Space Quest III: The Pirates of Pestulon - IBM PC / Amiga / Atari ST / Macintosh (1989)
American Cover
Space Quest III
Space Quest III
From here, it's not entirely apparent what to do, unless you spend your time mastering the arcade-style mini-game Astro Chicken, which is a bit like the classic arcade title Lunar Lander. If you get a high score, you learn that the Two Guys from Andromeda have been kidnapped by the evil Pirates of Pestulon and forcing them to create diabolic software. (This is the only mention of it in-game, which is technically an optional "puzzle". However, it's also plastered all over the game's packaging.) After deactivating the shield on the volcanic planet of Ortega, Roger infiltrates the Pestulon base, dressed as - surprise! - a janitor. The Pirates of Pestulon are actually software pirates, so their secret base resembles a modern cubicle farm. The enterprise is run by a diabolical fourteen year old named Elmo Puck, who challenges Roger to a real life game of Rock'Em Sock'Em Robots in the climactic battle.
Space Quest III is the first game in the series to utilize Sierra's enhanced SCI0 engine, which features a much higher resolution, as well as mouse control for movement. (You still need to type in commands, however.) In general, there's a lot more detail to the game, both in the writing and the visuals. The previous Space Quest games were kinda funny, but the sarcasm of the narrator is much more evident, and the world is filled with references to other works of science fiction. The junkyard in the beginning is filled with a giant Transformers head, the pod from 2001: A Space Odyssey, and a (bow) TIE Fighter, amongst other craft. The store on Phleebut is filled with postcards referencing Aliens and Dune. The enhanced graphics also allow for some cool first-person character graphics and cinematics, like the seedy store owner on Phleebut and Terminator droid. The SCI engine also allows for music from a variety of sound devices, ranging from Adlib FM to General MIDI. If you play on a Tandy or Mac, or enable Soundblaster support, there's even a cool little sound clip of Roger saying "Where am I?" right at the beginning of the game.. The soundtrack is composed by Bob Siebenberg of Supertramp, who supplies a catchy riff of the Space Quest theme for the opening, as well as a handful of other memorable themes, but a vast majority of the game is still played in silence.
Even though the interface is better than its predecessor, there are still some annoying problems. Some of the puzzles are a bit too arcadey, and the parser is extremely fussy with your positioning. Near the end of the game in the ScumSoft office, you need to zap bins of trash or else you'll set off an alarm. It's extremely hard to get in just the right spot for it to work. God forbid you miss too many times or you accidentally walk too far past it, because you'll set off an alarm and end up encased in jello, leading to a Game Over. At least the action now pauses when you bring up a text entry window, which is handy in the few instances where you're being chased. The minigames - Astro Chicken and Rock'Em Sock'Em Robots - are also both extremely clumsy.
Despite some rather difficult puzzles, the game's also ruthlessly short. Once you break out of the garbage ship and get control of your own space ship, you get full command, requiring that you turn on your radar, set your course, zap into hyperspace, and so forth. But it's a bit disappointing that, in the whole galaxy, there are only three locations to visit (four, once you uncover Pestulon.)
MP3s Download here
Intro Theme
Space Quest III
Space Quest III
Space Quest III
Space Quest III
Space Quest III
Space Quest III
Space Quest IV: Roger Wilco and the Time Rippers - IBM PC / Amiga / PC98 / Macintosh (1991)
American Cover
Space Quest IV
Space Quest IV
Before he can be executed, Roger is saved by another figure, this time friendly, who creates a rip in the space-time continuum and tells Roger to jump in. With no time to ask questions, our hero stumbles through time, ends up in a postapocalyptic nightmare, reads the title bar at the top of the screen, and notices that he's now in Space Quest XII: Vohaul's Revenge II. After escaping with another time pod, Roger ends up in yet another sequel: Space Quest X: The Latex Babes of Estros (probably a reference to the old Infocom text adventure The Leather Goddesses of Phobos.) Ending up in a prehistoric wasteland, he's captured by the titular babes, the leader of which had apparently been jilted by Roger at some undefined point in time, much to his own surprise. After proving his worthiness, the girls decide to go shopping and abandon Roger at a mall, where he's chased by same policeman that accosted him at the beginning. Once again zipping through time, he ends up back in Space Quest I, the original version. Roger himself is now a fully colored sprite in a blocky, 16-color world - some of the bar denizens will actually make fun of him for being pretentious. The game finally ends back in Space Quest XII, as Roger fights to wipe Sludge Vohaul (once again) from all existence.
Space Quest IV uses the SCI1 engine introduced with Kings Quest V, utilizing 256 color graphics and a fully icon-based interface, including the Smell and Lick icons from the VGA remake of SQI. They're still mostly useless, provide for some even more amusing commentary. The best? Try using your tongue on the ridiculous looking robot in the electronics store.
Far and away the best aspect is the voice acting, featured in the CD-ROM release. Like Kings Quest V, most of the voices are provided by Sierra's own untrained staff, to underwhelming results (fun fact: the robot in the female clothing store is provided by Jane Jensen, who would later go on to create the Gabriel Knight series), but the narrator is played by Gary Owens, known as the announcer from the old TV series Laugh-In, and also known for the original voice of Space Ghost. The narrator in Space Quest has always been its strongest points, and it takes on a whole new life when even the most mundane lines are delivered with a sense of sarcastic gravitas.
