimum amount of skills in order to be solved (like Climbing above 5 to climb a tree and obtain a lost ring) so the player may have to choose one character over another to solve it, or spend time building the skills of the first character. As in RPGs, the games involve battles, the result of which depends on his character's skills and health (and on the player's reflexes in the case of real-time combat). However, these kinds of games don't belong to the 'Action adventure' above. Typical examples include Quest for Glory and Beyond Zork. Quest for Glory is a series of hybrid role-playing / adventure Computer games designed by Corey and Lori Ann Cole. Beyond Zork (full title Beyond Zork The Coconut of Quendor) was an Interactive fiction Computer game written by Brian Moriarty and

Puzzle adventure

Adventure games that do not rely on obtaining items, their use, and character interaction belong to this genre. It emphasizes exploration, reading logs, and deciphering the proper use of complex mechanisms, often resembling Rube Goldberg machines. A Rube Goldberg machine is a deliberately overengineered Apparatus that performs a very simple task in a very indirect and convoluted fashion

The plot of these games is usually obscure, and relies on the player's interpretation of the setting and the scenery, and information from the logs in order for him to understand the background scenario. Almost all of these games are played from a first person perspective with the player "moving" between still pre-rendered 3D images, sometimes combined with short animations or video. Typical examples include Schizm, Atlantis: The Lost Tales, Riddle of the Sphinx and Myst, which pioneered this game style. Schizm is an adventure -genre Computer game created by Detalion and LK Avalon and published by DreamCatcher Games. Atlantis The Lost Tales is a fantasy adventure Computer game developed by Cryo Interactive and published by Dreamcatcher Interactive, and Myst is a graphic adventure Video game designed and directed by the brothers Robyn and Rand Miller.

Japanese visual novel

Main article: Visual novel
Japanese visual novels are commonly characterized with dialog boxes and anime-style sprites determining the speaker.
Japanese visual novels are commonly characterized with dialog boxes and anime-style sprites determining the speaker. A is an Interactive fiction game featuring mostly static graphics usually with Anime -style art A is an Interactive fiction game featuring mostly static graphics usually with Anime -style art (anime in Japanese, In Computer graphics, a sprite (also known by other names see Synonyms below is a two-dimensional/three-dimensional Image or Animation that

A visual novel (ビジュアルノベル bijuaru noberu?) is an adventure game featuring mostly static graphics, usually with anime-style art. A is an Interactive fiction game featuring mostly static graphics usually with Anime -style art (anime in Japanese, As the name might suggest, they resemble mixed-media novels or tableau vivant stage plays. Tableau vivant (plural tableaux vivants) is French for "living picture Visual novels are especially prevalent in Japan, where they make up nearly 70% of PC games released. For a topic outline on this subject see List of basic Japan topics. [1] They are rarely produced for video game consoles, but the more popular games are sometimes ported to systems such as the Sega Dreamcast or the Playstation 2. See also Software portability In Computer science, porting is the process of adapting software so that an executable program can be created The is Sega 's most recent Video game console and the successor to the Sega Saturn. The market for visual novels outside of Japan, however, is limited.

Visual novels have been a staple of PC software sales in Japan and other East Asian countries for over a decade, so much so that popular titles are open ported to consoles, and some even have manga and anime based upon them; such titles include Kanon (1999), Air (2000), Kimi ga Nozomu Eien (2001), Higurashi no Naku Koro ni (2002) and Fate/stay night (2004). For a topic outline on this subject see List of basic Japan topics. ˈmɑŋgə is the Japanese word for Comics (sometimes called komikku コミック and print Cartoons In their modern form manga date from shortly (anime in Japanese, is a Japanese adult Visual novel developed by Key and released on June 4 1999 for the PC. Air is a Japanese Visual novel developed by Key which was originally released as an adult game on September 8 2000 playable on the PC abbreviated as Kimibou or Kiminozo, is a Japanese Visual novel Adventure game created by âge, first released in 2001 is a Japanese Murder mystery Dōjin soft Sound novel series based on the NScripter engine produced by 07th Expansion. is a Japanese Eroge Visual novel game created by Type-Moon, which was originally released on January 30 2004 for the PC.

