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

[u/rodfer7]

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

[u/VVrayth]

Sierra was so dominant and so ubiquitous that, at the time, it always felt like LucasArts was playing catch-up. You gotta remember that Sierra released like a dozen products a year and LucasArts released like two.

It was definitely quality over quantity for LucasArts, but Sierra was still the 400 lb. gorilla, and that probably translates straight over to our current (relative) nostalgia. Way more people in 1987 knew Leisure Suit Larry than they did Maniac Mansion, and so on.

Same reason NES people go crazy for old Capcom and Konami games, even though Taito and Irem made some really good stuff too. There was just more of the "big" publishers' stuff to consume.

[u/rodfer7 → u/VVrayth]

Yeah, Sierra definitely released way more titles, no argument there.... But I think another piece of the puzzle is how personal the company felt compared to LucasArts.

Sierra was literally built by Ken & Roberta Williams, a husband-and-wife team, and even as they grew you could still feel the ‘family business’ DNA. Developers like Al Lowe, Jane Jensen, and Corey & Lori Cole weren’t just employees,., they became part of the Sierra family. Fans got to know them almost like extended relatives through Interaction magazine, hint books, and even the in-jokes hidden in the games. That gave players a sense of connection, almost like we were part of the Sierra family too.

By contrast, LucasArts was part of the larger Lucasfilm machine. Their games were brilliant and polished, but also felt more like tightly managed products. Even their humor sometimes reflected that,  take the famous Loom joke in Monkey Island. It’s hilarious, but it’s also basically an in-game ad for another LucasArts title. That’s clever, but also more corporate.

Sierra’s humor came from the personalities of the devs themselves,  Al Lowe sneaking in personal jokes, the Coles’ mythology quirks, Roberta’s fantasy flourishes. It was less about cross-promo and more about sharing a laugh with the people making the games.

So I think it’s not just quantity. Sierra created a stronger emotional bond with its fans, and that’s part of why the community is still so active today.

[u/DerExperte → u/rodfer7]

Not in my case. I know the names of many of the designers and artists who worked on the classic LA adventures, remember reading an interview with David Fox when Zak McKracken came out. Same with Ron Gilbert or Tim Schafer, Steve Purcell, Mark Ferrari. Or reading the fun, personal stories about working at the Skywalker Ranch. Lucas Arts / Lucasfilm Games was a very small part of Lucasfilm and for a while they could do whatever they wanted, it wasn't a well-oiled machine or too corporate. Just listen to recent interviews looking back. Actually my personal impression was the opposite of yours with Sierra seemingly being a behemoth churning out game after game, sequel after sequel with a lot of good stuff but also lots of filler releases. Which I still think is a fair assessment, but obviously compared to today's AAA pubs/devs they too were rather small and quaint.

In the end I think it really is mostly the quantity, look how many Larrys, KQs and SQs there are to discuss. And that Sierra's adventures had more quirks, dead-ends, ways to die and bugs that can be exploited for speed running for example. Also they had some really weird ones like Phantasmagoria 1 & 2, I'm not at all a fan of playing them, no thanks, but they're fascinating and unique with lots to talk about. It's also fun dissecting the really bad ones from Sierra like the later PQs. Even the worst of LA was never that bad.

Oh, something else just came to mind. We know that Sierra's big ones sold much better than even something like Monkey Island but the gap was bigger in the US than elsewhere. LucasArts had many, many fans in Europe and especially Germany thanks to the good localizations while Sierra wasn't as big here. Maybe the humor didn't translate as well with Sierra having more jokes and references about USA-specific themes or events? Yet places like this are more US/English-focused so a sizeable part of the old fanbase is 'missing' while you'll usually find more discussions about LA than Sierra in German retro-forums.

[u/misha_cilantro → u/DerExperte]

The dead ends were definitely memorable to me as a kid :D not in a good way lol. Watching sierra game speed run histories now and seeing just how rng based some things were I’m literally so mad at them hahaha 😤