With the recent release of CSI: Deadly Intent proving to be something of a disappointment, it got me thinking fondly back to one of my favourite crime series that still knows how to grab the imagination in a vice-like grip. While my first true adventure game love was Secret of Monkey Island, there was another series that threatened to steal away my affections and that was Police Quest. I was initially given the first Police Quest (In Pursuit of the Death Angel), then the second game by a friend a few years later, and was completely unfamiliar with the series or its pedigree. Although I found the first game difficult to adjust to with its incredibly basic visuals and dated animation (that became more enjoyable when remade as an enhanced point-and-click adventure) it was the second game, The Vengeance, that really struck a chord.

The creation of Jim Walls, a former employee of the California Highway Patrol, the Police Quest debut sees Sonny Bonds play the lead role of a rookie officer. Starting off with the most basic of equipment, from night sticks, cuffs, notebook and pen, Sonny gets to perform a variety of duties, from pulling over drunk drivers, patrolling the area and making arrests. It isn't long before Sonny unwittingly uncovers a drug cartel and soon becomes an undercover officer in order to bring down the ringleader Jesse Bains. It's a decision that will later come to haunt the ambitious fellow in the sequel. Now serving as a Homicide Detective (complete with forensic kit including fingerprint brush and powder), Sonny gets to investigate a wider range of crimes and can interview suspects and gather evidence. Not long into the game, Jesse Bains has made his escape from jail and this time he is out for the officer that put him there. It made for a gripping tale full of twists and turns that required quick thinking as much as it did investigating the scenes of crime. My love for The Vengeanceis something that is echoed with Evan Dickens' excellent review of the game, which highlights just how unique the game is even today.

With these games firmly in my heart, I decided it was essential to get hold of Police Quest III: The Kindred, which further cemented my passion for the series. Scrapping the part-text interface of The Vengeance in favour of a pure point-and-click adventure, The Kindred has Sonny Bonds taking on a more senior role as Sergeant Detective. With excellent writing and a well paced game that sees Sonny doing the more mundane elements of police work like office management, as well as the usual hands on activities, a larger storyline soon comes into play. I’ll never forget the half-naked hysterical man at the lake, the distraught woman at the shopping mall and the difficult working relationship with Officer Morales, who seems to be hiding a thing or two. The fact that the case later impacts on Sonny Bonds' personal life with an incident involving his wife, childhood sweetheart Marie, helps to connect the gamer emotionally with the storyline and its characters. Although there were moments in the game that proved to be a sticking point (a crippling bug that made it impossible to complete the pentagon puzzle without a patch, which I wouldn't be aware of until much later), the general atmosphere combined with a decent blend of puzzles backed up with real life police procedures meant that you always felt like a law enforcement officer and not just playing a game about one.

While the prospect of death in adventures can often be off-putting, in the Police Quest games it was a necessary gameplay device: you were an officer of the law equipped with a gun and dealing with unstable citizens and drug dealers who could turn on you at any moment. This element of risk made each situation true to life and compelled you to adhere to the correct procedures. Every death was logical and made sense in the context of the setting, rarely frustrating the player.

Despite the advance of technology that typically makes such games difficult to run natively, the introduction of emulators like DOSBox and the re-release of a classic compilation means that this series is still very enjoyable today. Sadly, the legacy of Police Quest is something that lingers within the remains of Sierra's past, seemingly never to be reawakened, and its fortunes weren't quite the same after the third game. With Jim Walls no longer part of the Sierra fold, the fourth game began with a brand new character and more investigative approach to gameplay, a change that many Police Quest fans (myself included) found difficult to take to. Further games in the series took an entirely different approach, focusing on the more trigger happy side of the SWAT team, with the Police Quest brand eventually dropped altogether. While Jim Walls left Sierra and created Blue Force, a game very reminiscent of the series in style, it lacked the magic that played such a huge part in Police Quest's popularity.

A whole new decade has now come and gone since then, and still nothing quite like Police Quest has been seen on the market. While there are plenty of detective games, forensics investigations, and games that feature cops prone to carrying a gun or two, none have blended together the same mix of puzzles and realism in quite the same way since.

Sonny Bonds, we salute you.

Movies and games have never been happy companions. Somehow the two mediums just don’t get on and experiments in cross-breeding have rarely panned out. As an afficionado of the truly awful, I own some fine examples of unsuccessful attempts.

