The great adventure

I have never played a Sierra adventure game. Tis true, I must admit. For whatever reason, I never even heard about them until I was much older and the company stopped making them. If I remember correctly, my gateway into adventure gaming was a demo disc that came in some Lucasarts game I bought, probably Tie Fighter, Rebel Assault 2, or Dark Forces. Regardless, it was the demo of Full Throttle that made me a believer in the genre of adventure games. Too bad it took a decade for me to finally play Full Throttle, but in the interim, I played Day of the Tentacle, the Monkey Island series (1 to 3), Sam and Max, and Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis.

Actually, Fate of Atlantis was the first adventure game I played. I bought it from a Scholastics Books catalogue for fairly cheap. I was so impressed at the time, and later moreso with the talkie version. On a recent Squadron of Shame podcast, they lamented the voices and harkened back to the silent version, but with most gamers, and especially the folks on the podcast, there is a desire to hold in reverence the old while damning the new. Yes, some of the german accents aren't good, but this was before Metal Gear Solid when voice acting in games wasn't very good and rare. Indy's voice was great, Sophia's was too, and since you were with them the entire game, that's all that mattered.

The game features one of the best introductions to a game ever, and doesn't let up in steam. From New York, Indy will travel to Central America, Iceland, the Azores, Cairo, Greece, and Atlantis. The puzzles aren't too obtuse, save for any involvement of the Atlantian stones; the Atlantian stones are a set of three circular stones that must be arranged properly at the outpost of Atlantis and various places inside Atlantis. The story is probably the second best in the Indiana Jones franchise (yes, including the movies). Also, a rarity in Lucasarts games: you can die in the game. As evident from the above screenshot, the pixel graphics are detailed and set in reality, but, from the temples in Central America (which I have seen in person since last playing the game, and they are fantastic) to the design of Atalntis, the artwork is inventive and appropriate.

I struggled with the fighting controls as a child for whatever reason, so I initially chose the teamwork path. About a third into the game, you are read your fortune by Sohpia, the psychic that accompanies Indy on the adventure, and you are given the opprotunity to either take a path featuring more combat, more puzzles, or a balance. While the other two options provided some differences in the game, the differences weren't that great, and more importantly, the game strongly encourages a canonical playing in the team path. At the end, several endings provide the opportunity for strange twists, such as Indy or Sophia becoming an Atlantian god or Indy failing to save Sophia earlier in the game, resulting in her death. It's important to note that the game, like with the great Indy movies, has its story positioned in reality. Plato did write about Atlantis, and in fact got me to read Plato at a young age. I was probably one of the few 6th graders who voluntarily read The Republic, Timaeus, and Critias!

The game is recently released on Steam. It deserves an update like Secret of Monkey Island, and remains as one of the top 5 LucasArts adventure games made.