Japanese adventure games belonging to the visual novel genre are more of an interactive novel than a conventional game, and as such have a tighter focus on narrative and more limited puzzle features than their Western counterparts. Instead of point-and-click or text parser interfaces, visual novels are characterised by the use of on-screen menus for everything from interaction to navigation, and the story-lines usually have a strong romantic aspect (with "dating sims" often being the main subcategory of the genre). Dating sims (or dating simulations) are a Video game subgenre of Simulation games usually Japanese with romantic elements

Visual novels are sometimes called "dating sims" in the West, because many visual novels track statistics that the player must build in order to advance the plot. Dating sims (or dating simulations) are a Video game subgenre of Simulation games usually Japanese with romantic elements This is also because many visual novels permit a variety of endings, allowing more dynamic reactions to the player's actions than a typical linear adventure plot. The cultural differences between Western and Japanese adventure games are closely related to those in role-playing games, such as the storyline being more linear and tightly-scripted in the latter. Due to cultural differences between game developers historically different inspirations and origins distinct target audiences and hardware with dissimilar capabilities two main trends or "families"

Other

A few adventure games have defined themselves as "original" because they distanced themselves from the main adventure genre and put focus on other elements.

Modern adventure games

For much of the 1980s, adventure games were one of the most popular types of computer games produced. However, their US market share drastically declined in the mid-1990s; action games took a greater share of the US market, particularly first person shooters such as Doom and Half-Life which progressively began featuring strong, story-structured solo games. A first-person shooter ( FPS) is an action Video game from the Shooter game The initial development of Maze War Doom (officially cased DOOM) is a 1993 Computer game by Id Software that is a landmark title in the First-person shooter This slump in popularity led many publishers and developers to see adventure games as financially unfeasible in comparison. Text adventures met the same fate much earlier, but their simplicity has allowed them to thrive as non-commercially developed interactive fiction.

Few recent commercial adventure games have been hits US but still very popular in Europe (95% of all adventures released in US are in fact translated European products). It has been suggested that this is because the "average" gamer today was weaned on console video games and first person shooters rather than the "traditional" computer games cherished by the original crop of adventure gaming enthusiasts. A video game is a Game that involves interaction with a User interface to generate visual feedback on a video device. A first-person shooter ( FPS) is an action Video game from the Shooter game The initial development of Maze War Another explanation offered states that MMORPGs, which offer a persistent multiplayer world, have at least partially supplanted the genre. A massively multiplayer online role-playing game ( MMORPG) is a genre of Computer role-playing games (CRPGs in which a large number of players interact with

Still another possible cause of the genre's downturn may lie with the nature of 3D graphics themselves, which for much of the 90's and early 2000s tended to be more oriented toward fast movement than graphical detail. Conversely, however, if a game were to implement more detailed but static imagery, this could be perceived as technologically regressive. Some question therefore exists of the adventure game making a comeback with recent advances in technology.

