Space Quest I: The Sarien Encounter

From TheAlmightyGuru
Revision as of 11:28, 19 November 2020 by TheAlmightyGuru (talk | contribs)
Jump to: navigation, search
Space Quest I: The Sarien Encounter.

Space Quest I: The Sarien Encounter is a comedic graphic adventure puzzle video game developed and published by Sierra On-Line in October 1986 for IBM PCjr, and later ported to various home computers of the day. It is the first game in the Space Quest series and uses the Adventure Game Interpreter. The game was primarily designed by Mark Crowe and Scott Murphy who go by the moniker "Two Guys From Andromeda."

Personal

My cousin had Space Quest II: Vohaul's Revenge back in the late 1980s, and we played it on his Tandy 1000. Since the game was a sequel, I knew there was a first game, but I never saw it at the time. It wasn't until years later until I was able to play the game. At first, I found the weaker graphics to be a bit of a turn off, but the game's humor quickly made me appreciate it. I made it to Deltaur before getting stuck. A few years later, I played the game again and beat it.

Status

I own a digital copy of this game in the Space Quest Collection. I have beaten the DOS port.

Review

Video Game Review Icon - Enjoyment.png Video Game Review Icon - Control.png Video Game Review Icon - Appearance.png Video Game Review Icon - Sound.png Video Game Review Icon - Replayability.png
6 4 5 2 4

Best Version: MS-DOS

— This section contains spoilers! —

Good

  • The game has a lot of hilarious dialogue. Much of it is laugh-out-loud funny.
  • The game's manual is also a well-made comic book describing the the events of Space Quest I: The Sarien Encounter (through the self-serving eyes of Roger Wilco) and the interim between the start of this game. It even has funny fake ads.
  • The title song is quite nice.

Bad

  • Other than the wonderful title song, the game is pretty lacking in audio.
  • The game suffers from the typical Sierra mentality of punishing the player with death for pretty much every action except the correct one.
  • On the ports to superior platforms, like the Amiga and Apple IIgs, none of the graphics or sound are reworked to take advantage of the superior hardware.

Ugly

  • The game has several ways to put the game into an unwinnable state. The one with the salesman is extremely difficult to predict, and will get a lot of players stuck.

Media

Box Art

Documentation

Maps

Screenshots

Videos

Ways to die.
Easter eggs.
Longplay - Amiga.
Longplay - Atari ST.
Longplay - MS-DOS.

Download

A non-playable demo of Space Quest is showcased in Sierra AGI Demo number 1.

Links

Link-MobyGames.png  Link-Wikipedia.png  Link-StrategyWiki.png  Link-GameFAQs.png  Link-TCRF.png  Link-TVTropes.png