Leasure Suit Larry Loses again

[Rob_Merritt]

Read today over at Shack and Gamespot that Vivendi today canceled not one but two Leasure Suit Larry games. One was a direct sequel to LSL:MCL for the Xbox and PS2 and the other was a take off on the Japanese Dating Sims for the PSP.

Rather bumbed out about that. I really enjoyed all the games in the series. Even the last one. I love humor in games and there just isn't enough of it.

I'm really confused as to what happened there. I was talking with several people from Vivendi and High Voltage and LSL was supposively their third biggest money maker behind World of Warcraft and Half Life 2. They were all happy with the game, aware of the critisms and were confident that the sequel would make fans and critics happy. The Dating sims sounded great as well. I can see that maybe they would cancel over hot coffee uproar but why now and not 5 months ago when they were reviewing the projects for the fiscal year?

However thinking about it, if they were a bit behind in development and they were targeting Xbox and ps2, I could see that killing it. Ofcourse doesn't explain the psp title or why they just didn't move the project to the 360 and ps3.

[Hanzii]

Yeah, but we all win.

Seriously, I'm with you on the lack of humour (well Nimoys voiceovers in CIV4 made me laugh a few times) but LSL isn't the cure.
LSL: MCL was juvenile and stupid and any continuation from that just needs to be put to death, no matter how much money it made Vivendi.

[Rob_Merritt]

Yeah, but we all win.
Because playing games like 25 to life is sooo much better?

LSL: MCL was juvenile and stupid

I disagree. There was juvenile humor and not every joke worked, but there were a lot of funny segments.

The only weakness I found with the game was playing the same mini games over and over again but it wasn't anything to put me off on a sequel.

[McCrank]

Im along the same line of thought of axing all non point-n-click Larry games...The cancellation most likely means that MCL flopped right? That's because they tried introducing a character that veteran PC gamers knew and loved well, but current day games had never heard of..., and by tweaking it to be friendly to the later group with juvenile jokes and lame puzzles, both ends ended up suffering from this game. If they wanna make a successful Larry game, grab Al Lowe, and make a adventure game along the same lines of the classic series or more recently the Longest Journey.

[extarbags]

If they wanna make a successful Larry game, grab Al Lowe, and make a adventure game along the same lines of the classic series or more recently the Longest Journey.

Yeah, because if there's one word that perfectly sums up adventure games in today's market, that word is "successful."

[Rob_Merritt]

The cancellation most likely means that MCL flopped right?


No it actually was very sucessful. Thats why they green light these two follow ups in the first place. Which makes this cancelation rather confusing. However I saw a rant by a former High Voltage employee place the blame on management so it might nothing to do with Larry or Humor.

[Jamie Madigan]

I'm with Rob --I thought MCL was great. It was hit and miss with the humor, but when it hit it was hysterical. I laughed my head off when the game revealed what you had to do to keep the lab monkey from masturbating. It was all juvenile and offensive, but funny in places.

[RichardC]

Read today over at Shack and Gamespot that Vivendi today canceled not one but two Leasure Suit Larry games.

Good.

[RobotPants]

The MCM had some funny parts and I rarely mind juvenile and offensive things, but the game just wasn't enjoyable. If you're going to make a game that's made up entirely of minigames, at least make those minigames a tiny bit fun.

[scharmers]

Jesus, talk about the nostalgia vaseline.

The jokes in the "good" (read: Al Lowe) LSLs were juvenile and purile. Some of them were pretty funny in a wink wink, nudge nudge sort of way. The rest were stupid in a "an 8th Grade substitute teacher is writing TEH FUNNIES ABOUT TEH SEX!" way.

The jokes in the "bad" LSL were juvenile & purile. Some of them were pretty funny in a 80's Porky's kind of way. The rest were stupid in a "an 8th grader is writing TEH FUNNIES ABOUT TEH SEX!!" way.

That being said, I laughed out loud more with the mini-game consolized Larry. I'm disappointed there won't be a follow-up. I'm not sure what's the matter with me.

[wildpokerman]

The MCM had some funny parts and I rarely mind juvenile and offensive things, but the game just wasn't enjoyable. If you're going to make a game that's made up entirely of minigames, at least make those minigames a tiny bit fun.


Whoah homie just because Tom is out of town is no reason to be slinging the F word around.

[Gordon Cameron]

Jesus, talk about the nostalgia vaseline.

