Tuesday, November 8, 2011

90s PC game in which you and/or your sister get kidnapped, revolving around minigames

Question

About 10 years ago, I picked up an old PC game that ran on Windows 2000. It was different from any other game I played at the time. It came from the bargain bin, so I don't think it was very popular.

I'll set it up for you. The story (what I can remember of it) was very simple. You control a blue blob-like alien(?) that lands on a new planet with his sister. When they emerge onto the planet, one or both of them get kidnapped. If your sister gets kidnapped, you need to rescue her. If you get kidnapped, you need to escape. If you both get kidnapped, you need to escape together. The story was told without words. As far as I can remember, there were no voice-overs and no text bubbles.

The gameplay was unconventional. Instead of an 3D adventure game or an FPS, this was a collection of minigames. A lot of them were controlled with the arrow keys, but I think some of them were point-and-click. The games were played in sequence to tell a story. Depending on the outcome of the minigame, the story would progress in different directions. It was like a "Choose Your Own Adventure" game.

The art design was very simple, just cel-shaded(?) 2D graphics. I don't remember any amazing artwork. I think most of the game involved the character's interacting with props on a primarily black background. The aliens looked like small, cute blobs with floating hands and feet. I think the boy wore a baseball cap, and the girl might have worn a bow.

Here is where I list all of the minigames that I can remember:

  • The first game involved you and your sister exiting the ship on a large slide (because why not?). You control your left and right movement with the arrow keys. If one or both of you fell, there would be a shadowy figure waiting down below who catches you in a large sack.
  • When one of you is captured, you are thrown into a large box (possibly a crib?). To escape from it, you need to run into the sides of the box by using the arrow keys. You need to time it correctly, or the box will not tip over
  • If one of you makes it from the ship to the ground safely, I think you find an old woman who offers you dinner. She offers you some kind of food. I can only assume that the food was wretchedly disgusting, because the next minigame involved you force-feeding the blob-alien by guiding the spoon into his mouth. Maybe the spoon had medicine in it. I don't know.

And that's all I've got. I can't remember anything else about the game. I only played it a few times, but it's been bugging me for months. I'd like to go back and revisit it if I can ever figure out what it was called.

So what do you say? Do you know what game I was playing?

Answer

I got it. I was pointed in the right direction by a true master of obscure DOS games. The game was a 1996 title called Space Kids. After taking a look back at it, I can only conclude that this game was a primary factor in my current mental state.

Man, I played some weird games back then.

No comments:

Post a Comment