Tag: these games

Quest for Glory Collection

On By Michel McDonaldIn GamesLeave a comment

quest_for_glory_collection

I bought the Quest for Glory collection some time in the late 90’s and I never got to play it because by the time I finally got to it, I had already upgraded to Windows XP and it wasn’t compatible.  I was frustrated to say the least, but I kept the CD’s just in case one day I might be able to play it.  Well, that day has finally arrived.

A few days ago I was flipping through my CD book looking for a CD with a backup file and I saw all of my Sierra games, mind you, I see them all the time and I usually just ignore them and keep looking for what I was searching for.  But this time was different for some reason because I was still in website refurbishing mode.  I figured, the Sierra games were such a huge thing in my life, I might as well add them to my website, and that got me really thinking about playing them again.  I actually tried installing it, but when the installation program was running the tests to see if my computer was fast enough, it ended up crashing.  I guess it was too fast.

I went to Google and typed “Sierra installers” and I found a website which I blogged about and I found and installed the Quest for Glory collection, but there were still problems with it.  There are 4 games in the collection and the first game has 2 versions; EGA and VGA.  I immediately ran the VGA version because that is obviously a better quality, but it crashed when it got to the character selection screen.  I ran the EGA version and that ran fine, but the quality was really horrible, like 1985 horrible lol.  I checked the rest of the games and the 2nd one was fine, the 3rd one wouldn’t even let me see the Sierra logo, it just crashed upon loading the game, and the 4th one loaded without a hitch.

After a few days, I had the realization that if I did decide to play these games, I would have to play the crappy graphics version that was similar to the original King’s Quest games, and there’s nothing wrong with that, I played those crappy graphic versions lol.  But I feel that if I have a good version, why waste time on a crappy one right?  I also had the realization that I would miss out on the third game.  Yesterday I did realize that I could fix the problem.  These installers have a program that allows you to configure the games before you play them since they use DOSBox.  I did that last night by changing a setting, and the 2 that didn’t run, finally run.

Here is the solution if anyone else has an issue with the Sierra installers.  If you go into the start menu and go to Sierra then mouse over to the Quest for Glory collection (or any collection for that matter) then click “Configure Quest for Glory Games.”  It runs sort of like an installation, but it doesn’t install anything.  It asks you which games you want to configure and you check the ones you want and uncheck the ones you don’t want to fix.  The next screen has the options, output is automatically on Overlay, so change it to the next one down which is OpenGL.  That’s it.  If that’s not good enough, change it to the next thing down.  OpenGL works for me, so I’m going with that.  I didn’t change that on all of the games, just those two that crashed on me.  Although, if the other ones run fine, but then crash at one point, then I will probably end up having to change their settings too.

So yeah, here are 2 images which show the EGA and the VGA version of the 1st Quest for Glory game.  The differences are night and day.  You tell me, which would you prefer to play?

QfG1 QfG1vga

CastleVille

On By Michel McDonaldIn Games2 Comments

I don’t know what it is about these Zynga games that is so addictive, but I just cannot stop playing CastleVille.  I don’t want to play it, yet I am compelled to for some reason.

I can remember how fun YoVille was because you were able to chat with your friends.  We would go hang out at the club (in the game of course) and chat and buy drinks; it was a fun time.  But then people stopped talking in chat because suddenly they were too busy with all of the mini games and with the job, that they just didn’t have time to talk anymore.  All of a sudden it became a job to play.

Then I started playing another Zynga game where you have a farm, oh what was it called?  Oh yeah, FarmVille… they seem to like the Ville titles, don’t they?  I was into it, and you used to be able to chat at the beginning, but then they took that away too.  You could go to someones farm and do chores and then go back to your farm and “work.”  That seems to be a common theme.

Then there was Chef World, Pioneer Trailer, Treasure Isle… the list literally goes on and on.  I had to stop playing these games because they took over my life.  I had people TELLING me to get on these games and send them crap that they need and I’m just thinking excuse me but I am busy with my own stuff here lol.  “Oh alright, what do you need?”

I had to quit playing all of those games so it’s very curious why all of a sudden I’m playing CastleVille.  I guess because it’s one game and I only play it for 5 minutes here, 5 minutes there.  This game requires hours of your life everyday, otherwise you miss out on quests.  Like, you have to build these wood planks or stone blocks to build other buildings and sometimes you have a time limit like 3 days or whatever.  I am going to miss out on a quest today because they want me to build 15 planks, 15 stone bricks and I don’t know what else in 2 hours.  Well, it takes 1 hour to build each of everything.  I refuse to beg anyone for help so I’m just going to let that one expire.

I want to say enough with this stupid game because I have better things to do with my day, but in a strange way I don’t want to; I like it lol.  I have a love hate relationship.  I love it because it’s cute, but I hate it because it’s work.  But then again aren’t all games work?  I play Lord of the Rings Online, which I haven’t been playing because of my book, and everything that you have to do seems like a job.  Maybe I’m getting too old for games.

Whatever, I like it and I will continue to play it at 5 minute increments like I am doing now.  It is time-consuming, but I am not allowing it to be on my screen for 16 hours a day and that is all that matters.

I’m sorry, were you expecting me to make a point about something?  LOL