People who paid the $20 registration fee for the shareware #dos adventure game Hugo's House of Horrors (1991) would receive an auto-playing version of the game intended for children and a hint booklet with floorplans and both "medium" and "obvious" hints.
When the third Hugo game came out, creator David P. Gray put together a trilogy pack and repackaged all the hint booklets into one — a few pages of which are pictured here.
#shareware #retrocomputing #retrogames #gamehistory
When the third Hugo game came out, creator David P. Gray put together a trilogy pack and repackaged all the hint booklets into one — a few pages of which are pictured here.
#shareware #retrocomputing #retrogames #gamehistory
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As for Hugo's inspiration, Gray had just one game in mind: Sierra's Leisure Suit Larry. Here's what he told me when I interviewed him for Shareware Heroes. (He was also inspired by TV series Hammer House of Horror and a book of monochrome clip art.)
@MossRC love the Hugo series but I see the hint book describe how to get across the bridge in Hugo 2 and HOW IS ANYONE SUPPOSED TO JUST KNOW THAT?!?!?!
@MossRC Awesome! Hugo was one of the first games I played. It took me several days to figure out that the thing in the closet was a mask. Also, as I recall, the mummy room is entered from the bottom, not the left. Fun trilogy!
@Bogusmeatfactory By buying the hint book, obviously! It's exactly the kind of crap that Sierra would pull all the time in the Quest games, so really it's very authentic as a shareware tribute to LLL's gameplay.