Superhero adventures?

[MasterGrazzt]

I'm a big fan of superheroes, which I think is evident, so naturally I've noticed somewhat of a... lack of the genre in adventure games.

Of course, there's Superhero League of Hoboken, and more recently the Adventures of Fatman, but those are really parodies. Not that there's anything wrong with that, I love a good, actually funny superhero parody, like SLoH, AoF or the Tick. But the usual "Commander Moron" or "Captain Farts" crap has me rolling my eyes.

Oh, I can understand the lack of "serious" superhero games in a genre known mainly for it's circumventive puzzles, after all, Spider-Man or Superman could just smash down a locked door that would leave King Graham or Guybrush scrambling for the key, but my point remains. Couldn't more physically themed puzzles be introduced? Defeat an incorporeal enemy? Or maybe a few puzzles about maintaining your character's secret identity? Base the game on a more human character, and have characters like Superman or the Spectre appear as NPCs?


Anyway, the point of all this is that for years, I have been thinking about creating my own superhero adventure in AGS. No, this isn't a "call to arms", I have no skills in programming what-so-ever, and I'm too busy to organize such an undertaking. I'm sure every adventure gamer these days thinks about such projects, anyway. I'm just wondering, does the idea of a straight-superhero adventure appeal to anybody else out there?

By the way, not to say that such a game couldn't be lighthearted or funny, (I felt I should make that clear, especially in THIS community) but that the heroes themselves wouldn't be the jokes. Rather, they would crack jokes and find themselves involved in a silly situation or two. I like superheroes that can joke with each other one moment, and then save the city from a giant robot the next.

[eriktorbjorn]

I'm a big fan of superheroes, which I think is evident, so naturally I've noticed somewhat of a... lack of the genre in adventure games.

I know a few were made back in the mid-eighties. But I've never been too fond of Scott Adams's (no, not Dilbert guy) games myself. Or rather, I don't have the patience for them. He is justly famous for being the first known person to create an adventure game that would run on a home computer, which of course led to some pretty terse prose. Even back in the eighties, I remember reviewers complaining that his description of a room would typically be something like "You are in a room."

[MasterGrazzt]

Heh, I wasn't really counting IF. I know about Questprobe, they advertised it like mad in 80s Marvel comics. There was a tie-in book too, I think.

[cappuchok]

I have yet to see a superhero-themed point and click adventure, besides maybe "Adventures of Fatman" and "Superhero League of Hoboken" (which are both, you guessed it, parodies).

Given the puzzle-based nature of adventures though, I can certainly see good potential for adventures based on entire groups of heroes each with their own skills. I'd be absolutely thrilled to see an old-fashioned Fantastic Four adventure game, or maybe The New Mutants (or maybe just Cypher and Warlock to make for less situations where the player thinks "hey I could've just kicked the door down"). As long as we're talking about somewhat lighthearted games, Pixar's The Incredibles (and Frozone) would be a totally incredible (pardon the pun) team to build an adventure game around (maybe have a part of it set in the "golden days" to allow for some puzzles with Gazerbeam as well).