Computer game from the late 80's... help!

[Pickle]

Looking into Minecraft for my son has brought back memories of hours spent as a teen playing a game on the very first computer we got. Would have been around 1988/89, and for the life of me I can't remember what it was called.

What I remember is that you controlled the actions of the (male) character by typing basic instructions - open manhole cover, look inside, turn right etc etc. And bizarrely at one point you got picked up by a giant eagle type bird and carried to a nest at the top of a rocky outcrop. I'm pretty sure this was real, and not a teenage experimentation type hallucination...

Can anyone remember what this was? I figure a few of you in the room are the right age/demographic ;)

I also spent hours playing Lemmings, must look to see if there's a current day version.

[Pickle]

Hmmm, I see Lemmings was early 90's, so I might be a couple of years out with my dates. And yes, there's a current day version, of course!

*half term, wet day, bored*

[StraferJack]

typing instructions sounds more early-mid 80s

do you mean a lucasfilm game where you clicked on verbs/nouns to instruct the character? How "graphical" was it?

[StraferJack]

verrrry slow moving?

Kings Quest maybe?

[Pickle]

No, you actually typed in instructions, albeit basic ones. I don't remember using the mouse at all. I remember it being pretty cool in terms of graphics, for the time. And it did tend to be pretty slow. Memory tells me that it was loaded on the PC, but also required a floppy disk to be in the drive chugging away every now and then.

It could have been older, I'm basing it on when we actually got a computer.

Kings Quest looks similar, but the name doesn't ring any bells.

[El Pibe]

i was going to say king's quest.

The hobbit perhaps? You definitely get picked up by an easgle in that.

I used to have to threaten my old beeb to load that game, then after 40 minutes of failed attempts it'd load and my brother typed 'attack gandalf' and you had to load it again when you died!! grrr......!!!

[El Pibe]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hobbit_(1982_video_game)

[Pickle]

God, slow loading, soooo tedious. Was the cause of so many fights between me and my brother.

Hobbit, nope, would have remembered that name. It's really bugging me! Google is not helping (although there are other people asking similar questions).

[Pickle]

List of Sierra games brings back memories, we had Police Quest and Leisure Suit Larry. Getting closer.

[Pickle]

I think it may have been Space Quest - a looking through screen shots and the sight of two muscly women wearing (not much) latex while poor old Roger Wilco is strapped to a chair has triggered memories. Figure my Mum didn't ever check the appropriateness of our games :)

[katanita]

I still have my BBC micro, though I don't remember Space Quest. It still worked last time I fired it up, but that was a long time ago. I wonder what I could usefully do with it?

[damzel]

I remember that game Pickle! I am struggling with the name but it might come to me. Loved leisure suit larry - so naughty. Think I still have all of the series somewhere

[Otta]

Whilst we're doing childhood memories... Not a game, but the giant eagle thing made me think of this

 

[Otta]

Wow, it turns out there was a new series last year starting where the 80s one left off. That's quite the gap!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mysterious_Cities_of_Gold

Anyway sorry, back to old games.

[Help-Ma-Boab]

I had one of these. Loved it.. Space Raiders

https://c2.staticflickr.com/6/5047/5362843637_155748f7f5_z.jpg

[El Pibe]

Oh my i remember that, height of portable gaming for at least another decade!!

[the-e-dealer]

Adventure? or MUD ?

[El Pibe]

I think MUD was more of a genre wasn't it? aaah, telnet, when games were incomprehensible!!

can this be a nostalgia thread then?

I guess I probably kicked off with this doozy!!

like i wouldn't have been winning 50-0, pah!

[the-e-dealer]

Mud was also a game. Hosted on BT Gold.

http://mud.co.uk/richard/pcpsep87.htm

It was a a mug - multi user game My friend moderates on another one that is still going.

[Dopamine1979]

Not quite as old but anyone remember this game on the Spectrum?

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/archive/4/44/20130614135449!Treasure_Island_Dizzy.png

[El Pibe]

nope, don't think i ever played the dizzy games.

lets see, classics would be the manics and jet sets i guess, ant attack? horace, sabre wulf probably lots of others.

On the beeb there was obviously revs, aviator and the still influential elite.

I spent a crazy amount of time on Chuckie Egg and i have fond memories of this little gem, though i doubt it'd play so well in this day and age

 

[grabot]

There's some PC reboots of some of my favourite childhood Spectrum games here http://retrospec.sgn.net/index.php?link=finished . "Head Over Heels" in particular is a game I loved and it looks lovely in its updated form. I'm scared to play it though. Don't want to taint my childhood memories with: "Urghh this is rubbish, back to Titanfall!"

[El Pibe]

happy days

http://www.repton3.co.uk/chuckieegg.aspx

you'll be happy to know chuckie egg is as good as ever with perfectly refined gameplay, something flabby but pretty games of today could learn from!!!

[StraferJack]

The big speccy classics get mentioned a lot and I played pretty much all of them. But one game you don't hear so much about, but which I completed and spent waaaay too much time on was the truly awful

http://www.retrogamesshop.com/product_info.php?language=en&info=p2048_transylvanian-tower--richard-shepherd-software--sinclair-zx-spectrum.html&

[El Pibe]

head over heels holds up pretty well, could do with moving a bit quicker, but otherwise pretty solid!

loving the manual 'if your computer is fast enough, over 233 mhz..."