Update: We've added none other than Costume Quest 2 to this list of games to round up the great adventure titles available mainly on the PC in 2014. There's not too many of them to go around, but the ones on this list are fantastic plays.
The former poster boy genre of the 1990s, the graphic adventure, has been in steady decline ever since the 90s ended and shooters took over. Nowadays with the resurgence of former adventure game design superstars, the genre seems to be heading towards a sort of renaissance. Tim Schafer is doing new ones with Broken Age, his buddy Ron Gilbert is also back on the ball, and a number of new faces from around the block have shown up to add some new flavor to the old pointy-clicky. Well. Not always pointy-clicky.
The surprise announcement and release of Costume Quest 2 took us by, well, surprise, and it’s nothing short of grand. Much like the first game, Costume Quest 2 sees players trick-or-treating, picking fights with villainous soldiers, and saving the town from mischief. The game comes with a myriad of improvements over the original, and allows players to explore spooky time-traversing landscapes, don adorable costumes that transform into powerful warriors, and collect a myriad of Creepier Treat Cards.
Last of the Blackwell games of which there are now four, Epiphany serves as the bookend. Developer Wadjet Eye have been working on these games since the mid 2000s, preceding the current adventure renaissance by a few years, so this is almost a back to the roots moment for the genre. Rendered in decidedly lo-res pixelated 16 bit era graphics yet with crisp sound, music and voiced characters, it’s a very classic adventure in a lot of ways. And a welcome conclusion to the Blackwell saga.
Fulbright Company’s super proof of concept game proved several things when it was released last year. For once, games that deal with the mundane and only the mundane do sell. Also, games that do not feature any kind of violent interactions do sell. Also games that are essentially explorations of story with little else going on do sell respectable amounts of copies. All these things were relatively surprising. Gone Home is a great little story wrapped in a game-y shell that uses the environment for storytelling to a great success.
Ex-Epic developers went and formed indie joint The Astronauts, who then went on to design this game which we will see later in the year. Ethan Carter is a game that takes inspiration from early 20th century horror dime novels, so we can probably expect some great cthuloid weirdness here as well. It’s not yet sure of this game will be delivered in single episodes, but given the trend, I would not be surprised.
Developed independently and funded through Kickstarter by a single guy, Dropsy aims at subverting a lot of traditional assumptions about adventure games, by offering a hard to identify with protagonist, an icon based speech system, and an open world. We will see how that works out once the game is done. So far, Dropsy has reached its Kickstarter goal and we can expect to see more later in the year.
Essentially a sequel to Ragnar Tornquist’s award winning Dreamfall and The Longest Journey games, the “Chapters” bring more from the same sci-fi universe as well as a huge graphical update for the series. As with so many games on this list, Chapters will be delivered in episode sized chunks.
Also developed by Telltale, and also based on a comic book series, this one is the first of the Fables games, a series of comics that take a unique, grown up, urban fantasy spin on classic fairy tales. Here we have a parallel world of fairy tale creatures inhabiting a fictional American metropolis in the 1980s. The Wolf Among Us centers on protagonist Bigby “Big Bad” Wolf, who has to solve some mysteries among the fairytale folks.
Telltale Games have reinvigorated the adventure game genre with their Walking Dead games. Widely considered to surpass both the original comics as well as the lackluster TV series and especially other official Walking Dead games, the Telltale Games episodes rank among the very best modern adventure games there are. Season 2 follows the previous season’s sidekick Clementine through a zombie infested world.
What this game is, is hard to describe. Among the games we list here, it’s by far the most experimental in both art style and narrative. At heart, KRZ is a mystery tale, but at the same time almost a work of abstract art. The first chapters of what will eventually be five distinct entries is out already, with the rest being released throughout the year.
Not the typical adventure game, Frictional go back to their love for all things Lovecraftian. As with the previous pants ruiners they published, namely the Amnesia and Penumbra games, this one is again a scary horror thing with adventurous aspects. The players find themsvelves probably abducted by aliens. Or sentient machine monsters. It’s not quite clear yet. In any case, SOMA seems to become another big hit for people who like to be scared out of their wits while solving obscure and macabre puzzles.
This troubled Double Fine project that now is slowly released in episode sized bites was the game that started the Kickstarter way of funding games. It’s a genuinely great adventure game that’s full of heart, a funny story, quirky characters and still retains a lot of the old magic. There will be more episodes out over the course of the year.
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