Non-Tex Murphy Access Software Games

[Infinitron]

I thought I'd make this thread in honor of the Project Fedora Kickstarter. All of Access' games strove for a FMV cinematic presentation, even before FMV became technologically feasible. None of them were particularly great games, but they had some cool moments and plenty of style. Many (but not all) of their games were adventure games.

Crime Wave (1990)

Extremely silly NARC clone, set in the grim dark future of 1995. The president's daughter has been kidnapped by criminals. Are you a bad enough dude to rescue the president's daughter? Has awesome opening credits and lots of pixelated gore.

Countdown (1990)

Cold War spy thriller adventure game. You play MASON POWERS, an amnesiac American spy who finds himself locked in a Turkish asylum and scheduled for a lobotomy! You need to escape and get to the bottom of an international conspiracy, yadda yadda. From what I recall, the first part of the game (the asylum escape) is nonlinear with tense timing and stealth sequences, but it goes a bit linear after that. Oh, and your character looks kind of like Elvis outside of cutscenes.

Amazon: Guardians of Eden (1993)

Also an adventure game, and probably the best of the three. Homage to 1950's pulp adventures, reminiscent of Indiana Jones and the Crystal Skull (no aliens or Russians though). Unfortunately, due to its linear chapter-based structure, it's very easy to become stuck by missing a crucial item from a previous chapter. Also, the latter portions of the game are punctuated by a pointless and lengthy canoe-sailing(!) minigame.

Oh, and they also made a series of golf games called Links, but fuck that

 

[Kz3r0]

About Crime Wave, here a LP made by Phelot:
http://www.rpgcodex.net/forums/index.php?threads/lets-play-crimewave.52892/

 

[Infinitron]

About Crime Wave, here a LP made by Phelot:
http://www.rpgcodex.net/forums/index.php?threads/lets-play-crimewave.52892/

Aw, he never finished it.

 

[Infinitron]

On Access' founder: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_Carver

Access was sold to Microsoft in 1999 and, as a result, several people were let go. Carver paid generous golden parachutes to several of these people out of his own pocket.[1] He continued to work on games until 2003 when he left to create a construction company, Carver Homes, and collaborate with other former Access employees in the golf simulator company TruGolf.[2] He was most active with his construction company, which built award-winning luxury houses to order.[1] The homes were often outfitted with the TruGolf system.
In December 2005, Carver unexpectedly died of cancer. He is survived by six children (three sons and three daughters), his wife, Lenna, his mother, Mary, and 16 grandchildren.[1] His funeralwas held in Salt Lake City, Utah.[1]

Would any Finnish member of the Codex like to comment on this game?

 

[FeelTheRads]

Would any Finnish member of the Codex like to comment on this game?

Why Finnish and what do you want to know?

Played it on the Spectrum. I found it disturbingly difficult at that time and couldn't get too far. But I'm not Finnish.

That's all the help I can give.

 

[Infinitron]

Would any Finnish member of the Codex like to comment on this game?

Why Finnish and what do you want to know?

Read the Wikipedia article.

 

[Metro]

Played Crime Wave and Countdown. Both were excellent.

 

[Sceptic]

Also an adventure game, and probably the best of the three [...] Oh, and they also made a series of golf games called Links, but fuck that

You have successfuly removed Infinitron from your brolist.

Countdown's my favorite of the three. Great game with a pretty good plot, some very clever (and some frustrating) puzzles, and a very unique atmosphere. Amazon was a shitty adventure though; the EXTREMELY over the top cheese might be fun, but the game itself is a disaster, with some of the worst puzzles of the era and an extremely linear structure that guarantees you'll have to restart several times. Oh and very, very shitty minigames. And a high-res VESA mode that was a joke.

Links and Links 386 Pro were awesome golf games, the latter especially was a benchmark standard at release. I've never liked any other golf games but spent hours on this one. Had a ton of addon courses too (DLC before the term was coined... though IIRC they were pretty cheap and quite substantial)

Raid Over Moscow... god I remember this game! played it off a cassette (don't ask me to remember what system) decades ago. Barely remember anything other than the name though... must've been on the C64 because I also remember playing Spitfire Ace around that time. heh.

 

[Metro]

Raid Over Moscow... if I'm remembering it right... was sort of like a Zaxxon clone where you'd fly through Soviet defenses and the last level was an attack on the Kremlin!

 

[Infinitron]

Also an adventure game, and probably the best of the three [...] Oh, and they also made a series of golf games called Links, but fuck that

You have successfuly removed Infinitron from your brolist.

Countdown's my favorite of the three. Great game with a pretty good plot, some very clever (and some frustrating) puzzles, and a very unique atmosphere. Amazon was a shitty adventure though; the EXTREMELY over the top cheese might be fun, but the game itself is a disaster, with some of the worst puzzles of the era and an extremely linear structure that guarantees you'll have to restart several times. Oh and very, very shitty minigames. And a high-res VESA mode that was a joke.

It's been a long while since I played either of these games, so I won't argue with you. I do remember Amazon having lots of (often amusing) text to read, which is something I value in a game. Countdown was a bit terse, similar to Mean Streets.

 

[DarkUnderlord]

On Access' founder: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_Carver

Access was sold to Microsoft in 1999 and, as a result, several people were let go. Carver paid generous golden parachutes to several of these people out of his own pocket.[1] He continued to work on games until 2003 when he left to create a construction company, Carver Homes, and collaborate with other former Access employees in the golf simulator company TruGolf.[2] He was most active with his construction company, which built award-winning luxury houses to order.[1] The homes were often outfitted with the TruGolf system.
In December 2005, Carver unexpectedly died of cancer. He is survived by six children (three sons and three daughters), his wife, Lenna, his mother, Mary, and 16 grandchildren.[1] His funeralwas held in Salt Lake City, Utah.[1]

Would any Finnish member of the Codex like to comment on this game?

Fuck you Infinitron. This is what your careless linking gets us: https://rpgcodex.net/forums/index.p...d-can-dogs-detect-cancer.126919/#post-6080372

 

[Beastro]

There was a time when Infinie made threads discussing shit and didn't just link articles?