Movies made from games rarely work, with only the tiniest slivers of original game story surviving. Doom turned its solo horror into a multi-marine slugfest with gameplay only represented in the closing minutes with an all-too-brief first-person bout of shooting that could have been ripped straight from any game-in-action video. Tomb Raider had lots of high-octane action sequences but not much in the way of raiding. And let us not forget the master of this arena, Uwe Boll, whose many classics include such delights as Alone in the Dark. To his credit, Mr Boll fully embraces the “dark” but he never once seems to get to grips with the “Alone” part, bringing commando teams in at every opportunity. At least Edward Carnby didn’t discard his trusty revolver for one of the high-tech machine guns the film was filled with, even if he isn’t quite the Victorian Gentleman adventurer I remember from the first game.

Perhaps part of the problem is that the film-makers seldom seem to have interest in the source material, beyond its potential ready-made audience. When those involved in making a film have some personal investment in the original, the film benefits as a result. Whilst it might not be about to win any Oscars in the near future, the Ben Jordan film Le Chateau Macabre is a good example of this. This story of ghosts and mysterious suicides at a French hotel could easily find a place as a game in the popular freeware series. Hardly surprising, since the title role is taken by the creator of the series, Francisco Gonzalez himself. There is even a cameo by the creator of the AGS games engine, Chris Jones, as regular series character Percival Quentin Jones.

So, is the long-running attempt to bring Myst to the movie screen an example of the former or the latter? Brainchild of the Mysteriacs, Patrick McIntire and Adrian Vanderbosch, the seeds of this idea run back as far as 11 August 1994. On that day Patrick’s mother bought him a new computer game that he found pretty cool. That game was Myst and in 2004, his love of that game led to Project Passage being born. Since then, Patrick and Adrian, both involved in independent film, have put in a lot of work, liaising with Rand Miller, creator of the Myst game, and even creating a concept animatic outlining the intended plot of the film. .

It has been a tough slog for them, as anyone looking at the Myst Movie website can see for themselves, but the project got a big boost recently with the official endorsement on Cyan's own website. This isn’t the same as the movie actually going into production of course, but it’s a big step forward and may be just the boost the project needs to start becoming reality. Maybe this is another thing that will fade away, but the fact that the dream has run this long without dying gives me hope. Call me a mad optimist in a cynical world, but I wish them well and look forward to the day I can see the fruits of their labours.

Almost inconceivably, Day 2 at E3 was bigger and crazier than Day 1. It was open for more hours, there were more people attending, I got more swag, I saw many more adventure games, and I even represented Adventure Gamers in a human interest piece for Slate Magazine. In every way imaginable, today was all about more.

I started out the day in the South Hall with an early morning meeting (okay, 10am, but it sure felt early) with the folks at White Birds. The developers of such games as Paradise and Sinking Island have a lot of new products on the horizon they think adventure fans will be interested in, including a new franchise for the Nintendo DS called Criminology (or Crime Scene as it’s known in North America), based around forensic investigations. They’ll also be bringing the franchise to Wii, iPhone, and PC, but under the name Scipol (short for “science police”). In fact, White Birds is also dedicated to expanding their other games to different platforms, and for that reason they’re porting their PC game Nikopol to the iPhone. I was able to get a look at an early version, and the graphics are remarkably clear. Their third and final announcement here at E3 is Paris Mystery Files for the DS and Wii. It’s inspired by the Professor Layton series, the biggest difference being that all the puzzles will be related directly to what you’re doing in the story instead of simply assorted brainteasers.

Next I rushed over to the West Hall (no small feat, I assure you) to sit with dtp entertainment, where I was excited to see The Black Mirror 2 and Ghost Pirates of Vooju Island . Black Mirror 2 takes place 12 years after the events of the original title, and gives an all-new protagonist the opportunity to experience the horrors of Black Mirror Castle for himself. The graphics are absolutely amazing, with really impressive amounts of detail creating a consistent sense of atmosphere. Ghost Pirates is the latest from Autumn Moon, and has a unique twist: since you play as a ghost, you can’t talk to anyone, nor interact with many parts of the environment. In fact, you’re invisible to living beings. Because of these restrictions, you have to figure out ways to accomplish things in unusual ways, like moving a few small objects in order to trick a corporeal person into doing what you want.

From dtp it was straight to Wizarbox, who detailed the new version of So Blonde for the Wii and the DS. Unlike a lot of DS and Wii games we’ve been hearing about, this isn’t a port of the PC game, but rather an “alternate” game posing the question: What if Sunny had landed on the other side of the island? All the puzzles after the tutorial are completely new, with many new characters, and almost 100% new locations. Wizarbox only had the DS version available for me to play, but it worked like a charm. The graphics are very impressive considering the system’s limitations, with lots of color and background animations in every scene.

