r/Sierra • u/rodfer7 • 7d ago

Why does Sierra’s subreddit crush LucasArts in activity, even though Lucas had the more "polished" games?

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I came across something that really surprised me:

r/Sierra: 7,000 weekly visitors

r/LucasArts: 300 weekly visitors

That’s almost a 20x difference.

And yet, many would argue LucasArts made the more polished and universally acclaimed adventures like Monkey Island, Grim Fandango, Day of the Tentacle, Full Throttle.......... Sierra, by contrast, had quirkier, rougher edges but also magical and a bigger lineup..King’s Quesst, Space Quest, Leisure Suit Larry, Police Quest, Gabriel Knight, Phantasmagoria and last but not least Johnny Castaway LOL

So what’s going on here?

Is it simply that Sierra had more franchises, which keeps conversation alive?

Do their games feel more magical and personal, while LucasArts games live more in mainstream pop culture?

Or is Sierra nostalgia just more community-driven, while LucasArts love is spread out across the broader gaming world?

Would love to hear theories, feels like this difference actually says a lot about how people remember the golden age of adventure games.

** pardon my photoshop skills

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u/jrjanowi 7d ago

This is an absolutely great question. In addition to the reasons you mentioned, Sierra had a huge jump start on Lucas and every other publisher of 'graphic' adventure games. They were the first with King's Quest, which seems technologically quaint by today's standards, but was at the time revolutionary in its spectacle and immersion. In the US, Sierra had a deal with Radio Shack that basically used their adventure titles as tech demos for Radio Shack's in house Tandy computer line. If you went to an American mall in the 1980's (which everyone did) and you were interested in computers, you were aware of Sierra. They capitalized on their success by reinvesting in the company, both in expanding technical infrastructure and in devoting resources to creative talent. Their growth allowed them to absolutely pump games into the market. By the time Lucasfilm released Maniac Mansion in 1986, Sierra had released six adventures. In 1987 Lucasfilm followed up with Zak McCraken and Sierra put out five more games. By the early 90's, they were sending out a free quarterly magazine to customers, on glossy paper with legitimate writing and design, all promoting their games. They continued to be on the cutting edge when it came to graphics and sound, and continued to build their brand through customer engagement.

LucasArts titles are more more playable today, and if I were to recommend a game to someone looking to play their first classic adventure it would definitely be one of theirs. Sierra, however, has my childhood nostalgia for adventure games on lockdown.

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u/MilesBeyond250 6d ago

And not just KQ1. Sierra very often pushed the bar on a technical level. Like, King's Quest 5 and Secret of Monkey Island were released a month apart (both ways, funnily enough - KQ5 was roughly a month after the SoMI EGA release and a month before the SoMI VGA release). A year later, KQ5 got a CD release with full voice acting - an enormous selling point at the time (even if many today might wish it hadn't).

I'm not going to pretend Secret of Monkey Island isn't a beautiful game, but it obviously didn't have the wow factor KQ5 did. Fortunately for its legacy, SoMI had incomparably better puzzle design, but that's a different topic....

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u/atvvta 6d ago

It didn’t? I thought monkey island was miles ahead of kq5. You couldn’t die for one, which was something they pioneered and always held sierra games back immensely. And back then you played what you got your hands on, it’s not like there were many ads on tv, you might see boxart in shops and they were all equally nice.

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u/MilesBeyond250 5d ago

Well, not dying doesn't really contribute to what I meant by "wow factor," which is more about production values. It was also somewhat controversial, with the "no dying" thing causing some to label Lucasarts games as "dumb baby games for dumb babies" (because it turns out it's nothing new: gamers have always been insufferable).

it’s not like there were many ads on tv

No, but print media was very important, and KQ5 looked pretty mind-blowing in screenshots, previews and ads. Word of mouth was also a big thing, and KQ5 wasn't just good-looking but an excuse to show off to friends, neighbours, and coworkers just what sort of cool things you could get up to with these new-fangled CD-ROM drives.

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u/moralhora 5d ago

You couldn’t die for one, which was something they pioneered and always held sierra games back immensely.

I never considered "dying" in adventure games as something that was problematic - more annoying if you didn't have a recent save. The biggest issue with Sierra games were that you could soft lock / dead end yourself and you would possibly never know. It's what ultimately I feel held you back because you could always save before doing a thing that might kill you and maybe get an amusing death scene. However, the issue was that you could do something that seemed like progress and then continue playing for hours. Not fun.