AGDInteractive - Sierra Adventure Game Remakes Forum

Needlessly frustrating? You make it sound as though this is a rampant design flaw which is detrimental to the overall gameplay experience. It isn't.

If I were to click with the hand on an item when I should have used the arrow and I die (which has happened at least once,) I don't say "I wish they'd fix that." I say "Damn, that was a stupid move. I can't believe I did that."

I'm not saying it's a rampant design flaw, I'm saying I personally feel it's an excessive penalty. When I'm right-clicking, it's quite easy to accidentally over- or under-click and accidentally get the wrong icon. It's happened to me several times and it gets really old really quickly.

I'm not saying AGDI should fix it; I'm just offering my personal opinion. They can take it or leave it.

Brainiac wrote:

MusicallyInspired wrote:Again, though, when have you ever used the hand icon to "pick up" an item already in your inventory in a past Sierra game?

Off the top of my head...every VGA Quest for Glory game and The Castle/Island of Dr. Brain.

You've certainly proven your point for Cole-centric Sierra games.

(And I also died numerous times before getting the hang of right-clicking object manipulation during the spell making exercises. In my zeal to complete the spells quickly, I'd often use the wrong icon...)

Brainiac wrote:

Chyron_8472 wrote:Perhaps you're accidentally using the hand cursor on the sand instead of the arrow cursor? If you did that, you'd die as soon as you clicked the sand.

You know, that's probably the most frustrating thing in the Redux spell system. I kinda think accidentally using the hand icon should be one of the actions that the game is forgiving about (much like certain mistakes with the original parser version).

That's probably what messed up my spell casting the most often. Just clicked on the hand icon when I should have clicked on the arrow icon to select an item, rather than try and perform an action on an item. Oops. Ah, well.

Not as easy as the IA version, but still tons easier than the original AGI version of KQ3.

Still, I was glad to see how the spell casting system was performed. After recently playing KQ2+, I was hoping that the spell casting sequence would be similar to that of making the enchanted emerald in KQ2+.

Personally I'm quite happy with this version of the spell creation process. One of my only complaints about IA's KQ3 was that they took the spell-making almost entirely out of your hands. I enjoyed going through all the steps. But I made sure to save before attempting any spell, so dying on accident wasn't a big deal to me.

I played IA's KQ3 a day before KQ3R came out, and I was confused by the fact that their CAST cursor is white, while KQ6's cast cursor is orange. It made me think that the option to cast was greyed out until I tried clicking for the heck of it and it worked....

MusicallyInspired wrote:I strongly disagree with that notion. I've always hated the idea of having only a hand and an eye in the inventory GUI. All of Sierra's VGA games had an eye (for examining the obejct), a hand (for using or manipulating the item), and an arrow (for selecting the item). The difference is important. I don't see how it's so easy to confuse the two. The hand has always meant "use" or "manipulate" or "pick up", never select. And anyone who confuses "pick up" with "select" confuses me. How did you ever get through the classic Sierra games without having issue with this?

I don't get where this came from? I personally cannot think of a single Sierra game i've played where there is an arrow tool as well as a hand tool?

Certianly none of the Quest For Glory VGA games had an arrow tool, you selected an inventory item using the hand tool.

Solarkid wrote:

MusicallyInspired wrote:I strongly disagree with that notion. I've always hated the idea of having only a hand and an eye in the inventory GUI. All of Sierra's VGA games had an eye (for examining the obejct), a hand (for using or manipulating the item), and an arrow (for selecting the item). The difference is important. I don't see how it's so easy to confuse the two. The hand has always meant "use" or "manipulate" or "pick up", never select. And anyone who confuses "pick up" with "select" confuses me. How did you ever get through the classic Sierra games without having issue with this?

I don't get where this came from? I personally cannot think of a single Sierra game i've played where there is an arrow tool as well as a hand tool?

Well, let's take a look, shall we? You're correct that the VGA Quest for Glory games lack the inventory arrow, as do the Dr. Brain games, but what about the other VGA Sierra games?

EcoQuest 1-2:


Freddy Pharkas:


Conquests of the Longbow:


Leisure Suit Larry 1 & 5:


Pepper's Adventures in Time:


Police Quest 1, 3, & 4:


Space Quest 1, 4, & 5:


See the pattern beginning to emerge? Near as I can tell, virtually all of Sierra's VGA point & click adventure games use an arrow for selection and a hand for manipulation in the inventory window (aside from PQ3, which doesn't even have a hand icon). Exceptions to this would be the Cole's games (Quest for Glory and Dr. Brain) as well as Gabriel Knight 1, which has an icon system completely distinct from any of the other VGA adventures.

What about King's Quest itself? That's the most important series to consider if we're discussing precedent, right?

King's Quest 5-6:


There ya go. Arrow plus hand icon. Furthermore, it's worth noting that this is how AGDI has always done their KQ inventory windows.

AGDI King's Quest 1-2:


So there's precedent in Sierra's VGA adventure line, there's precedent in Sierra's VGA King's Quest games specifically, and there's precedent in AGDI's King's Quest remakes up to and including Redux. So what's the problem?

(Incidentally, it's also worth noting that IA took the exact same route in their KQ3 remake):

Well that settles that.

The crucial point, though, was not that AGDI designed its inventory interface differently than Sierra (which it didn't, as has been shown). Rather, some people perceived (and it's their opinion, not a statement of fact) that the deaths in KQ3 Redux spellcasting that result from clicking the hand on inventory objects instead of the arrow are an unnecessary cruelty to the player, since Sierra never implemented such death-by-interface-misadventure in its VGA games.

Au contraire. Think back to Kq5, standing before the witch in the Dark Forest. You need to select the genie bottle and present it to the witch. She opens the bottle, and gets trapped inside for a thousand years. The Dark Forest is liberated! Yay!

But what happens if you accidentally click the hand icon on the genie bottle rather than the arrow icon? Unless I recall incorrectly, Graham experiences the death-by-genie rather than the witch. Oops! Hope you saved! That is virtually an exact parallel to the spell creation process in KQ3: Redux. So unless I'm misremembering that particular scenario, AGDI still has clear precedent in the original KQ series.

EDIT: Just checked, and I was right; that's exactly how the genie scenario works.

El Ravager wrote:Au contraire. Think back to Kq5, standing before the witch in the Dark Forest. You need to select the genie bottle and present it to the witch. She opens the bottle, and gets trapped inside for a thousand years. The Dark Forest is liberated! Yay!

But what happens if you accidentally click the hand icon on the genie bottle rather than the arrow icon? Unless I recall incorrectly, Graham experiences the death-by-genie rather than the witch. Oops! Hope you saved! That is virtually an exact parallel to the spell creation process in KQ3: Redux. So unless I'm misremembering that particular scenario, AGDI still has clear precedent in the original KQ series.

EDIT: Just checked, and I was right; that's exactly how the genie scenario works.

Heh. Forgot about that one! I guess it WAS done on occasion by Sierra after all. Good memory, sir!

Thank ya! I think the reason it stuck so firmly in my mind is that the first time I ever played through Kq5, I accidentally used the hand instead of the arrow and I hadn't saved my game since before the desert trek. Grrr! Funny how well we remember the things that piss us off...

Nice example, El Ravager.

Nice presentation of the icon bars, El Ravager.

Chyron_8472 wrote:Hey, I enjoyed KQ7 far more than KQ5.

Ha! I eventually totally forgotten about KQ7!! I am kind of dissapointed with KQ7 because KQ all along is not cartoonish. KQ7 reminds me of Loney Tunes.