Adventure games have ceased to be the flagship titles they once were, and high profile publishers like Sierra Entertainment and LucasArts have either disappeared or shifted towards publishing titles developed by other companies. Sierra Entertainment Inc is a Worldwide American Video game developer and publisher founded in 1979 by Ken and Roberta LucasArts Entertainment Company LLC is an American Video game developer and publisher. However, adventure games continue to be made in the 2000s, primarily outside North America where the genre is still popular. Games such as The Longest Journey by Funcom and Microïds' Syberia with rich classical elements of the genre still garnered high critical acclaims. The Longest Journey ( Den lengste reisen) is a point-and-click Adventure game developed by Norwegian Studio Funcom Funcom Productions A/S ( is a Norwegian game developer specializing in online games and is best known for its MMOs Age of Conan and Anarchy Online Microïds (also known as MC2-Microïds) is a French software company who publishes and develops Video games Since 2003 they have been part of Syberia is a 2002 computer Adventure game conceived by Benoît Sokal, developed by Microïds and published through The Adventure The Myst series came to a close in September 2005 with the release of Myst V: End of Ages by its original developer, Cyan Worlds. Myst V End of Ages is the fifth and final installment in the Myst Adventure game series Cyan Worlds Inc (formerly Cyan Inc) is a Computer game company founded by brothers Rand and Robyn Miller in 1987 (A possible exception to this is Cyan's Myst Online. Myst Online Uru Live is a Massively multiplayer online game developed by Cyan Worlds, featuring several diverse D'ni Ages designed in the ) Adventure games based on the Nancy Drew books are published by Her Interactive and comprise a series of over fifteen titles published since 1998. Nancy Drew (1930-present is an amateur sleuth, the fictional Heroine of a popular Mystery series, aimed at the children - young Her Interactive Inc is a Computer game developer and publisher located in Bellevue Washington, United States The Nintendo DS and its unique features have sparked a renewed interest in pure adventure game content, with the release of Trace Memory and Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney in 2005 and the release of Hotel Dusk: Room 215 in 2006. The is a dual-screen Handheld game console developed and manufactured by Nintendo. This entry is about the video game For the book based on the Torchwood television series see Trace Memory (Torchwood. Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney, released in Japan as, is a Visual novel -type adventure Video game published and developed by Capcom Hotel Dusk Room 215, released in Japan as, is a graphic Adventure game for the Nintendo DS. IGN has noted that Nintendo's Wii controller would be well-suited for the genre, and could see some ground-breaking releases in that vein, such as the 2007 release of Zack & Wiki: Quest for Barbaros' Treasure. IGN (abbreviated and formerly known as I magine G ames N etwork is a multimedia news and reviews Website that focuses heavily on Video Zack & Wiki Quest for Barbaros' Treasure, known as in Japan, is an adventure Video game for the Wii console

Although traditional adventure games are rare today in the US market, action-adventure games that combine elements of adventure games with action games are quite common. There are also similarities between adventure and role-playing games, particularly those in a more modern, story- and character-based mold. A computer role-playing game ( CRPG) is a broad Video game genre originally developed for personal computers and other home computers Computer role-playing games in this vein have been published more frequently since the success of Baldur's Gate in 1998, and console role-playing games have generally been quite focused on plot and story, thanks in part to the success of the Final Fantasy series. Baldur's Gate is a Computer role-playing game in a High fantasy setting developed by BioWare and released in 1998 by Interplay

In 2005, Fahrenheit (titled "Indigo Prophecy" in the US and Canada) was released by Quantic Dream. Fahrenheit (known as Indigo Prophecy in the United States and Canada) is a Video game that was released in September Quantic Dream is a French Video game developer based in Paris, France, founded in 1997. An adventure game with a highly-original interface, many believe that the game will help renew interest in the adventure game genre. This followed the prior release of their own Omikron: The Nomad Soul and Sega's Shenmue games, which were also adventure games with direct character control interfaces. Nomad Soul is also the title of an album by Sengalese singer Baaba Maal Omikron The Nomad Soul (Simply The Nomad Soul is an Adventure game developed by Sega-AM2 and published by Sega for the Sega Dreamcast, produced and directed by Yu Suzuki.

Many classic adventure games cannot run on modern operating systems. Early adventure games were developed for home computers, most of which are not in use today. A home computer was a class of Personal computer entering the market in 1977 and becoming common during the 1980s There are emulators available for modern computers that allow these old games to be played on the latest operating systems. An emulator duplicates (provides an emulation of the functions of one System using a different system so that the second system behaves like (and appears to One Open Source project called ScummVM provides a free engine for the LucasArts adventure games, the SCUMM-derived engine for Humongous Entertainment adventure games, early Sierra titles, Revolution Software 2D adventures, Coktel Vision adventure games and a few more assorted 2D adventures. Open source is a development methodology which offers practical accessibility to a product's source (goods and knowledge ScummVM is a collection of Game engine recreations Originally designed to play LucasArts adventure games that use the SCUMM system (the VM in Another called VDMSound can emulate the old sound-cards which many of the games require. VDMSound is an Open source (licensed under the GPL) Emulator of legacy Sound card devices for Microsoft Windows, designed to allow