After a break for lunch (bland hot dogs! woo!), I headed to LucasArts and a 45-minute long walkthrough of The Secret of Monkey Island: Special Editon , the high-definition remake of the classic game. If you’re not excited about this yet, you should be. I spoke with some of the game’s producers, and these guys are passionate about Monkey Island, even going as far as to say it’s the whole reason they work for LucasArts. All the voice actors (even the Voodoo Lady) from Curse of Monkey Island are back and they sound terrific. You can seamlessly switch back-and-forth between the classic version and the HD version at any time, which makes the HD version look even more impressive. And best of all (at least for me), they gave me the greatest swag in the history of swag: a t-shirt that says “I Found the Treasure of Mêlée Island … and all I got was this Stupid T-Shirt.” That’s right, I now own a replica of the friggin’ treasure of Mêlée Island itself! So cool!

Last but not least, I sat down with Deck13 for a first look at their new adventure game, Haunted . It’s another light-hearted game from the creators of Ankh and Jack Keane. As you’d expect from its title, this game also features ghosts (haven’t you heard? ghosts are the new black), but it has its own unique features to help it stand out. This time you play as a homeless girl in 18th century London who has a coterie of ghost friends that follow her around, each with unique capabilities to help her solve puzzles. It has a similar art style to Deck13’s previous titles, but with a lot more detail in the backgrounds and some more advanced tech driving the graphics. It’s very early on, so it could change a lot before it comes out, but it definitely looks interesting.

Of course, I did other things today as well, including playing games like The Beatles: Rock Band and Brütal Legend. I talked with a programmer at DoubleFine, slyly suggesting they work on an adventure game next, but she wasn’t going for it. She suggested I take it up “with Tim [Schafer].” Sure, I’ll get right on that. If you have any desire to look at my big face or hear my nasally voice, check out www.slatev.com, the video version of Slate Magazine, and click on “Gaming Through the Recession”. They interviewed a bunch of people at E3 about how the gaming industry has been affected by the economic downturn, and for whatever reason one of those people was me. You’ll see me at 2 min 56 seconds, and then once more before the video ends.

Tomorrow is the last day of E3, and I don’t expect to see many more adventure games, so this may be the final daily round-up at AG. I am taking one final crack at getting in to see Heavy Rain at Sony (after being rebuked today), so keep your fingers crossed and start passing the hat around for bail money. In any case, there’s no rest for the weary-from-lugging-swag, as there are detailed previews still to come, so stick around over the next little while for E3: The Aftermath!

It’s time once again for the Electronic Entertainment Expo, known to its friends and admirers as E3. Just those two little digits can send a video game enthusiast’s heart aflutter. It isn’t quite the spectacle it’s been in years past, but this was my first E3 experience, and as a life-long fan of video games, having the opportunity to actually attend myself on behalf of Adventure Gamers was a dream come true. The first day of the three-day event is the shortest, six hours instead of eight, yet somehow I managed to get some hands-on time with 17 unreleased games (only four adventure games, so don’t get your hopes that high). So does it live up to the hype? Did I get lots of “swag?” Was it as fun and crazy as we’ve all imagined it to be? Yup, yup, and yup again!

As soon as the doors opened to the West Hall (there are two full-sized halls, West and South, and I didn’t even step foot in the South today), everyone swarmed in and started seeking out the biggest and most important games. While most of my journalistic colleagues headed to God of War III or Modern Warfare 2, I stayed true to the cause (at least at first) and went right for Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box for the Nintendo DS. The sequel to one of my favorite all-time puzzle-adventure games has finally been localized for North America, and I couldn’t be happier. The demo only lasted 10 minutes, but that was time enough to remind me that every puzzle indeed has an answer.

Nintendo definitely had the biggest presence of any company in the West Hall. After Professor Layton, I couldn’t resist checking out a bunch of other really cool games, like Wii Sports Resort (my first swag of the day: a Frisbee), and New Super Mario Bros., a side-scroller in the classic Super Mario Bros.-style but designed specifically for four players at a time, which was only announced just a few hours earlier at the Nintendo press conference. If you’re an RPG fan, you’ll want to check out Mario & Luigi: Bowser’s Inside Story for the DS. The brothers have been miniaturized and are living inside Bowser’s body, so naturally they’re forcing him to finally use his powers for good. Returning a little closer to the genre we all know and love, I next checked out the new Women’s Murder Club: Games of Passion for DS, a hidden-object adventure that also features interrogation puzzles and color-matching. No sign of Another Code R for Wii, which is a shame, as it looks like one of the most promising adventures ever to hit the adventure-friendly console, and I’d have loved the chance to put it through its paces.