The jokes in the "good" (read: Al Lowe) LSLs were juvenile and purile. Some of them were pretty funny in a wink wink, nudge nudge sort of way. The rest were stupid in a "an 8th Grade substitute teacher is writing TEH FUNNIES ABOUT TEH SEX!" way.

The jokes in the "bad" LSL were juvenile & purile. Some of them were pretty funny in a 80's Porky's kind of way. The rest were stupid in a "an 8th grader is writing TEH FUNNIES ABOUT TEH SEX!!" way.

That being said, I laughed out loud more with the mini-game consolized Larry. I'm disappointed there won't be a follow-up. I'm not sure what's the matter with me.

I was just about to say, I wasn't aware of the original LSL games being some kind of paragon of sophisticated wit. I only had a glancing look at them in their heyday though, so I couldn't say for sure.

Now Leather Goddesses of Phobos, on the other hand...

[Hanzii]

Sorry if I wasn't clear.
I thought the original games sucked too. Even when I was in the age, where farts were inheriently funny, I didn't like the humour. So I was appalled at the MCL revive and surprised that they managed to pair bad humour with even worse gameplay - I think you have to look at the German Lulu game to find something worse. And I'm just dandy if this spells the true death of the franchise.

Yeah, Infocom made some funny games. Leather Godesses of Phobos was sexual innuendo done right... that was the one with the 'scratch and sniff'-card as well, right?! Also Hitchikers Guide and bureacracy (SP?) - funny, but frustrating hard.

[TheWombat]

Even when I was in the age, where farts were inheriently funny

You mean, they aren't funny any more? Damn.

[Rob_Merritt]

Yeah, Infocom made some funny games. Leather Godesses of Phobos was sexual innuendo done right

While Infocom did make some fun text based adventures, Leather Godesses of Phobos was as about as fun as reading about paint drying.

[Hanzii]

Well Tom Sawyer had paint drying in it as well, and that was pretty fun. It just takes the right writer and not some guy making fart jokes.

[Gordon Cameron]

William Faulkner could write a fart joke that would really make you think...

[Rob_Merritt]

Well Tom Sawyer had paint drying in it as well, and that was pretty fun. It just takes the right writer and not some guy making fart jokes.

Great game that Tom Sawyer... or not.

[Shadari]

Great game that Tom Sawyer... or not.
Maybe not, but it had great graphics (http://www.vgmuseum.com/images/nes/01/tomsawyer.html)... for its day, of course.

[Rob_Merritt]

Maybe not, but it had great graphics (http://www.vgmuseum.com/images/nes/01/tomsawyer.html)... for its day, of course.


Well... that was unexpected.

[Ex-S Woo]

Weirdest thing is that I recognized those screenshots...curse you, childhood!

[Laralyn]

However I saw a rant by a former High Voltage employee place the blame on management so it might nothing to do with Larry or Humor.

Do you have a link for the rant?

[andrew_fm]

Maybe I am just a dour, humorless individual but I don't recall laughing a single time while playing MCL. I can scarcely believe that it sold well enough to be considered "very successful."

[Matthew Gallant]

I thought the jaw harp-playing girl was funny. Her sex scene was also the most Larry-ish.

I also laughed when they did the Grease parody in the gay bar, but only because of how earnestly they went for it. It was like up until then I was subconsciously keeping track of how the development budget had been apportioned so far, and then I saw the money seismograph needle start going crazy. The idea that gay bars don't have drinking songs, just repurposed show tunes, is a little funny too I'd say.

[Peter Olafson]

The game was funny here and there, but, mainly, it was tedious. I kind of like the mini-games conceit, but it needed about twice as many.

Peter

[JPR]

I actually liked the dialog system, but the DDR games didn't do much for me. The only part of the game that made me laugh out loud was when the secret agent lady comes to Larry's dorm room and they have the conversation through the door. He uses the bad SciFi movie as another person in his room, and it was magnificent. I remember zero jokes now, but I thought that was great.

[Rob_Merritt]

Do you have a link for the rant?


I looked, I can't find it. Well actually I'm fairly sure it was in the gamespot forums but since was deleted. It basically said they weren't dedicating the resources to the production of the console version and it was looking like missing the fall release date. Putting out a ps2 title in 2007 just wasn't an option. With the console version out of the question attention turned to the PSP version. With no console big brother version and the PSP market tanking, killing the psp version was easy. That was according to this ranting employee.

The name of the game was apparently going to be called Leisure Suit Larry: Cocoa Butter.

I'm still trying to find out if this singles that there will be no more LSL games again or just no LSL games from High Voltage.