1. I grew up on the text adventures -- Adventureland and Pirate's Cove for the VIC-20. Later on, when my dad got an XT (which had a Hercules card), it was Zork and Planetfall, Collosal Caves.

On the Game Boy, Sword of Hope was my favorite game. On the NES, Dragon Warrior, Castlevania 2, Deja Vu, and Shadowgate. Then there were the Sierra games on a new VGA-sporting 386...

I feel like the DS adventures (Trace Memory, Phoenix Wright, Touch Detective, Hotel Dusk, et al) are likereturning home. They're definitely comfort food for me. As long as the writing's good and the graphics don't make me blind, I'm game. Bring on Touch Detective 2, Professor Layton, and Phoenix Wright 3!

Posted at 11:47AM on Feb 17th 2007 by Lard Of Dorkness

2. I agree with the above. I go back a little bit further, with Adventure on a mainframe, TRS80 Model I, etc. These games are exactly the reason I bought a NDS in the first place.

Cheers!

Posted at 2:33PM on Feb 17th 2007 by Maluus

3. i have never really played a game like Hotel dusk, but enjoy a great deal. I hope for more games like it!

Posted at 3:07PM on Feb 17th 2007 by JKAntwon

4. I'm in a perpendicular (but not opposite) camp. While I'm open to the idea that these games are fun, they don't SOUND like fun when I hear about them. They don't sound "adventurous" at all. A lot of walking around, clicking on things, reading, more clicking, more walking around... that's it. No skills necessary save for the odd puzzle; just have enough patience to let the story unfold. And since I'm an avid reader, I can't imagine such a game can tell a story better than a good old-fashioned book.

Reading reviews on Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney, the only part that sounded interesting to me was that final mission, where you use the DS's unique interface to manipulate the crime scene. But it seems they haven't bothered to reproduce that in the new game.

Unfortunately, I'm not willing to shell out cash to find out if this type of game is for me. Anybody want to mail their copy to me on loan? I'd return it.

Posted at 3:22PM on Feb 17th 2007 by Xian!

5. I'm a huge fan of andventure games. I played all the big names back in the day, Maniac Mansion, Zak KcKracken, Day of the Tentacle, Zork, Planetfall, Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Space Quest, Police Quest, Hero's Quest...

When I play this new crop of point & click games, it's like finding an adventure game helmed by the "Guy that Tries too Hard to Fit In" who was never really part of your group, but always really wanted to be accepted.

Somewhere later in life, he actually managed to get somewhere in power enough to make decisions on these games, and dredged up memories of how your group liked adventure games and then decided to make one...with his typical trying too hard flair.

Hotel Dusk is BORING. Nowhere in any of the Monkey Island games am I confronted with 15 minutes of text that I can't speed through. People understood that you couldn't force a gamer to sit through that much blathering (even though it was VOICED, and VOICED WELL, dammit!) 15 years ago. What happened to keeping the dialogue punchy and snappy?

What's worse is that the writing in Hotel Dusk is bad. I don't ever remember wondering why Roger Wilco would open a conversation with a guy, tell him that the man was wasting his time, and then demand that the same man regale him with a tale of absolutely no bearing on his current situation.

I don't care who's at fault here, it's just not engaging.

Phoenix Wright is better, because they're not trying to be realistic, and are instead going with comedy. (Although they fall way, WAY short in Justice for All.) I can forgive some of the writing there, just because they aren't trying to make their characters sound real or gritty, and they try and write something funny.

But that isn't even a real adventure game. It's more like a "Choose Your Own Adventure" novel. The adventure games of old had you using you inventory to solve puzzles, not simply presenting it at the right moment. The old adventure games required logic, where Phoenix Wright relies on the most tenuous of hints in a "do or die" situation.

In the old days, if I wanted Guybrush to win the spitting competition, I'd have as many tries to work through the conundrum I wanted, it wasn't, "Chose the right thing or your client, dies, Phoenix. And by right thing, I mean the exact "right" thing we the designers were thinking of, because even though other things you present may logically lead us to the same conclusion, we don't care!"

These games are not in the same league as the adventure games of old, and if you think I'm just looking through rose tinted glasses at the past, then, pick up any of the new installments of Sam & Max and I guarantee you'll find those to be much truer to the art form than anything on the DS these days.

Visual novels are crap. They're crap on the PSP, and they're crap on the DS, and they're crap on the PC. Seriously, either read a book, or watch a movie, nothing is gained by the hybridization of the two.

They're also NOT adventure games. They're VISUAL NOVELS. Do not try and blur the line, Alisha, as it's meant to be a very distinct demarcation. Adventure games have interaction, visual novels do not. These are terms that mean very specific things, so don't go tossing them around like they're interchangable.

Posted at 3:54PM on Feb 17th 2007 by AlmostInfamous

6. i really enjoyed hotel dusk. i think it's just not made for everyone. some may find it boring but the visual and writing style really made me feel like i was experiencing the time period in the game.

phoenix wright was a lot funnier, but it was designed to be funnier. hotel dusk was designed to be a bit more serious or boring as i'm sure some people will find it. but when i finished it last night, it was just so cool as i felt the whole mystery unravel

Posted at 10:50PM on Feb 17th 2007 by diego

7. AlmostInfamous,

I think it's funny that you say

"Nowhere in any of the Monkey Island games am I confronted with 15 minutes of text that I can't speed through. People understood that you couldn't force a gamer to sit through that much blathering."

When you yourself have submitted what is possibly the longest blog comment I've ever read.

Posted at 12:54AM on Feb 18th 2007 by NothingShocking

8. Diego: I LIVED in that time period...and in the town the game's set in. It was almost, if not completely, unlike Hotel Dusk.

NothingShocking:

Yeah, but that's the way it goes sometimes.

Posted at 3:15AM on Feb 18th 2007 by SomeRandomGuy

9. I'm dreaming of Monkey Island being brought to the DS (officially)! Those kind of adventures would be perfect for it...
As for the visual novel type, I hope somebody tries it soon, but would the DS be suited to it?

Posted at 6:23AM on Feb 18th 2007 by cal

10. Though I'm enjoying Phoenix Wright and Hotel Dusk (to a lesser extent), I'm really hungry for some good action games. But then, I've probably logged more hours on EBA than any other handheld game ever. So I don't really know. I just want more good games.

Posted at 8:56PM on Feb 18th 2007 by Bipedal

11. Check this out: http://www.insecticidethegame.com/
It looks like a pretty awesome game from ex-LucasArts folks. The website says it's coming to PC and handheld... but doesn't mention what handheld it's coming to. Here's hoping it's the DS!

Posted at 9:40PM on Feb 18th 2007 by james

12. to me, what makes a game successful is that it has a great story backing it up. while there are some great games that don't need a story to make them great (tetris is the best example), what draws me into a game and keeps me playing is the need to know what happens next - just like a great novel, movie, or tv show.

for this reason, the rebirth of adventure games on the ds is like a godsend to me: games where the main focus is the story. while playing phoenix wright or hotel dusk sometimes feels like i'm read ing a (expensive) book, in a sense, that's a good thing. after all, how many video game storylines could really hold their own as a novel?

Posted at 1:44PM on Feb 19th 2007 by danielle