But Roses you LOVED king's quest VII and that isn't even a good game so how can you think Torin's Passage is worse kjhes;kfh;augf;iugs;rjkhgjdkjha ...sorry, someone had to do it
Gosh I'm surprised you didn't mention this game's soundtrack, scored by a three-time Academy Award winning composer...thinking back to my first time playing when I was 6 or 7, it's one of the most memorable parts of the game IMO; it did a fantastic job setting the tone for each world and situation.
The Bitternuts part was supposed to be annoying, but it got so annoying that even as a kid I hated that part! It could've worked if that part of the game were a lot shorter. Using the same laugh track was making fun of sitcoms using the same 4-5 laughter tracks over and over again. The jokes being crappy were supposed to make fun of sitcoms that use a roaring laugh track for a joke that was always mildly amusing at best. The humor itself is there, but it just went on and on and on and on! Other than that part and the lava maze, I loved that game.
Torin's Passage came with my first computer in 1995, an IBM Aptiva with a Pentium90, 8 KB of RAM and a 28.800 modem. Little noob 10-year-old me loved this game and had a blast with it...and also understood the Bitternuts sequence cuz I watched Nick-at-Nite.
Roses: "I leave you with more Bitternuts!" Us: "That's our Roses!" *Insert Freeze Frame and Canned Laughter as Credits begin to roll* "That's Our Roses! Was filmed before a live studio audience."
Awww, I really loved this game AND KQ7 as a kid. I think we got them bundled together... My favorite part is the little singing guys. "Out of my WAY!" XD
I have been looking for this game for almost 20 years now and I just found it today thanks to this. I played this as a kid and I just could not remember the name. Thank you so much! This is surreal, I was starting to think that I made the game up in my head.
Had this as part of a 30 game pack-in with our IBM Aptiva, this was the gem of the bunch. It's flawed, and esoteric, but it had a Discworld-esque narrative to it. "Hawt-a-sawuce" Torin: "Wait, what?"
This game came with my families IBM Aptiva in the mid 90's! Such great memories playing this as a kid. This game, Dr. Brain, MechWarrior 2 all came with that IBM. I still have the disc's by the way!
For reason when you brought up the animation of King's Quest VII, I knew you were gonna show that scene, and I knew you were gonna bring up the Dorito eyes again. XD
I loved Torin's Passage but maaaaaan, screw the bitternuts part. Easily the worst part of the game. Also interesting fact: those mazes in Chapter 4 were designed by Al Lowe's daughter.
Admittedly, I spent literal YEARS playing The Black Cauldron before I realized that a.) it was a book-series, and b.) it was a movie that Disney more or less disavowed for its "black witchery". ... still, beat the game, loved the books, was kinda 'meh' on the movie. (Wasn't Bluth involved in the Black Cauldron? Similar animation styles.)
I played this at the right age bracket. I had a HARD time with the puzzles because I was a kid but I was able to suspend disbelief much better than if I played it today. It got me inspired to try doing goofy voices and my infant is now benefiting.
These eighties/nineties adventure game reviews bring back so many childhood memories. It’s almost difficult to imagine how dominant a gaming genre this once was. It feel like a self-contained moment in time.
I really loved this game as a kid. I remember playing it at a friends house when I was around 8 years old and really loving it. I later found it on sale at a gas station (what?) for the equivalent of 10 dollars. Too bad that the game disc got stuck in our old computer a few years later and I couldn't replay the game until the GOG release. Personally, I still really like this game except from the really freaking annoying "sitcom" part. That one felt like a shore even as a 10 year old. Oh and by the way: Watch 01:02 at 0.25 speed. You'll thank me.
I played this game as a child. I have extremely fond memories of it. There was something so mysterious about the story. It took me years to beat it. Adding to the mystery.
I'm pretty sure Pecand's plan was to kill Torin along with his parents, leaving him next in line for the throne with no sign of how or why they'd died. Also, that his name sounds like "pecking". Someone says it during one of the cutscenes. I found the game disappointing in many of the same ways you did, but I appreciated the humor, likely because I did play it when I was younger and the nostalgia came through. I eventually had to turn off the hint timer and just keep hitting the button through most of the back half of the game, though. Very few of those puzzles made any sense to me.
