I have fond memories of old-school Sierra. The King’s Quest and Police Quest series in particular hold a special place in my heart. So, you can imagine how shocked I was to learn Al Lowe, the man behind Leisure Suit Larry, has put the source code for some of these games up for sale on eBay.
If you’re not familiar with Al Lowe, he worked for Sierra during its heyday in the 80s and 90s, a stint that lasted 16 years. When he left, he took a bunch of backed-up source code for games such as King’s Quest III and the first Police Quest with him, as well as the earlier instalments in the Leisure Suit Larry series.
According to Lowe, speaking in a video with ex-Sierra dev Jason Lindsey, the disks haven’t seen the light of day in 30 years.
What’s astonishing is how utterly rare Lowe’s bounty is. In the clip, he “guarantee[s]” his backup of the King’s Quest III source code is “the only copy on Earth”.
At time of writing, it appears most of the source code has already gone under the hammer. However, the source for Leisure Suit Larry 2 is still available, though the current bid is $US7100 ($9702).
Even if you do buy it, Lowe is quick to stress that you don’t own the intellectual property:
…you will not own the intellectual property rights to the game, the code, the art, or anything else. Nor do I. The I. P. rights were sold over and over again, until they are now owned by a German game company.
At least you’ll have an amazing piece of gaming history.
Al Lowe [eBay, via Ars Technica]
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