Sam & Max Hit the Road

It's difficult to write this, because it's been quite a long time since I played the game. Reading back through my notes, and through some of the other reviews, I think I can remember a little bit. I remember that I enjoyed the humor, and the "Americana road trip" concept (which is one of my all time favorite tropes). I don't remember the puzzles at all, but I seem to remember the latter part of the game being a drag. Some of the reviews mention a lackluster final third of the game, so I guess that might be it. Otherwise, this is a historian's game at this point. I hesitate to call it a niche, because zany graphic adventures are already niche enough, and Sam and Max are an even more specific subsubgenre of their own. If one has an interest in gaming history, especially graphic adventure games (and I do), then this is a must play. Otherwise, I dunno, I can't think of a person that would randomly buy this and play it, but I'm sure there's a few of you out there.

A great reminder of why the classic LucasArts era is still praised. The story is pure chaos in the best possible way, the humour lands hard, and the puzzles swing between clever and “what on earth was that?” — and that’s exactly why it works. If you enjoy adventure games for the joy of the journey, this one is essential.

Great adventure with humorous twist!

While the humor is witty, it can feel forced at times. Also, the pixel hunting is atrocious and puzzles don't make any sense.

The jokes are better than Leisure Suit Larry (who gets a call-out), but "better" is relative, and a lot of the dialogue is "Max hasn't said something in a while so here's a quip!" There are a few good lines, and it's fun trying to figure out how many characters Bill Farmer is voicing, but it's a tough ask for that to carry what is otherwise an obtuse and illogical puzzle adventure game with 40-ish items you have to figure out how to use. The 1993 interface doesn't help at all with "how was I supposed to know I could even touch that" levels of pixel hunting, or characters' hitboxes almost entirely overlapping things you must use, so you keep interacting with the wrong thing. Or, scenes that straight up hide that you can walk to one of the edges and there's extremely important things over there you couldn't see, which nothing in the scene mentions. I appreciate that LucasArts' design relied on never killing or softlocking the players, but they miss that frequently saving and trying things that might kill you, was also a form of player feedback, and in some cases definitely a better one than just not knowing if you can pick up that champagne bottle (you can) or that there's an elevator to another area behind the wall (there is) or that you need a lightbulb from a closet offscreen (you do). The plot itself seems to forget that it was important, and you fully resolve the case you started out with midway through the game, but just sort of ... keep going anyway, because there's more puzzles and jokes, but you don't have any further imperative or motive to do this other than "maybe there'll be more funny lines somewhere". GOG's release comes with the hint book, which is enough to get you through without spoiling things, but, Jesus Christ