Text adventure games are more accessible. There are only a small number of standard formats, and nearly all the classics can be played on modern computers. Some modern text adventure games can even be played on very old computer systems. Text adventure games are also suitable for PDAs, because they have very small computer system requirements. Many classic Infocom games are completely playable via web browsers. Infocom was a Software company, based in Cambridge Massachusetts, that produced numerous works of Interactive fiction. A web browser is a software application which enables a user to display and interact with text images videos music games and other information typically located on a

There is something of a revival of the adventure game online, in both a fairly traditional style, such as Mystery Of Time And Space, and in 3-dimensional games, such as Crimson Room. This article is about the game For the expansion of the initialism see Wiktionary. Escape the room is a genre of online Adventure game, usually created for Adobe Flash and utilizing a Point and click style of play

In October 2006, online game company Telltale Games, made up primarily of ex-employees from LucasArts, released their first installment of Sam & Max: Season One. This episodic game series utilized 3D graphics, but was played in the 'point and click' style of older LucasArts titles. Episodic games are those produced and sold in small units that build into a recognisable series (See Expansion pack) It was designed to be exclusively distributed online, and featured characters from the classic game 'Sam & Max Hit the Road. ' The series was successful, leading to a retail release of the full season and the development of a second series, Sam & Max: Season Two. Telltale was also responsible for a two-game series based on Jeff Smith's Bone comics. Bone Out from Boneville is the second video game endeavor by Telltale Games, and the first episode of the Bone Adventure game Bone is an independently published Comic book series originally serialized in 55 irregularly-released issues from 1991 to 2004

Common features

Adventure games, like RPGs, often feature "fetch quests": in order to advance, the player has to help a character in order to gain information or an important item as a reward. A quest in Role playing games, including Massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs is a Task that a player-controlled character In fantasy-themed games, this character is often a healer or magician, and the secondary quest could be to find artifacts or items, such as ingredients for a potion. From a programming point of view, this allows the adventure to be modelled as a finite state machine. Answers to problems in games are not usually plain to see, but the player must use their logic to figure out what to do next. For example, a character is usually not willing to volunteer their information, but must be convinced to talk, or given something that will benefit them.

Adventure games have been criticized because some games adopt the attitude that 'the ends justify the means'. In such cases, the player must obtain an item from someone reluctant to cooperate, and the only way to progress is to distract him or her in order to steal the item. In contrast, however, many adventure games have quests or missions that urge the player to help others; for instance, helping tormented spirits that seek deliverance, freeing a trapped animal, or otherwise performing benevolent, selfless acts. Often these characters will reward the player later in the game, often at a critical juncture. . . .

Early adventure games sometimes trapped the players in unwinnable, dead end situations. Unwinnable is a state in many Text adventures graphical Adventure games and Computer role-playing games where it is impossible for the player to win the For example, if the player overlooked a key (or an important item early in the game), the game cannot be completed if he later finds himself trapped in a cell. Such games frequently did not end at this point since the player was not killed; with no indication that a vital object had been missed, the player was often reduced to trying increasingly outlandish actions until finally restoring to an earlier point or quitting the game altogether. A famous example of a dead end situation is the plant in "Return to Zork". Return to Zork is a 1993 Adventure game in the Zork series for the PC and Apple Macintosh. Early in the game a plant can be obtained. Most players just take the plant, but will find out later (much later) in the game their plant has died. Without the plant the game can't be finished. What they should have done is carefully dig out the plant, instead of just grabbing it. Naturally, players rarely found this type of game-play entertaining. Some companies, including LucasArts, deliberately and explicitly avoided dead-end situations in many of their games, such as Grim Fandango, in which it was impossible to get Manny Calavera killed or stuck in an impossible situation. Grim Fandango is a graphic adventure computer game released by LucasArts in and primarily written by Tim Schafer. Grim Fandango is a graphic adventure computer game released by LucasArts in and primarily written by Tim Schafer. Although some adventure purists scorned such practices as "dumbing down games for the masses", more games adopted the approach over time; even Sierra, who was infamous for a time for ruthlessly "punishing the player", eventually embraced the concept.

