Forums > Game Talk > Looking for a particular breed of adventure game
Lain Crowley (6629) on 6/26/2014 6:52 AM · Permalink · Report
Does anyone know of any adventure games centered around Treasure Hunting/Archeology, either in the Indiana Jones sense or the more sensible modern sense? I remember buying Secrets of the Luxor decades ago because I wanted it to be that, and blessedly I never got far enough into the game to uncover that it was not at all.
Indra was here (20752) on 6/26/2014 9:11 AM · Permalink · Report
I'm still trying to remember that Windows 95(?) Indiana Jones game where you can play in a windowed box. We don't seem to have an Archeology game group. Stupid Tomb Raider messes the theme/protagonist up.
Only game I know where the game's goal it to explicitly search for a buried treasure it Wayward, though perhaps not specifically an archeology themed game you're looking for.
Don't think the Pirates series is what you're looking for either (i.e. collect maps, find buried treasure).
Indra was here (20752) on 6/26/2014 2:48 PM · Permalink · Report
Yup. That's the one. Thanks dude.
Alex Z (1856) on 6/26/2014 10:57 AM · Permalink · Report
1931: Scheherazade at the Library of Pergamum is all about Indiana Jones-like "archeology". It's not particularly good, though. It's also a Choose-Your-Adventure style game, so it may not be strictly an adventure game in your sense.
However, almost any adventure game has some pseudo-archeology to it. Stuff like discovering ancient secrets and artifacts in Broken Sword series or Flight of the Amazon Queen.
Pseudo_Intellectual (66423) on 6/26/2014 2:50 PM · Permalink · Report
Choice of Games' "To The City of the Clouds" is a heady mix of archaeology field work, cultural anthropology, plus some of the Indiana Jones business. But all text, multiple choice.
Lain Crowley (6629) on 6/29/2014 2:49 AM · Permalink · Report
Man, these are some slim pickings. I guess there was a reason I had trouble digging stuff up myself.
I always figured the adventure game genre would be a good fit for this style of game, but now that I think about it most adventure games are more in the detective story genre.
Game Guesser (28) on 6/29/2014 11:57 AM · Permalink · Report
Treasure hunting? So....hidden objects, right?
actually, I'm kind of surprised this isn't a category at AbandonWiki. There's no suitable search option at TheLegacy, either. I guess you'll find a few listed for Egyptian themes, but other than that...
I have to admit, I have a little trouble envisioning this. I guess it might be a bit like The Lost Crown, only with ghost-hunting replaced with excavation/research?
WillyWombat (10) on 6/30/2014 6:36 PM · Permalink · Report
Well there's always Riven. It's closer to the archaeology side of detective as far as theme goes... but not really all too close either. It's a hard balance to discuss since arcaeology is really detective work on ancient artifact.
Curious, what would the ideal game function like if you were to make one? I had spent a good 6 months designing an archaeology/detective game a year or so ago.
Lain Crowley (6629) on 7/1/2014 2:01 AM · Permalink · Report
My concept in a sentence would have been 'Uncharted but you don't shoot 800 dudes', although that requires a lot more effort than it would appear.
I've yet to play the broken sword games, surprisingly, and I blew my shot at getting them super cheap in the recent sales. When I was thinking back on all the adventure games I'm familiar with, and how many I know of, I was kind of surprised at just how many adventure games are detective stories. Even a game like Monkey Island 2, which is about hunting a treasure, is for a decent part of the game basically a detective game. The way you hunt down information on the pieces of the Big Whoop map is pretty close to what I was thinking of.
Actually one game that might be really similar to what I'm looking for, and that I'd really like to play again, is The Sacred Mirror of Kofun. Sadly, like most FMV games, you need actual Win95 era hardware and OS to run it.
WillyWombat (10) on 7/1/2014 7:42 PM · Permalink · Report
You could install 95 on a virtual machine if you'd like.
http://lifehacker.com/5714966/five-best-virtual-machine-applications
What about a game like Spelunky?
Lain Crowley (6629) on 7/2/2014 5:04 AM · Permalink · Report
Spelunkey's just a game with treasure. They've been making those since Pitfall!
CalaisianMindthief (8172) on 7/12/2014 4:48 AM · edited · Permalink · Report
If you're looking for an Uncharted game without killing, then the closest thing is the Adam Venture series. It is rather average however, and a bit short. I actually liked it mostly for the puzzles, quite a stinker when it comes to dialogue and characters. If you find it for one dollar, you can give it a try.
A bit farther from the concept, many Lovecraft-inspired games have elements of archaeology, Daughter of Serpents and Demon's Tomb: The Awakening come to mind. They have little to do with treasure seeking however and the first one is pretty bad.
If I were you I'd just play the Broken Sword games first, however.
Lain Crowley (6629) on 7/13/2014 12:22 AM · Permalink · Report
I played daughter of serpents back when you could get pretty much anything off of HotUD. I really liked the way your character's background influenced their investigation paths. Unfortunately my particular character build (nobility with a hobbyist interest in occultism) caused a script error when I attempted to excavate a tomb.
I want to try out Demon's Tomb just for that customization menu. It never occurred to me that text adventures should have options like that, but now that I've seen it I have to wonder why every game doesn't.
Euro adventure games are such an oddity to me. I've played american adventure games my whole life, which fall into either the vignette style, like Lucas and Sierra games, or the minimalist Myst-descendant games, so seeing adventure game mechanics adapted into straight through linear storytelling just confounds the hell out of me. I suppose a lot of those games are designed by teams of people who are frustrated novelists.
Pseudo_Intellectual (66423) on 7/13/2014 12:54 AM · Permalink · Report
I loved Daughter of Serpents but could never get the genie to trigger. An interesting failure!
PolloDiablo (16847) on 7/13/2014 6:26 PM · Permalink · Report
You can play as an archeologist in the Chronicles of Mystery-series, but there isn't much actual archeology going on if I remember correctly. Same goes for NiBiRu.