OMG I LOVED Kings Quest VII AND Torin's Passage! Some of the Torin's puzzles became tiresome the further down you travelled like the lava planet and those stoopid singing tiny people, but I'll take those over the "that tree branch in the background is randomly pointing up so if you blow the grave digger's horn right now the skeleton is going to murder your face off" shit in Kings Quest VII. Loved both games though
Let me get this straight. The voice behind Barney and the G-Man from Half-Life... IS TORIN!!!!!! That's awesome!!! And so fitting. I know that Half-Life was not designed by Sierra's adventure developers, but Half-Life feels like it contains a little of the spirit of Sierra's adventure games, even Torin. Heck, the Xen crystals from Half-Life make me think of the crystals from Torin's Passage. It makes you wonder if one of the phenocrysts might lead Torin to Xen. [Edit PS: It would be also be awesome if the G-Man appeared before Torin, and gave him a job offer like he did Gordon Freeman. "Mr. Torrrrin!"]
Holy cow, I've never thought of the correlation between the phenocrysts and the xen crystals, even Nihilanth, the final boss, was in the center of the planet/dimension just like in Torin's Passage
@@edoslacker I'm glad to meet with another fan of Torin's Passage and Half-Life. Thanks for appreciating my correlation! If only a modder were able to recreate the environments of Torin's Passage in a mod for Half-Life 1 or 2. I could see Torin's Passage's environments working in Unreal 1's engine as well, and there were a lot of crystals in Unreal. I'm surprised no one's tried to do a fan crossover between Torin's Passage and Half-Life, since both works complement each other. I think Pecand and Lycentia would look particularly freaky as NPCs in Half-Life. Imagine seeing them in the same room as the G-Man. And there're lots of possibilities for using Boogle as a multi-functional weapon and item for such a crossover.
5:37 I never realized someone could like adventure games, but _dislike_ logic puzzles. That was, by far, my favorite aspect of all point-and-click style games, with moon-logic inventory puzzles being the part I disliked the most.
I feel compelled to say that I absolutely love the Knossos labyrinth/maze in Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis. It's so atmospheric and haunting. And also not a complete pain in the behind. Though the maze at the end of the game isn't as good or memorable.
A demo for this game came bundled with another Sierra title of my youth, I can't remember which one exactly but I suspect it was one of the Dr. Brain educational games. I always found it so incredibly intriguing, but couldn't quite figure out what was going on or what I was supposed to do, even in just the demo, yet kept coming back to it time and time again as a little kid because of how it caught my attention. I still hope to get around to playing the full game someday, just to see it for myself! And thanks for mentioning how people of our era grew up on Nick at Nite, sometimes I feel crazy for my connection to shows like Happy Days and I Love Lucy despite their being from decades and decades before I was born, but it was all from trying to stay up late and be "cool" watching Nick at Nite! Thanks for the great video!
Oh wow, literally that one shot of Torin's foster parents frozen in that green crystal brought back like...a WAVE of memories 'cause even though I thought I'd never heard of this game before, I think a friend of mine had it. I think I was scared of that bit when I was a kid. Anyway, Roses, I just wanted to say I think this is one of the best videos you've ever done. It's a perfect blend of a game you don't care for too much blended with stuff that you do love, and your wit and sarcasm were super on point here. I've noticed some of my favorite vids of yours are the ones for games you really love like Laura Bow and Gabriel Knight, but this game worked really well with your sense of humor, and I just wanted to say you knocked it out of the park on this one :) Great job.
I decided to revisit this game last year and I find I do have to agree with you on almost all accounts. It was fun to go and play with my nostalgia again, but yeah, the maps are very desolate and the puzzles , starting around the third map, are so hard and time consuming you start to get annoyed. That lava area takes so long to do and yet is the least memorable part. Thank goodness you can just chapter jump whenever. Still, I also agree with the positives you talk about too. The characters are lively and it still amazes me how much original animation there is in this game. Also, I love the little weird easter eggs scattered throughout. Like, how Licencia has Yoda, Darth Vader, and Sailor Saturn trapped in green crystal. Why? Who freaking knows, but it is oddly amusing.
