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So many games nowadays are all about saving the world through extreme violence with guns and magic. Too often we forget that there are people out there walking through the woods with their Birkenstocks and a bag of granola, saving the world one oil coated bird at a time. But there is one adventure game that pays appropriate homage to our soap and deodorant hating friends. So, today on our ADVENTure calendar, we honor:
EcoQuest’s main character was a young boy named Adam Greene. The child of an ecologist, Adam was born with innate skills to recycle plastics and paper. Adam’s world gets turned a little upside down when a dolphin that his father rescued starts to speak to Adam and tells him the great Whale King Cetus needs his help. Yes, it sounds like a plot derived from an acid-induced haze while listening to Jimmy Hendrix, but the game really is something interesting.
While most Sierra adventure titles have a degree of focus placed on humor, EcoQuest is something more serious. This is one of the first adventure games I can remember that was geared towards younger players and also focused on education while retaining a concept of entertainment. Sierra even went as far as to brand the game part of their “Discovery Series”…though I cannot think of any other titles in that series, this one was notable.
A few years later, Sierra decided to pop back in on Adam Greene and focus on another ecological disaster: the rainforest. This time, the youngest card carrying member of Green Peace (and owner of one of the sickest youth mullets of all time) goes head to head with aptly named poacher extraordinaire Maxim Slaughter. Your goal, aside from stopping the creepy Slaughter, is to save a giant tree in the middle of the rainforest, the Forest Heart.
Sure, it all sounds like a bunch of tree hugging hippy crap and it probably is to a degree, but to a much younger me it was fun. On top of it all, I walked away learning quite a few facts about nature and some of the animals on the planet. As I didn’t exactly have the Discovery Channel or the National Geographic Channel on my television as a kid (we had 13 channels + ESPN), it was all new to me.
It sounds a bit outlandish, but the game truly was fun and it didn’t shove the concept of ecology down your throat like Captain Planet, but it was set up in such a way that the player learned about our responsibility to use our resources wisely and recycle as well as understand the risks we run when we use things like animals skins, wood, and oil in an irresponsible manner. Then again, when this was made the concept (and endless debates) regarding the idea of global warming was barely evident in culture, at least not that I heard of as a kid. I imagine of the game was made today the main character would be Al Gore fighting the global weather change monster…I’m glad this game wasn’t made today.
Regardless, if you ever feel like pulling out your hemp backpack and going for a quick two hour point and click adventure, these two titles will definitely do the trick.
“Holy HDTV! Some litterbug dumped a boob-tube in the ocean!”– Adam Greene