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Top 5 Adventure Games: The Definitive List
Guy makes a “definitive” adventure games list and doesn’t put Firefly on there.
Does that seem right to you?
Now, before anyone goes any types up some ill-conceived bullshit about Firefly being a pick up and deliver game, let me state that Firefly _is_, without any shadow of a doubt, an adventure game that happens to have pick up and deliver elements. Not the other way around. The only statement one could make about it that is any more wrong is that the game isn’t any good, so go ahead and stick that line of stupid right back under your hat where it belongs.
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If I were going space, I'd definitely go Xia way before Firefly. Though not sure that'd be in my top five either.
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That constrained choice is in line with the source material and I understand it but I think the superior adventure game gives more agency to the player in terms of career path.
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- hotseatgames
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As for Talisman, I will happily play Relic any time, even though it always overstays its welcome. I'm guessing Talisman does the same thing.
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It's a flaw in the players understanding not the game itself
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I’d consider both adventure games first.
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I think this is an excellent list even though it doesn't represent my personal favorites. Each of the games on this list captures the essence of a specific style of adventure game. If a newbie gamer told me they liked adventure games, and wanted to know what to try next, I'd give them this list. After they played these 5, and were able to tell me which game they liked best and why, or what they found lacking, I could direct towards which rabbit hole to jump down.
I like that RepoMan didn't shy away from the longer and more sprawling games. The shorter playing and/or more streamlined descendants of Arkham Horror, Merchants & Marauders, and Talisman may make it to the table more often, but each do so at the price of cutting something out. I think if you are making a definitive guide, and limiting it to just 5 games, you have to lean towards the games that have all of it thrown in there.
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So, like, on your list Merchants and Marauders is clearly "you're going to die" given how brutal combat is. So is Talisman, imho, and definitely something like Dungeonquest. Magic Realm fits here too.
Most adventure games these days are explore the space, because punishing players or player elimination/huge setback w/death is not a well regarded mechanic anymore. Which is what makes Merchants and Marauders so remarkable to me since it is recent-ish.
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repoman wrote: Firefly is an Adventure game, no doubt. And I did have it written down as a contender. I think what kept it off the list for me is that the game sort of dictates your course of action via the jobs you take. Yes there is some choice but it's mostly a card draw thing. If you spend too long trying to get the jobs you are interested in then Al Rose has already won.
That constrained choice is in line with the source material and I understand it but I think the superior adventure game gives more agency to the player in terms of career path.
I’d give you that if you hadn’t put M&M on the list. Sure, you get a choice over which path you want to take, but the captain you get (also a card draw) makes it 100% obvious which path you should take. You can choose to ignore it, but with everyone else doing what their captain cards suggest and reaping the benefits of doing so, that puts you at a big disadvantage.
I keep wanting to disagree with this list, but I’m not sure what I would do differently. I dislike at least half of these games, some of them I dislike quite a bit. Western Legends and Mage Knight are the only two that I genuinely enjoy playing. I don’t think it’s a matter of me falling out of love with adventures games, it’s more that they’ve never really sat well for me and I’m just now becoming comfortable with the fact that I don’t have to like them. I do RPGs and I have a certain “This time is for this, that time is for that” approach to my gaming schedule and adventure games are often lesser experiences without anything interesting for me to latch on to. I don’t want “RPGs in a box,” neither campaign or one-off plays. That’s probably why Mage Knight, Firefly, and Western Legends are such big hits for me. They all do something special or do something differently that brings me back down to that I’m playing a board game, not something my brain registers as being redundant with a similar but completely separate hobby.
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However, I think adventure games fill a need at least for me in that RPG's take a great deal of time and effort in preparation to play. They require scheduling and they need attendance. What DM has not gnashed his teeth when contemplating the fact that their 10 hours of prep time just got flushed because or scheduling problems with the players? An adventure game can be picked up and played with 0 prep time (outside of rules refreshers) and isn't so dependent on everybody showing up.
And we should be honest in that not everyone is or wants to be and RPG gamer. Plenty of people can enjoy an adventure game and not have the ability or desire to be as extroverted (not sure if that is the right word but it's close) enough to be comfortable RPing.
I also think they allow for the ability to leap from one setting to another. Maybe tonight we are tired of fantasy and want horror or pirates or whatever. RPG's require a commitment to the setting of the system or campaign.
Add in a touch of competition and what you have is something that is it's own thing and not necessarily a poor substitute for an RPG.
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You know, one thing about adventure games that I actually like less is that they don't always give you room to do the stuff you like because there is often such a strong racing component. This is true in both Arkham Horror (where you're trying to beat the game) and in Merchants & Marauders (where you're trying to beat the other players). They have all these cool options and weird stuff you can do, but if you do much of that at all you'll probably lose. This is especially bad with Arkham Horror, because there are all those places like the Newspaper and the Silver Twilight Lodge that make for entertaining stories but actively pull you away from the process of winning.
Talisman is a race too, but it's driven by the players entirely. It's also long enough that it feels like you've gotten to do most of the cool stuff by the time the game is over. Playing to win doesn't necessarily mean you are missing out on the weirder things.
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Gary Sax wrote: I'll bite. What does Firefly do that you consider special in the genre? I'm not trolling.
There’s two ways to look at why this game is as good as it is.
First, there’s the inescapable standpoint of the IP. If you’re a fan of the show (and to be entirely upfront in my estimation of the game, it is my favorite show), it gives you that universe in full. All the stuff and window dressing is there, but what’s really important is that what the show is about is there. No matter what you’re doing in the game or what jobs you’re taking, the game is about the same exact things the show is about. Pushing your luck to get ahead, dealing with the unexpected when things go wrong, getting a crew of diverse people together who might not always agree with what they’re doing. If you ever want a crystal clear example of the difference between setting vs themes, look no further than a GF9 game, especially Firefly. They nailed it as much as they did Star Trek.
The other thing to consider are the mechanics. They handle those themes with clean, back to basics design that works. It’s a long game, but you’re never spending that time with overhead or needless clutter. It has my absolute most favorite movement system in all of gaming. Anyone designing a Firefly game would know to have some pickup and deliver elements, with adventurey stuff at either or both ends of that aspect, but they fit it in the movement as well (again, just like the show) with minimal fuss. It doesn’t matter how many times I play the game, flipping those cards over when doing a full burn can be so tense and exciting.
It absolutely deserved to be on this list, especially over M&M, a game that is completely undeserving of the praise it gets. It offers nothing interesting from a mechanics standpoint, the combat is a chore, and the choice of path A or B is a complete farce. It has AH style 5 and 6 hunting. Wow. Merchants have it easy until a pirate player messes with them, which, oh good, there’s that combat system!. Holy shit, color me fucking floored! No, I’m not having it. Its status is entirely built on the fact that it has a somewhat underused subject matter.
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Escape from 100 Million BC - just bonkers nuts but produces some fun narratives.
Would Android count as one?
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