I loved this game when I was in middle school and I was always disappointed that this game didn't get a sequel. Have many good memories of playing this game by myself and with my younger ex step-nephews.
Hey PUR, I'd love to see you cover the old Black Cauldron game someday. I've thought for *ages* it's easily one of the best-designed games Sierra ever made - due to its branching storyline and multiple solutions - but almost no one remembers it or plays it anymore since it's so obscure and tied to a movie which many people didn't like. Hell, it could be argued as being the first (only?) time in history a game-based-on-a-movie-based-on-a-book was actually the best version of the three.
Thanks for the laughs this morning, I like your "comedy style" haha. I'm glad it's you and not me that has to play through stuff like this. Nostalgia can be blinding.
man, I love all the different HUD designs for this era of point and click adventures, I think I remember that the most from the ones I've played. The perspective of this one reminds me of the one of ETERNAM
Yeah, plot is clearly unfinished and other than first two "worlds" it's not very fleshed out (third one is literally bit of walking, cutscene with princess and 2 fairly complex puzzles). I don't know where did come the assumption of this game possibly having more sequels to flesh out characters (unless it was in design document, then devs are being just silly) with Torin as main lead. He's done with his character arc, he rescued his foster parents and is rightful heir to the throne. His possible love interest is princess, so that plot point can be called resolved in predictable way. Pecand is effectively dead-not-dead (floating in crystal in middle of planet), and most likely will stay that way since Lycentia is good now. There is nothing left. I don't know, maybe it would be Boogle adventure or not-King's Quest? Otherwise it may as well be original game with original characters and setting. But hey, game was fun.
Holy Molly, the game is real. Only played once (like when I was 6ish), but I fell in love with it. Over time I couldn't remember if I actually played the game or if it was just my imagination; but for some reason that caterpillar stayed in my memory. Nice to know the game exist.
OMG. I played this game when I was 16, and I stayed with the Bitternuts WAY too long because I didn't know what a trivet was. I don't remember anything else about the game, other than I liked it.
It was one of the few games I had as a child and it was my favorite. I replayed it as an adult and still had fun. Of course I've not played much more from this era. I will say the lava land was a bit "eh" to me.
i LOVED this game when I was a kid, granted this was back when point and click adventures were still a fairly large game genre, like Day of the Tentacle and Sam & Max Hit the Road. Great video, keep it up.
I got this game for Christmas along with another Sierra adventure game. I actually did beat this on my own, but something about the program almost destroyed my dad's computer though. The other game was called "Lighthouse" though we never beat that game. I would recommend checking it out. The puzzles were way too extreme though and suffered from like every single thong Sierra games were infamous for taken to an unholy degree. Timed puzzles, everything killing you, and getting caught in a no win situation. The story was intriguing though.
With some channels, I get bored and loose interest as time goes on... but with this channel, I am having the opposite experience. With each video I watch, my enjoyment grows - and I look forward to watching the next all the more. I'm not exactly a "notification squad" viewer - but I think your content is gold, and I'm so glad you make it. Thanks! :)
OH MY GOD! I have played this game so much in my childhood, and I've managed to forget its name. A few years ago, I've found it on an Abandonware website, but formatted the PC and lost it again. Thanks so much for making a video about it, PUR! Gonna get it now and play it again!
With the entertainment and depth of Roses' commentary, I'm left with the unfortunate regret of not having grown up playing any adventure games besides the floppy disk iteration of Oregon Trail. I spent the majority of my gaming in the 90's playing Super Mario games, Donkey Kong Country games, and so many other action oriented Nintendo games.
my folks bought a new computer when I was was 7 and it came with a whole CD booklet thing of games... this one was our favorite. I was the oldest and my siblings and cousins would gather around me and watch me play (no one ever insisted on getting a turn!). our other favorite was Dr Brain (the one where his machine broke after he uploaded it to a mouse, so we had to put it back into Dr Brain's real body piece by piece). we also got Chex Quest (literally Doom, but with cereal) _for free_ with a box of chex. that was an even bigger hit!
