Space Quest III: The Pirates of Pestulon

The Good
The first Space Quest pretty much defined the whole series with its lighthearted, amusing space tale about an extraordinary janitor who keeps surviving against all odds. The second installment was less funny and focused more on various hazards. Space Quest III goes back to the template of the first game, but enhances it with more humor and personality. Filled with all kinds of wacky situations, weird encounters, and silly fun, Space Quest III is perhaps the most typical game of the series, its most "pure" representative. Together with its sequel, it is also the one fans of the series usually remember most fondly.

Gameplay-wise, Space Quest III has decidedly more to offer than the previous games. The new text parser allows you to choose more concrete verbs and some very specific actions. There is an excellent variety of different situations and actions you could perform in the game. From traditional exploration and item-gathering to playing funny minigames, navigating a spaceship, or infiltrating a company building disguised as a janitor (what a disguise, indeed...), there is always plenty of things to do, keeping the game fresh and exciting. There is not a bit of repetitive gameplay in Space Quest III, and it is amusing and diverse from the beginning to the end.

The humor is also much more evident in this title than in the two previous games. There are more weird characters, all sorts of funny situations, plus the traditional death scenes that were the trademark of Sierra's adventures at that time. Pop culture references, movie spoofs (a terminator called "Arnoid"? Really?..), and situations far surpassing the earlier installments in comedic entertainment value (such as a mecha fight against a dorky office boss) are much more prominent. The game is more verbose and descriptive, having somewhat warmer, eloquent writing. Also, while in the two previous games you were still a nameless "player" (although the hero's real name was mentioned in documentation), this is the first game where Roger Wilco acts under his own name. In this game particularly, the charming "loser" personality of Roger comes to life. Later Space Quest installments added more character development, but Space Quest III made a step in that direction.

Technically, this game is a noticeable step forwards compared to its immediate predecessor; with a new, updated version of classic Sierra text-based interface, the game's interaction became richer, more intelligent and satisfying. The graphics are also much more impressive than in the first two installments; until now, Space Quest III is remembered as one of the finest examples of late EGA art. Even compared to other Sierra games made with the same engine, those visuals have something that make them stand out.

The game presents a good variety of locations, classical Space Quest-style planet-hopping that was lacking in the second game. From a spaceship graveyard to an intergalactic burger restaurant, from a mysterious planet with a purple surface and a shop that sells tourist souvenirs to the headquarters of an evil corporation, the locations of Space Quest III always keep the player interested, pressing him to continue playing and see where he would be taken next.

The Bad
Space Quest III has its weaknesses. Firstly, while it does expand the game world and increases diversity, it is still a rather short and fairly straightforward game. There is hardly any exploration of a continuous world in the sense of King's Quest. In fact, most of the locations are very small and there isn't much you can do there besides performing the necessary actions to advance the plot. The only exception is the initial junkyard - which is, frankly, not a particularly thrilling area to begin with. It is also disproportionally long, occupying about a third of the entire game. And while you can visit several planets afterwards, the whole thing is over a bit too soon, with only the tightly scripted hazards creating the illusion of a longer adventure.

In terms of storytelling, Space Quest III is a disappointment. The two earlier games were hardly groundbreaking works of fiction, but at least they had overarching goals and objectives that made sense within a larger context. In this installment, you escape from the lengthy junkyard sequence only to travel to the few available planets without any compelling reason. The actual plot information is handed to you almost by accident, and by that time you might have already completed areas you had no idea were crucial for your quest.

The Bottom Line
Amusing characters, all kinds of weird deaths to avoid, funny locations - the classic Space Quest ingredients are all there. Space Quest III feels a bit too simple at times and suffers from traditional Sierra-style strange logic; but it is also a dynamic, entertaining game that stays in your memory with all its silliness and charm.

