Blogger is annoying the hell out of me. I have finally logged in though.

More news for nerds! (Not that nerds wouldn't know about all this stuff already).

We just got through a presentation of the interaction of an online mystery-type game. It looked very cool, and I loved the visual style of the particular game presented, but "Mystery/Adventure" is by no means an unpopulated genre.

I'm not sure if anyone remembers the old King's Quest series? They pretty much pioneered the idea in a graphical context (older games like them surely exist, but were mostly text based). More recent examples (though not current, we're talking 1995 here) include Full Throttle and Grim Fandango. The idea in this kind of game is that exploring the world is itself the game. You usually have some sort of goal to strive for, but the idea is always to see what you can find and do.

If you extend the definition a bit to include console-based Survival/Adventure games, then series like Silent Hill and the original Resident Evil are obvious fits.

Finally, there are a number of current, on-line variations of the exploration game (see Scott's post below for links)

EDIT: -Leo