The NES/Famicom version of Maniac Mansion was developed and published by Jaleco in 1990 and is still worth playing today. It’s a fine port of a great game and translates well enough to Nintendo‘s machine that it arguably plays even better than the C64 original (although many will cry “Sacrilege!” to that).
Tag Archives: point-and-click
Zombi, ZX Spectrum
Ubisoft‘s point-and-click Dawn of the Dead rip-off originally came out for the Amstrad CPC in 1986, and this ZX Spectrum version followed four years later, in 1990. It was converted by a three-man team: Geoff Phillips, Colin Bradshaw-Jones, and S. Chance and is a faithful recreation of the Amstrad original, with the same clunky controls and zombie-bashing combat.
Cosmic Spacehead, Megadrive/Genesis
Cosmic Spacehead is a 1993 Sega Megadrive release for British publisher Codemasters. It is, in fact, an enhanced remake of a previous Codemasters game, Linus Spacehead’s Cosmic Crusade.
Normality, PC
A weird mix of 3D exploration and point-and-click adventure, Normality was developed and published by Gremlin Interactive in 1996.
In some respects Normality is the predecessor to Realms of the Haunting – a 1997 release from Gremlin. Both games use the same game engine, and gameplay-wise they also share a lot of similarities.
Thimbleweed Park, PC
Thimbleweed Park is a point-and-click adventure, released in 2017 by Terrible Toybox, and co-created by ex-LucasArts employees Gary Winnick, Ron Gilbert, and David Fox.
In case you didn’t know: Fox, Gilbert and Winnick have been involved in the making of some of the best games of all time, including (but not limited to) titles such as: Ballblazer, Maniac Mansion, The Secret of Monkey Island, and Day of the Tentacle.
Sam & Max Hit the Road, PC
Sam & Max Hit the Road, released by LucasArts in 1993, marks the video game debut of the infamous dog/rabbit crime-fighting duo.
Created by artist Steve Purcell, Sam & Max are “freelance police” and basically engage in a series of surreal mysteries involving bigfoot, and a whole host of other weird characters and strange situations.
Day of the Tentacle, PC
This is the original 1993, VGA, MS-DOS version of Day of the Tentacle, with graphics presented at a fairly low-resolution 320 x 200. They still look great to me though.
Compare this to the high def Double Fine remake of 2018 and there is no contest – the high def version wins every time – although there is still a perverse nostalgic thrill to be had from playing the original VGA version.
Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis, PC
Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis was initially published by LucasArts in 1992 and was immediately recognised as something rather special – at least better than what most of the competition were doing at the time.
What makes Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis so good is the melding of the Raiders of the Lost Ark movie mythos, and the great writing, art and animation talent of LucasArts.
Monkey Island 2: LeChuck’s Revenge, PC
Monkey Island 2: LeChuck’s Revenge is the 1991 sequel to the classic The Secret of Monkey Island and is arguably even better than its fondly-remembered predecessor.
Created by essentially the same team as the previous game, Monkey Island 2 once again follows the exploits of Guybrush Threepwood and his adventures into pirating and comedy. And once again he is up against his arch nemesis, LeChuck, only this time LeChuck is a rotting zombie due to him having been killed in the last game and brought back to life in this.
The Secret of Monkey Island, PC
This is the original MS-DOS classic, as released by Lucasfilm Games (later to become LucasArts) in 1990. The Secret of Monkey Island is a humorous point-and-click adventure introducing wannabe pirate Guybrush Threepwood and his evil arch nemesis the pirate LeChuck.
The King of Grabs 