The Good
This game was the first computer game I ever played. It came out in 1988, but I didn't play it until about 1990, when I was 9. Its mix of space adventure and incredibly funny humor immediately appealed to me, and for years the Space Quest series was my favorite series of computer games. In this game you pick up the story of Roger Wilco where he left off at the end of the second game, drifting through space in an escape pod. Roger gets the first ship that is completely his in this game, which gives him the ability to planet-hop at will, and you get to zip from place to place at will for most of the game (a neat kind of perk for a kid whose bedtime was still 9 PM). It has a rich plot compared to the first two games, as well as improved graphics. When I finally finished it, I just sat in front of the screen with a feeling of accomplishment, and immediately felt like playing the next one. A true pinnacle of early adventure gaming.

The Bad
Not many bad things, in my opinion. It was a challenging game, which would have been good, but my version of the game had a little glitch that didn't let me save the game. Whenever I died, I had to start at the beginning again. This allowed me to get REALLY good at navigating around the trash freighter at the beginning of the game, and increased the feeling of joy when I finally finished it. The arcade-like sequence at the end when you have to destroy Elmo's Scumsoft fighters to get away was kind of repetitive, and seemed really hard to me. Could have done without it, but what are you gonna do? The Astrochicken game at Monolith Burger was also kind of monotonous, but was too hilarious to complain much about.

The Bottom Line
If you don't mind the not-that-great graphics (by today's standards), and have an interest in classic text-parser adventure gaming, go to E-bay and pick a copy of this up for a couple bucks. You have to start it from a DOS prompt, but it still works on today's computers. In my opinion, this kind of adventure gaming went out with the text window. I can't describe it (I don't know if anybody can), but there's a certain something about these kinds of games that I absolutely love. Sierra's different "Quest" games (Space, King's, Police) were about all the games I played for a few years, and they kind of drifted away once spoken voiceovers on CD came in. So while you're enjoying today's adventure games, look back at these incredibly fun pioneers of the genre.

The Good
While Space Quest II didn't really deliver something as interesting as the first of the series, the third installment came back with new ideas and a better storyline overall, but it was on the technical side that is was the most astonishing.

Let's start with the storyline. Not everything was explicit on-screen; sometimes you really had to "look around" to find objects, and looking around every new room quickly became a habit. Some references to the previous episodes were interesting, such as a Terminator which comes to take care of you since you never paid for the whistle you ordered from Gippazoid Novelty (sic) in Space Quest II. It also looks like being sued by Toys 'R Us didn't scare Mark & Scott as they didn't hesitate to put a McDonald's parody within the game. Although I don't remember the whole storyline, it involved space travels as usual and less time spent walking around in solo on a lonely planet as it was the case in the first two episodes. More encounters meant more fun.

One thing that was great was the fact that the game wasn't as hard as the previous ones. I was actually able to get through it in a few weeks without a hint book. Some might have disliked the fact that it was easy, but I preferred that style of gameplay.

Technically, it was the first to use the Script Interpreter with its 16 color 320x200 resolution and full sound card support. Sierra was slow to upgrade their graphics engine, but they finally did it. The artists used enough dithering techniques to make the overall graphics pleasing. As for the sound, it even supported the digital output of the Tandy 1000TL series to squeak occasional digital sound effects. That was great!

1988 can be remembered as the year when video game producers started using professionals instead of programmers to make music. The producers hired a once-star member of Supertramp to make the music and while I can't say he had an extraordinary talent for composing video game music, he was good enough with percussions to make it sound good.

The Bad
[spoilers] The ending was so lame!

Bringing back the two guys to earth was okay but landing in Sierra's parking lot and seeing Ken Williams hiring them wasn't funny. Fantasy must remain just that: fantasy. What was the pertinence of going back to the real world? It's like if DOOM ended with the hero falling in a timewarp, showing up to ID software's office, cleaning off the blood on his hands in the executive bathroom and receiving a medal from John Carmack. Give me a break.

The Bottom Line
a) A sequel that is better than Space Quest II. b) The last SQ adventure before the point-and-click interface. c) Humorous as usual. :) d) Never mind the ending.