If the sequel hopping and awesome narrating weren't enough, Space Quest IV throws in all kinds of other self-references. There's a hidden sequence where you can teleport back to Ortega from Space Quest III - using the same exactly 16-color backdrop, like the SQI segment - although since you can't find any thermal underwear, you'll melt instantly if you leave your timepod. You also come across a futuristic software shop, filled with parodies of famous computer software titles, including SimSim (simulate your own simulator), Cluck Egger's Advanced Chicken Simulator (fly rubber chickens), and BOOM (the description mentions no interface, no puzzles and no conflict, a pretty accurate description of LOOM, the Lucasarts game it's parodying.) You'll also find an Infocom-style hint book for Space Quest IV, (complete with a marker to slowly reveal answers for puzzles.) It's mostly filled with red herrings and made-up puzzles that have nothing to actually do with the game, but in a brilliantly Spaceballs-esque moment, there actually IS some essential info in there.
There's also a new Astro Chicken game, this time dubbed "Ms. Astro Chicken", which is a typical side scrolling shooter and is thankfully less annoying than its predecessor. (This, along with the original Astro Chicken and the speeder scene from SQI were packaged together in a release called "Nick's Picks", which also included other minigames from Sierra titles.) Near the end of the game, you stumble upon a computer interface that has icons for Kings Quest XVIII and the mystical LSL4 (which, as Sierra fans know, doesn't technically exist, though it plays a pretty huge part in this game's plot.) There's also a SQ4 icon - if you delete it, you're unceremonious kicked out of the game without warning, leaving you at the cold, hard C:\ prompt if you're playing in DOS. It would've even more cruelly hilarious if the game actually deleted itself, although that perhaps would've been going too far.
Unfortunately, despite its enhancements and even more ridiculous sense of humor, Space Quest IV is plagued with many of the same problems as its predecessor. There are too many action based segments, which are still clumsy and frustrating. The opening segment in Space Quest XII is filled with Invasions of the Body Snatchers-style subhumans, which will screech and summon death robots, instantly killing you if you're unlucky. It's a completely terrible way to begin an otherwise hilarious game. (Although the random Energizer Bunny running around for no discernable reason is pretty amusing, although trying to catch it to steal its batteries is more difficult than it should be.) Another action segment, where you escape from Time Police in the mall, is similarly aggravating. Segments such as these, littered with needless deaths, seems like the developers were once again trying to compensate for the extremely short game length. At least some of the death scenes - and their associated commentary - is still pretty funny. Earlier Sierra games ALWAYS let you walk off cliffs if you're not careful, and Space Quest IV has one of the best lines to accomodate these accidents. ("Serious damage to important body parts pretty much screws up any future plans you had for living.")
There aren't too many skippable items, but there is one particularly annoying bit. The only thing you need to watch out for are time codes, which control which era you'll travel to. When you come across the first time pod, the disk version uses these as copy protection, although you can randomly hit buttons in the CD version. However, it's incredibly important that you write down the time code on the panel before you press anything, since these are important for switching between locations later in the game. Naturally, the game doesn't tell you this, so if you don't take notes, you're essentially screwed later on.
Space Quest IV presents an interesting dichotomy. It's frustrating and poorly designed at spots - although much better than the remake of Space Quest I - but at the same time, its premise is brilliant, and still remains one of the funniest games ever made, even years after it release. The Two Guys from Andromeda have also noted in interviews that it's their favorite of the series.
In addition to the voice acting, the CD-ROM version makes a few minor graphical changes. In the mall, the electronics store was originally called Radio Shock, but after being legally hounded by Radio Shack, the revised version changed it to Hz. So Good, a parody of another, lesser known store. The black and white bikers now ride black and white bikes (correcting an inconsistency from the disk version), the huge building in the background of Space Quest XII looks a bit different, and there's an extra easter egg featuring one of the game's developers shopping for pants at the mall.
Clever hackers also found a secret room hidden in the game's resource files, filled with references to all of the legal issues that Sierra's adventure games have run into over the years. This includes the ZZ Top members and Drods R Us sign from Space Quest I, the Radio Shock sign, the Hero's Quest logo (the series was renamed Quest for Glory due to legal issues) and Earl, the father from the TV series Dinosaurs, who made a random cameo in the VGA release of the first Quest for Glory game.
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Main Theme
Space Quest IV
Space Quest IV
Space Quest IV
Space Quest IV
Space Quest IV
Space Quest IV
Space Quest IV
Space Quest IV
Space Quest IV
Space Quest III begins right where its predecessor left off, with Roger floating around space in hypersleep. As luck would have it, he's "rescued" by a junk barge, but needs to dig himself out of the scrap heap and reactivate a old spaceship to escape. Once free, Roger is stalked by a Terminator-esque bounty hunter, who's seeking retribution on the vending machine that Roger vandalized back in Space Quest II. After adventuring to the hostile desert/tourist trap planet of Phleebut and taking care of the Terminator, the plot kinda comes to a stop at Roger stops to enjoy a meal at Monolith Burger.
Space Quest III already fudged with the fourth wall, what with you having to rescue the Two Guys, and meeting up with Ken Williams at the end. Space Quest IV goes several steps further with its self awareness by sending Roger through his own sequels. The game begins with Roger taking a break at a seedy bar, where he's accosted by mysterious policeman, who are working for a seemly resurrected Sludge Vohaul.
