There are two reasons why I decided to go and see a demo of Leisure Suit Larry: Wet Dreams Don’t Dry at Gamescom 2018: First, I’m a big fan of adventure games and have played all the previous Larry games.
Second, I was dying to know how developer CrazyBunch is planning to revive Larry in 2018. It turns out Wet Dreams Don’t Dry is relatively mild in comparison.
Kevin Niederelz, Head of Games, handled the hands-off demo. It started right at the beginning of the game: Larry wakes up in a dark room after another night of looking for love in several wrong places, with no idea how he got there.
It is immediately apparent we are playing as the original Larry Laffer, and not is modern counterpart Larry Lovage. But this isn’t an older, perhaps wiser version of Larry Laffer – this is the same Larry from the original 1987 title. Somehow, he jumped ahead to the year 2018.
What Larry is doing in 2018, and how he got there is part of the mystery. The developers hinted they aren’t to focus too much on the “how” – it’s more of a convenience plot device for a “man out of time” story. They are much more interested in exploring how a walking ’80s cliche like Larry will survive in today’s world.
The game plays like a classic point-and-click adventure: left-click to interact with items, and right-click to examine them. There’s also an inventory system where you can store and combine items, and use them to solve various puzzles.
We solve one such puzzle to get the lights on and operate a small elevator that takes us out of the underground room and straight into a familiar scene – Lefty’s Bar, which looks even worse than it did in 1987.
Inside the bar, we meet Lefty, who’s very surprised to see us, as well as Becky Butters. Niederelz referred to Becky as a “wannabe influencer” and explained that every character in Leisure Suit Larry: Wet Dreams Don’t Dry represents a different stereotype.
Becky is out of seven dateable characters in the full game. Each character has their unique quest line and story arch, and you can choose which character to focus on at any time, making Wet Dreams Don’t Dry somewhat non-linear. However, Larry’s ultimate goal is always the same: go on a date with the sexy, smart and powerful Faith.
To be worthy of Faith’s attention, Larry first needs to score ninety points on Timber – a dating app. Luckily, he stumbles upon a top-of-the-line smartphone prototype by Prune (the game’s version of Apple, whose headquarters are shaped like a penis, and the logo looks like a vagina).
This is where the dateable characters come into play. Larry needs to romance them, show them a good time and, ahem, “satisfy their needs” to gain a good score on the app.
The premise is kind of similar to that of Leisure Suit Larry 7: Love for Sail, where you romanced and impressed several different women to win a date with the ship’s captain.
During the demo, I asked Niederelz what the age rating they are aiming for with Leisure Suit Larry: Wet Dreams Don’t Dry is. His answer was either 13 or 16. Let me remind you that all other Larry games were rated “Mature” (17+), so this move might be somewhat unexpected.
However, it makes sense when you consider that this is 2018, and making a game where your goal is the seduce and objectify women isn’t as… forgivable as it was back when.
That’s why Wet Dreams Don’t Dry is more about comedy than sex. Sure, the jokes are all dirty, and there is plenty of suggestive imagery, but there’s nothing explicit.
Just like I was hoping for when the game was first announced, Leisure Suit Larry: Wet Dreams Don’t Dry takes the series iconic lewd humor and updates it for the 21st century.
You won’t find any nudity in the game, and women aren’t represented in an offensive way (at least not as far as I could see in the demo). To be sure, I asked our Video Team Lead Nicole Dave to join me for the presentation, and she seemed to like the humor.
I’m intrigued by this new incarnation of Larry. It’s colorful, with more than 30 hand-drawn environments to explore, and looks pretty funny, in a very childish kind of way.
Leisure Suit Larry: Wet Dreams Don’t Dry will launch on PC on November 7.
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