Space Quest 6 Scummvm Download
Nevada Biernat
Space Quest: The Sarien Encounter was the first game in the Space Quest series. The game follows a janitor on board the scientific spaceship Arcada. After waking from an on-duty nap in a broom closet, he discovers that an evil alien race called the Sariens stole the Star Generator, an experimental weapon that was being held on board, and killed all of the Arcada's crew members.
My favorite all-time game is Space Quest 2. I have always played it on dosbox and loved it. However, recently, I downloaded scummvm (yes, I know I'm posting in a "dosbox" forum), and saw that it supported AGI games, so I tried running sq2 on it just for kicks.
To my surprise, the audio in the game sounded very different! The first thing I obviously noticed was the title song that plays right when you start the game. It sounded.. "synthesized", not like it was coming out of an internal computer speaker in an old machine. In other words, the audio sounded "better" than what I heard while playing in dosbox. In fact, I even heard sweeping sounds from Roger's broom (when he's sweeping outside the space station at the first of the game) that I had never heard before!
I'm guessing that this has something to do with my sound card configuration in dosbox or something to that effect.. I'm not sure. I play other games with dosbox (like King's Quest VI) and it sounds fine... How do I get the same kind of "complex" sound from dosbox while playing space quest 2 that I heard while playing scummvm?
I forgot to mention, that when I play sq2 in scummvm, it's also like I'm playing a different version of the game alltogether.. I suddenly have mouse support and the menus look a little different than they do in dosbox.
When I play in dosbox, I have no mouse support whatsoever. Then again, maybe that's just a configuration I can set on my part, but it seems like an altogether different version of the game when played in scummvm for some reason...
Well, what's new in this version, besides the very cool graphics it now has. It now also has very nice sounds P. Enough 'bout that. The game as been improved a bit, because now also the younger-ones who can't type can play this magnificent game with the mouse. Just click and walk, search, smell, touch, etc. it's all in the game. Of course the scenes are a bit different and much better. For instance, you know how much time is left, before the spaceship you start in is blown to smithereens.
by Latis
I made a tiny DOS program that scans through SQ4's audio resource file, locating and repairing 331 incorrectly clipped samples spread across 1500 waveforms. It won't remove minor clicks or any other sort of audio glitch, but removing the loud clicks is truly a mercy for the ears. Copy RESOURCE.AUD from the CD-ROM to HDD and run the program where the file is located. Modification is done in-place, so nothing beyond the 160 MB of disk space for the file is needed. The repaired file can be used with the stock game or with the patch made by NRS.
For my scummVM box project, I'm now at the living books, educational games. I've had to create some back covers for the Crazy nick's software picks. all in all I'm making good progress. over 160 boxes are done.. and I'm currently wondering if, when I'm done, if I should take on the list of SVN game titles. I probably will.
I'm not going to make a box for each game version. So there will not be 8 different boxes for each version of Monkey Island. I'm assuming most people will just group them under a single title.
After scummvm I will do a small box collection for residualVM, I mean 3 or for boxes nothing, I will just have to modify my template .
So for all you lurkers on here. now you know. enjoy
Trying to escape from the Sequel Police in weightlessness.
The biggest problem with the game is that while it is a huge step forward in technical aspects of game design, it is also a huge leap backwards in actual game design. Where the third game, Space Quest III: The Pirates of Pestulon, was a big improvement in playability, getting rid of most dead-ends and making most game deaths well motivated, the fourth game goes absolutely 180 degrees opposite direction. There are several unwinnable states in the game, and the biggest issue is that the entire gameplay consists of avoiding unpredictable deaths. Some of these are provided by the Sequel Police, who shoot first and don't even ask questions later, some others are provided by things like two mazes with deadly things moving inside them. The usual ones, like falling off high places, are there too, of course. While there is the possibility of death in almost every scene in the game, there's disappointingly the least amount of variety in them compared to the other games in the series. As a result game deaths are simply annoying, amusing elements like funny animations are nowhere to be found.
The plot is so full of logical holes that it makes Swiss cheese look solid in comparison. And this is the case even if one tries to factor in the fourth wall thing. After all, if the game world can be manipulated from inside the game world as a computer program, wouldn't it be possible to simply re-install it and get rid of Vohaul and his helpers? Apparently it is not an option, so the story goes where ever it goes, still leaving the first game in the series to be the one that actually had a decent basic plot.
A precursor of this game is the interactive fiction game Planetfall, created by Infocom, whose player-character is a lowly "Ensign Seventh Class", who does the lowest form of labor aboard a spaceship and who appears on the cover with a mop. Just as King's Quest adapted the text-adventure puzzle games set in a medieval world to a visual display, Space Quest did the same for the space puzzle game.
For example, if you forget to get a cartridge on the spaceship when the game starts (for which you need to know a password given by scientist who shows up out of pure random luck), you won't be able to use it around the middle of the game and you'll be stuck. Of course, all your saved games until then will be crap, so you then have to replay from the beginning all over again. Ah, well...
One last thing: there is a part in the game in which you need to play slot machine in order to have enough bucks to buy yourself a spacecraft. No, you can't buy the cheapest one, try it out and you'll understand shy. This is the long and boring part of the game, as you have to play a while (and save your game often) in order to win enough. I really would have liked an option to bypass that useless sequence.
The Bottom Line
No matter its problems, this game is worth it.
Space Quest fans must try it out. It started the whole series and while it is certainly not the best, it gives you an idea of what Mark and Scott were up to back when they started. It is also an interesting alternative to those who dislike the medieval theme of King's Quest. Just don't leave the spaceship without the cartridge!
The game centers around Roger Wilco, a space janitor who is stationed on the starship Arcada, where a device known as the Star Generator is undergoing testing. This device is designed to generate a sun that would replace the one on Earnon, a galaxy whose sun is slowly dying. An evil race known as the Sariens find out about the Star Generator, and get on board the Arcada and successfully take it under Wilco's watch. The device must be retrieved before the Sariens use it to conquer the galaxy.
I could not believe how impressive the title looks. Both the red outline used to create the title and the star background inside it blend well with each other. The quality of the graphics throughout the game reminds you, just like other games in the series, that this is purely a sci-fi adventure game set in outer space. The characters you meet through the game are alien-like figures, as you would expect. Most of them are unfriendly to Roger but at least they can be used to his advantage. Out of all the characters in the game, I found the spider droid on Kerona a bit scary. The way it looks and the way its animated is rather disturbing.
Another thing I like about Space Quest is its division into three parts , like 3 stages i.e your home space station, planet Kerona and the enemy battle cruiser, which I suppose makes it feel more like an arcade game and I loved arcade games before adventure games.
The Bad
I liked a lot of the problem solving, but there are some puzzles that drag the game down a bit, the worst being the gambling at Ulence Flats Bar(there is actually a code phrase cheat that makes you win every time). But even in the Arcade at the start, I felt that the keycard required to escape was a little too randomly placed. Other puzzles were interesting and probably worth the effort. The skimmer challenge, dodging rocks, is quite difficult, though there are a couple of strategies to make it easier.
The Bottom Line
My opinion is that it's Sierra's best game, not only that, the best adventure game ever, better than any I've played by LucasArts, Revolution Software, MicroProse and all the rest. Of course the game was made fairly early in the timeline of computer adventure games, but I think it has a heart and soul that the more visually and sonically impressive adventure games don't have.