Some of the other big presences in the West Hall were Sony and Capcom. I couldn’t bring myself to get in long lines for the hottest Sony games, but I did manage to play Uncharted 2: Among Thieves (more shoot ‘em action with Nathan Drake) and Batman: Arkham Asylum, which features my new favorite feature: Detective Vision. All the baddies carrying guns show up in red, which lets you know Batman can’t tackle them head-on, and instead you’re forced to take to the shadows (or the rafters) to sneakily take the thugs out one at a time. On the Capcom side of things, I had a round with Tatsunoku vs. Capcom (various anime characters battle Capcom characters, Street Fighter-style) and Dark Void, which is the lovechild between Gears of War and The Rocketeer. The main reason for being there, however, went sadly unfulfilled, at least for today. Capcom isn’t showing Ace Attorney Investigations: Miles Edgeworth at all, while Sony is showing Heavy Rain behind closed doors only. I’m as disappointed as you are, but there’s still a chance yet to see Quantic Dream’s ambitous new thriller, and you can be sure I’ll do my best to get on the other side of those doors before all is said and done.

In the afternoon, I fared much better on the adventure front when I sat down for a nice hour-long chat with the good folks at City Interactive, the Polish developer behind the Chronicles of Mystery and Art of Murder games. They’ve got new titles in the works for both franchises slated for later this year. In fact, the former is actually getting a dual platform treatment. Chronicles of Mystery: Curse of the Ancient Temple for Nintendo DS is a retelling of the original Chronicles of Mystery: The Scorpio Ritual, but adjusted for a more casual audience (more hidden objects, for example), while Chronicles of Mystery: The Tree of Life is the next full-fledged point-and-click PC adventure, bringing back Sylvie Leroux, who is now in pursuit of, well, the Tree of Life! City also revealed they’re hard at work on Art of Murder: Cards of Destiny , in which FBI agent Nicole Bonnet returns to track a killer who leaves playing cards on the bodies of the victims. Production on Cards of Destiny is so early that they didn’t have anything for me to see first-hand, but they at least want fans to know the series will be back.

We’ll have a more detailed preview of City Interactive’s games in the coming days, as well as longer looks at Professor Layton and Women’s Murder Club, but with two more days of E3 still to come, I’m afraid there’s only time for these teasers for now. So that’s Day 1 in the bag, but tomorrow is going to be even bigger and busier, with two more hours of show, and five times as many appointments with adventure game companies. If games like Ghost Pirates of Vooju Island and Black Mirror 2 mean anything to you, or you’re interested in finding out what’s in store from the likes of White Birds, Deck13, and a little company called LucasArts, stick around for tomorrow’s report! Come to think of it… Yipes! I better bring a few extra pencils, and maybe another notepad while I’m at it. See you then!

A recurring theme in the forums is control systems. Which is your favourite? What do you think of this new game's setup? Isn't point-and-click an antique that should be consigned to history? For me, all of these questions miss two vital aspects of player character control that are both more important than the mere mechanics.

The first is that the control method should be easy to use. This goes some way to explaining the enduring nature of point-and-click. Since it simply makes use of the mouse in a way that users apply in all aspects of computer operation, it is arguably the most intuitive control system available. Adding a variety of icons accessible by clicking the right mouse button, you can even allow for a wide variety of actions to be undertaken with the same left-click. This is not to say that I'm inextricably wedded to the point-and-click interface. Back as far as Grim Fandango I've used a variety of control methods and found myself ultimately comfortable with many of them. My sole requirement is that, after a brief learning curve, I should be able to achieve everything without having to think about it. If I have to break off from a game to check the manual for the talk key then the designers have failed.

Secondly, and far more importantly, I must actually have control. This is an area where adventure games tend to suffer much more than most other genres. A first-person shooter will allow you to run into a patch of open ground in front of a machine gun nest. A strategy game will allow you to march your troops into the enemy base one at a time. Even racing games will allow you to potter along at 10 miles an hour if the fancy takes you. By contrast, adventures are all too often full of situations where the PC will refuse to do something. There's nothing interesting down that street, I don't want to talk to that person, and no earth-shattering emergency is going to make me reach into a muddy puddle to grab a key. I appreciate that the story-driven nature of adventures makes diversions a lot more work than just an extra bit of map. However, every time a player runs up against one of these blocks, they are jarred out of the game world the authors have tried to create. Allowing players to perform actions that are dumb or even outright suicidal reinforces the realism of the game for them. It is my prerogative to open the hold of a sunken submarine, even if I know a hideous creature from beyond, intent on destruction, lurks inside. (Prisoner of Ice allowed me to do just that, and yes, the creature did kill me immediately)

Developers won’t capture my interest in controls alone; I do still demand more from a game than that. But if they get that part right, they’re well on their way to getting me lost within their world.