I'll be very honest about something... Torin's Passage is actually my introduction to Sierra and their other games. Like I found this game among a bunch of other games that were among a collection of old PC games that my dad found at a Flea Market. I had no idea what this was or who this 'Sierra' was, yes it was intriguing and was a blast to experience when I was young. Yes it's not great compared to King's Quest or other adventure games, but it's safe to say this game was my introduction to the genre and I probably would have overlooked King's Quest if I hadn't recognised that sweet sweet Sierra jingle XD
I loved this game as a kid. Played through it several times. It was actually the only game my mom ever really liked that I played. That being said, I'm not surprised about your reaction to it. It probably hasn't aged that well. As for the difficulty, I had this game when I was about 6 or 7 and was able to complete it by myself, for the most part and sometimes with significant trial and error, EXCEPT for the music puzzle. I don't think you showed it in your video but there was one puzzle where you had to arrange guys singing notes in a certain order to activate an elevator or something like that (it's been 20 years, forgive my probably inaccurate memory!). I could never do that as a kid and would ask my mom to do it for me. Anyway, that was my experience! Thanks for the nostalgia trip!
A computer my parents bought in the 90s came with this game, along with a few others like Mechwarrior 2. Played through it once, and never thought of playing it again. I didn't think it was particularly good at the time, but it was at least good enough to play through it once. I too thought it was at least memorable, if nothing else. Except that while watching this video I kept thinking 'Wait, I don't remember this part, or this one, or this one, or this one...", so I guess it really wasn't even that. I do remember the Bitternuts, though. Oh, god...
Thanks for covering this forgotten part of Sierra's past. No, really -- I forgot Torin's Passage existed, and I played just about everything (I remember when Quest for Glory was still Hero's Quest, dammit).
At 1:43, please tell me I'm not the only one who thought that the "totally-normal-not-suspicious-person" looked like Batman in a trench coat/hooded robe.
first point and click adventure game i ever played so it has a fond place in my heart. i enjoyed it a lot as a kid, despite it being frustrating at times. some of the deaths are a bit morbid, though. at one point torin is eaten by tons of small creatures that tie him down and is turned into a skeleton. but i was very engrossed in the story. i probably played through it at least a dozen times as a kid. tbh i even liked the bitternuts segment haha. i assume they only had one laugh track audio file to keep the game's overall size down and the bitternuts are a very small part of the game.
I'm afraid I have to agree with you--though shamefully I never even finished it. My main memory of the game as a young teen was that I kinda had a crush on stupid Torin (those biceps!). And, as you say, the actual animation is better than Sierra's other examples of that style.
It's easy to lose sight of the fact that Dragon's Lair in the early '80s set this seemingly impossible standard for home gamers to achieve. PC technology in the '90s was finally able to "fake" the feature animation style. It was a big thing to have cartoon-like animation in a PC game, even though we all knew it paled in comparison to Dragon's Lair. That's also why when CD-ROMs became a thing, we felt like we were finally going to be able to achieve Dragon's Lair quality animation in home gaming. In fact, it wasn't long before those old Don Bluth games were dumped onto compressed CDs for home play. Nowadays with seamless full-motion video and even CG that's pretty photorealistic, it's easy to forget that this was ever exciting to games.
TP is my absolute favorite game (nostalgia from 199..something. ) and I won't stand for this slander! Lol thanks for revisiting this game. I still quote "the only saw I saw is the saw I saw with"
ive been watching video game reviews on youtube for at least 7 years now, and just yesterday I found about your channel...shame on me. Great video Roses
Reminds me of how The Black Cauldron, Disney version, gets a lot of hate for not being well liked as some Disney Renaissance films. We need more games with beautiful artwork, well-developed side characters, and humor accessible to both kids AND adults.
I've never played this game before, but from this video, it reminded me a lot of Space Ace and Dragons Layer, both are Don Bluth games, and ofcourse Don Bluth was a former Disney Animator.
Can I just say, Torin is the best first name a guy can have? I have named more than one OC "Torin", and I didn't even know this game existed until today.
This was my absolute favourite PC game growing up (until my little sister accidentally scratched the disc at least, R.I.P 10 year old me). I never knew there were sequels planned though, but then again younger me tended to miss unresolved plots and odd pacing