Some items are featured very often in various adventure games, and have many uses. Two examples are a rope and a crowbar. A rope is a length of Fibers twisted or Braided together to improve strength for pulling and Connecting. A crowbar, pry bar, or prybar, more informally a jimmy, jimmy bar, jemmy ( British Isles) or gooseneck is In some games, certain items are used as part of running gags; for example being used in many absurd situations far from their original intended purpose, or items which are seemingly useless for most of the game, such as the rubber chicken with a pulley in the middle in The Secret of Monkey Island, or the combination of a clothesline, a clamp, and a rubber duck with a hole in it, which, when put between the clamp, can make it contract over time, and grab a certain item in The Longest Journey. The running gag is an often amusing Joke or reference that appears repeatedly throughout a work or series of works A rubber Chicken A pulley (also called a sheave or block) is a Wheel with a groove between two Flanges around its Circumference A clothes line or washing line is any type of Rope, cord or Twine that has been stretched between two points (e A clamp is a fastening device to hold or secure objects tightly together to prevent movement or separation through the application of inward Pressure. A rubber duck, or rubber ducky, is a toy shaped like a duck and is generally yellow The Longest Journey ( Den lengste reisen) is a point-and-click Adventure game developed by Norwegian Studio Funcom Situations like these have been criticized, but such criticisms have only been minor.

Many graphic adventure games depicted or make reference to subject matter that would otherwise been censored or taboo in a video or computer game. Censorship is the suppression of speech or deletion of communicative material which may be considered objectionable harmful or sensitive as determined by a censor A taboo is a strong Social prohibition (or ban) against words objects actions or discussions that are considered undesirable or offensive by a group culture Adventure games set in a gritty environment (e. g. Rise of the Dragon, Police Quest and Snatcher) would contain bits of profanity and include either depictions or allusions to mature sexual themes such as prostitution and illicit drugs. Rise of the Dragon is a graphic Adventure game that was released in 1990 for the DOS computer and later remade for the Sega CD (1993 Police Quest is a series of Computer games produced and published by Sierra On-Line between 1987 and 1993. is a Cyberpunk -themed Adventure game published by Konami and originally written and directed by Hideo Kojima. Prostitution is the act of performing Sexual activity in exchange for Money. Adventure games that relied heavily on humor (e. g. Discworld, Blazing Dragons, The Adventures of Willy Beamish, The Secret of Monkey Island and Simon the Sorcerer) were often influenced by Monty Python-style satire and comedy. Discworld ( aka Discworld The Trouble With Dragons) is a graphic Adventure game developed by Teeny Weeny Games and Blazing Dragons is the title of a popular British cartoon series the brainchild of Monty Python 's Terry Jones. The Adventures of Willy Beamish is a graphic Adventure game developed by Dynamix, using their newly-developed Dynamix Game Development System The Secret of Monkey Island is an Adventure game developed by Lucasfilm Games. Simon the Sorcerer was released by Adventure Soft on 2 January, 1993 for Amiga and MS-DOS formats Monty Python (sometimes known as The Pythons) is the collective name of the six creators of Monty Python's Flying Circus, a British Television

Many adventure games simulate a conversation through a conversation tree. A conversation tree is a gameplay mechanic that is used throughout many Adventure games (including Action-adventure games and occasionally Role-playing games When the player encounters a non-player character, they are allowed to select a choice of what to say. A non-player character, often shortened to NPC, is a character that is controlled by the Gamemaster in Role-playing games or one that is not The NPC gives a scripted response to the player, and the game offers the player several new ways to respond. As with the game itself, it was impossible to reach a 'dead-end' in the conversation tree -- players had to either back out of the conversation willingly, or exhaust all available options.

Well-known adventure games

Graphic adventure games in a series

Graphic adventure games not in a series

Text-only adventure games

Japanese adventure games

References

Originally translated from the article on the French Wikipedia, which cites the following sources:

See also

External links

Dictionary

adventure game

-noun

  1. (video game genre) A genre of computer or video game, characterized by investigation, exploration, puzzle-solving, interaction with game characters, and a focus on narrative rather than reflex-based challenges.
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