Space Quest IV: Roger Wilco and the Time Rippers

Space Quest IV: Roger Wilco and the Time Rippers sends the eternal space janitor Roger Wilco time-traveling across the various entries of his own series. The player ends up in a post-apocalyptic future guarded by armed goons, visits a shopping mall full of cyborgs, dips into the eight-bit past of one of the series' earlier games, and finally lands in a world that looks exactly like a pixelated title from the genre's early days.

Those jumps between eras are the heart of the experience — the game is a self-parody that pokes fun at its own genre, at sci-fi movies, and at player habits. The controls are icon-based, the puzzles are mostly fair, but the series keeps up its tradition: dying is easy, often funny, and comes with a sarcastic comment, so frequent saving is a necessity. Several sections are also timed and demand quick reflexes, which remains the most common complaint even years later.

Technically it was one of Sierra's best-looking titles of its time: 256 colors, plenty of animation, and backgrounds that shift visual style to match whichever era is being visited. The CD version brought full voice acting including a narrator whose dry commentary supplies a good chunk of the game's humor. The music has a synthetic, spacey feel and sounded excellent on a decent sound card. At the time, Space Quest IV was seen as the peak of the series and a technical showcase of what PCs could do in 1991. Today it works mainly as comedy and as a tribute to the genre's history — anyone familiar with the eight-bit and sixteen-bit roots of computer games will appreciate the references most, but the humor lands even with newcomers. Alongside the jokes, the game also keeps a surprisingly readable structure — the player hops between eras through time rifts and quickly learns where to go back to. There are also a few minigames and a shopping segment where earned credits can be spent on gear. Space Quest IV is therefore still pleasantly playable, just keep in mind that a trap that kills you without the slightest warning is always waiting somewhere.