I stumbled across this award show for video games tonight via a random tweet that somebody else posted – I really have no idea what the rest of the show covered, but it was neat to see these two veritable icons from my childhood get some recognition as vanguards in the video game industry some thirty years after their prime.
One of the earliest computer games that I ever played was a little text adventure called Mission Asteroid – despite it’s numbering, it was actually the third game that Sierra created for the Apple II. It was before I even had a Nintendo, so I must’ve only been six or seven at the time – I remember having to keep a notebook by the computer so that I could write down the various commands that worked as I progressed through the story! I don’t think that I ever actually made it to the asteroid – I could never seem to get the rocket to take off, but it sure was a fascinating experience to me and no doubt helped to spark a lifelong love for video games at large…
From there I played the same classics that everybody else played – King’s Quest, Space Quest, and when my parents weren’t around, Leisure Suit Larry! I was a HUGE Sierra fan, arguably almost a collector at my age because I would get their magazine that would have the Buy 1 Get 2 Free offers and end up ordering 6 or 9 games at a time until I literally had shelves of their game boxes in my room … the Hoyle games, the 3D Ultra games, you name it.
I remember playing Shivers for hours and hours before I could even figure out what I was supposed to be doing, though granted this was long before my need to watch scary movies with every light on in the house!
I also remember Phantasmagoria being something really special because this was around the time when Myst and other CD-based games just started to emerge, and it was kind of crazy to hold in your hands a game that required seven CD-roms to play!!!
Anyways, now that Ken and Roberta are well into retirement, I mostly read along in envy with their adventures in yachting on Ken’s Blog, it’s pretty awesome to see these two recognized as the pioneers in adventure gaming that they are, not to mention their little ceremonial passing of the torch to the crew that’s working on the next King’s Quest game.
Kinda makes me want to dig out some of those old game discs and spend a night exploring with Graham and Roger and Larry for old time’s sake… 😉
