Nerds That Geek Game Review – ‘Space Quest IV: Roger Wilco and the Time Rippers’

 Written by John Edward Betancourt 

​There comes a point for every single franchise out there, when it outright reaches perfection. This is where the story is at its finest and the tale that is presented to the audience is one that keeps them talking for ages on end and in 1991, that perfect moment arrived for the Space Quest franchise since the fourth entry in the series, Space Quest IV: Roger Wilco and the Time Rippers provided fans of this franchise everywhere and everyday gamers as well, with a virtually flawless adventure game, one that felt like a Hollywood motion picture. 
 
Much of that is due to the fact that in 1991, new advancements in computer graphics allowed for Sierra On-Line and the Two Guys from Andromeda to put together worlds that few of us had seen in computer gaming and every single place, and time that Roger ventures to in this particular tale is downright breathtaking and they manage to evoke powerful emotions from the player, since I felt a genuine sense of dread and danger while I spent my time with Roger in Space Quest XII: Vohaul’s Revenge II. But while the graphics here are breathtaking and immersive, let’s be totally honest, it’s the story that truly brought this franchise to the next level.
 
Now, that’s not meant to be a knock upon the game’s predecessors, because the trilogy of stories prior to this were indeed fun and fascinating in their own right. But this script, well this one was simply on a whole new level. Because this tale, managed to put together a space opera if you will, one that figured out how to bring Roger’s greatest nemesis back into the fold despite his death and his evil and sweeping plan to travel through time to wipe Roger out is on par with the greatest sci-fi franchises out there and well, this plan leads to one hell of an epic showdown when all is said and done, one that outright takes your breath away and leaves you hungry for more.
 
However, while in many ways it sounds as though the franchise plays it straight in this one by offering up an epic plot line, one grounded in grittiness and darkness, that’s simply not the case. The silly is still strong in this one, and the gags are just as epic as the story. I mean come on, I love the fact that as Roger travels through time, the title banner at the top of the screen changes slightly, reflecting the game/time period you’re in, giving us quite the chuckle when we see Space Quest X: Latex Babes of Estros and well, the trip to the mall there is pretty damn hilarious as well.
 
But in the end however, this is just hands down, the peak of the Space Quest franchise. This one made me laugh the hardest, it offered some fine puzzles for me to solve and well, what matters most, it hooked me from the get-go, thanks to its quality story. I simply had to know every single detail about Vohaul’s plan and how he came back to life and of course, I had to defeat him because you can’t let a twisted monster like that win and this one, well this is one that I revisit often since it offered up so many incredible moments and well, the series wasn’t done with providing us with epic moments just yet since the next game in this saga, was everything I could have hoped for and more…    

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