Ah, yes, "The Longest Dialogue"
Majority of TLJ fans will probably disagree with my opinion but I found the game to be extremely overrated. And I've actually been a huge fan of adventure genre, having played excellent classics like "Monkey Island" 1 and 2, "Curse of Monkey Island", "Grim Fandango", "Broken Sword" (1 and 2), "Gabriel Knight" (from 1 to 3), "Space Quest" series, "King's Quest" series, "Legend of Kyrandia" series, and many many more, way too many to list here.
When I first tried the game's demo, it looked so promising and I was very excited to try the full version. However, while playing the full game, the dialogues ended up being so long-winded and overbearing, you often wanted to tell the characters to simply shut up. If I wanted to read that much text, I'd pick up a book (and no, the length of my post doesn't even come close
). Voice-overs either helped or made it more annoying. Although the concept of two different worlds (of magic and science) sounded very exciting, the protagonist sounded like she was written by a fanatical and delusional female rights activist. I won't spoil it for you with details but you'll see it when you play. Or you might like it, who knows. I like a strong-spirited woman with a bit of mean streak (the sexy kind) but this was just twisted into something stupid at times.
I don't want to put it down completely. The game does have its good points, and at times you will be excited and feel like you're lost in another world but other times it fails miserably.
What was even a bigger let down was finding out that Ragnar Tornquist, the author of the story, turned out to be an ungrateful and complete ego-inflated jerk. I think someone mentioned on this forum that "writers usually are". Perhaps they're onto something here.
I was actively reading many adventure game forums at the time, being a fan of the genre and all, and there was a big discussion about the upcoming sequel to TLJ, called "Dreamfall". Some news were released that "Dreamfall" wasn't just going to be an adventure, which usually has heavy emphasis on story and story-driven puzzles, as well as a relaxed pace, but an action-adventure. Majority of past reviews of such hybrids have pretty much rated them to be a failure because they tried to pull off two genres in one and ended up failing in both, turning off fans of each one. People weren't sure why such a move was made and politely asked for an explanation.
Later it turned out that "Dreamfall" was automatically developed for both, video consoles and PCs, with heavy emphasis on video consoles. People once again politely raised concerns that many console-to-PC ports ended up being less than enjoyable, too arcade-like with numerous jumping "puzzles", and whether "Dreamfall" would avoid such pitfalls. Apparently, even "The Longest Journey" was originally planned as a platformer but for whatever reason changed to be exclusively for PC.
Yet more news have surfaced that despite TLJ's popularity, it did not get enough sales in Funcom's and Ragnar's eyes (it's always about money in the end, isn't it?). Hence, the attempted move to attract console gamers as well. However, once again, attracting console gamers in the past often proved a horrible transition with stupid pointless jumping puzzles, and weak story. People pointed out the classic example of the excellent "Simon the Sorcerer" series, with "Simon the Sorcerer 3D" being a dismal failure. The same company is making "Simon the Sorcerer 4" now, and came back to the traditional point-and-click style, and majority of the fans are extremely happy about it.
This is what Bill Tiller had to say about "point-and-click" approach:
“Point and click is just simply the best way, in my humble opinion, of playing an adventure game. Driving around and walking everywhere is not fun! They cut that part out of movies and books for a reason. In movies they call it ‘compression of time’ which means compressing the boring traveling done to a few editing cuts, and boom! Our protagonists are where the more interesting action is. When games make you drive your character around everywhere you are wasting valuable gaming time
…
Plus point and click games can allow artists to create background art in third person, the preferred perspective used in most movies and TV shows, - the perspective we are all used to. Plus if you have to navigate in 3rd person it is often hard to display the collision geometry and create interesting angles at the same time. You often run into things and get stuck on corners. It’s so much easier if you can just point and click where you want to go, and let the computer navigate for you. Make the computer work for you, don’t do work for the computer. Point and click makes the computer work for you.â€
-Bill Tiller
If you don't know who Bill Tiller is, take a look here:
http://www.worldofmi.com/features/interview/tiller.phpNow, I personally don't care if the game is 2D (or 2.5D, as they call it in adventure genre) or 3D, as long as the story is great and puzzles are interesting. What people were questioning was the fact that it was now labeled as an "action-adventure", which is a hybrid genre that carries a certain stigma with it. I think it was a reasonable concern to ask questions about it. Some people pointed out that the move was about money and that it was disappointing to see it manipulate Ragnar so much.
Note that this has nothing to do with MMORPG genre. Many adventure game fans love MMORPGs as its own genre and the approaches it usually takes to navigation and interaction work well for the type of genre that it is, so don't be tempted to compare the reasoning behind each.
Eventually, a single person (yes, a single person) in a specific thread frustratingly called Ragnar a sell-out and that he "ate too many hamburgers". He got really insulted, referred to that thread in his blog, and labeled
all (yes, all) "PC gamers" to be ignorant and ungrateful and much worse than console gamers, that "point-and-click" adventure was "dead" and there was no money in it, and supposedly that's why he was desining "Dreamfall" primarily for consoles now, as he always wanted to do with TLJ. That is because of a
single comment by
one person.
People have questioned him on such ignorant and immature comments about stereotyping all PC gamers and that it was uncalled for, just because he got offended by one individual's comment. They also reminded him that it was PC gamers who helped with TLJ's success in the first place, and that he should be more grateful to them and not stereotype them like he did.
Surprisingly, he started posting on the adventure forums and his blog simultaneously, reducing himself to nothing more than immature bickering and never-ending arguments. He even mentioned at some point that he liked being sarcastic because it made one to be "cool" and that "women liked cool". Someone pointed out that trying so hard to be "cool" for women usually has the opposite effect.
Anyway, the drama and bickering went on for a while, and can probably still be found in his blog archives. But the point is that it made him look like an immature and ego-inflated jerk who reduced himself to nothing more than petty bickering and insults. That was not the image of a respected writer that I thought he initially was, so I was especially not interested in anything he had to say anymore, whether it's the stories he writes or more whining in his blogs. I really think he should just stick to writing stories rather than whine in his blogs about every comment someone made about him.
On the other hand, I've heard he was involved into the initial story for "Anarchy Online" MMORPG (but not in expansions), and I actually didn't mind that game when I tried the free AO classic + "Notum Wars" thing that's still going on. I would never pay money for it though, it's not good enough, and only tried it initially for being free.
By the way, the game (TLJ) has a lot of swearing going on. That never bothered me though but be warned if you have kids around.
Anyway, your personal experience may vary, so play it, if you like.
When it comes to adventure games featuring female protagonists, I was personally much more impressed with "Syberia" 1 and 2, featuring Kate Walker. Absolutely gorgeous games written by the talented Benoit Sokal. The only thing is I wish there was more interaction with more objects. But otherwise, an excellent story, mystery, sadness, and just an exciting experience. I actually won "Syberia 1" with a signed poster in a contest.
For really great examples of adventure games, I recommend "Curse of Monkey Island", "Grim Fandango", "Broken Sword 1" and "Broken Sword 2", "Syberia 1" and "Syberia 2", and "Gabriel Knight" series (supernatural stuff) for starters.
This was my personal opinion, so do not criticize me for it. I'm not trying to force it on anyone, I'm simply stating mine. I won't judge you for liking the game.
Thanks.
