Tachyon Dreams Anthology review: '80s-inspired space questing that channels Sierra's heyday

In the heyday of Sierra's adventure game years, there was a series called Space Quest that featured an intergalactic janitor named Roger Wilco. The series was more satirical than King's Quest, less preachy than Police Quest, and not quite as adult as Leisure Suit Larry. Spearheaded by Scott Murphy and Mark Crowe - a pair of devs who called themselves "Two Guys from Andromeda" - Space Quest was renowned for its humour, and there was a nice sense of progression throughout most of the series, with Roger Wilco leveling up from working class spaceman to the head of his own Star Trek ship.

Tachyon Dreams Anthology, a collection of three short games previously released on Itch.io, is clearly channeling Space Quest. Made by indie dev Cosmic Void, AKA Aviv Salinas, each episode of Tachyon Dreams puts you in the shoes of an intergalactic dishwasher named Dodger, who's almost like an alternate Roger Wilco if you squint. Dodger's just chilling on a spaceship clearing plates when all of the staff around him disappear, which is basically what happened to Roger at the start of Space Quest I. Guided by a sentient computer, Dodge has to travel through time and space, and his quest eventually leads him on the trail of the Margdonians, a mysterious race that once cultivated the galaxy.

The plot, which starts with time travel and ends with Dodger literally contemplating his past while sitting on the porcelain throne, doesn't quite hit the mark set by any of the Space Quests. But the game's visuals are 100% reminiscent of a lost Sierra adventure from 1987 made with the company's then-famous AGI (Adventure Game Interpreter) engine. Even Dodger's walk cycle channels Roger Wilco's, though Dodger is several pixels larger than Roger ever was. I'm not sure if Tachyon Dreams Anthology was made in AGI Studio, gamemaking software that's been widely used amongst Sierra fans, but it certainly looks it. Cosmic Void's expert use of AGI's 16 colours is especially impressive, and I really appreciate the pixelated depictions of the galactic sky, swathed in lovely shades of blue and magenta. (Anyone who wants to see similar visuals in something that resembles a '90s game rather than an '80s one should check out Twilight Oracle, one of Cosmic Void's other projects. Alice B (RPS forever in peace) liked the demo!)

Visuals aside, this is a parser game where you control Dodger with the arrow keys and type in commands to get him to do stuff. It takes a certain type of adventure gamer to appreciate this control scheme, but as someone who spent countless hours as a kid trying to figure out which Sierra games recognised what dirty words, I dig it. "Pick up berries." "Use computer." "Take off pants." (The last one doesn't work.) Tachyon Dreams Anthology recognises a fair number of verbs, though on some occasions you'll run into an infernal puzzle that requires a very specific combination of commands. But getting stuck is par the course for a Sierra-inspired adventure game, and on the one occasion when I couldn't figure out how to progress, Cosmic Void was kind enough to answer my query via Twitter/X.

There are two minigames which break up the exploration and verb-typing. One of them's a mandatory "move the coloured thingies around until they match" exercise, which I could have done without, because I hate it when an adventure game forces you to sit down and solve a Rubik's Cube before progressing. At least there's nothing as annoying as Space Quest III's mandatory Astro Chicken game to contend with here, thank goodness.

There's also no deaths or dead ends in Tachyon Dreams Anthology, which is a page taken from the LucasArts playbook rather than the Sierra one. I'm of two minds when it comes to no deaths in adventure games - I appreciate the lack of danger, but back when I was playing the Space Quests, a perverse part of my soul delighted in seeing Roger Wilco perish in all manner of hilarious ways. I kinda wanted Dodger to suffer ridiculous demises as well, especially when progressing through that aforementioned end-of-game stretch that involves a trip to the loo.

Aside from lacking goofy deaths, Tachyon Dreams Anthology also lacks a truly cohesive story, which I hinted at before. The game's original episodes - Tachyon Dreams I: The Radiant Fish of the Apocalypse, Tachyon Dreams II: The Bloated Can of Space Root Beer, and Tachyon Dreams III: The Rancid Buttermilk - have been bundled with a smattering of extra screens, puzzles, and text descriptions that attempt to string them together. But the resulting product feels disjointed, like you're clearly hopping from what was intended to be a standalone bite-sized game to another standalone bite-sized game that misremembered the plot of the first. The snappy computer that Dodger speaks with in Part I sadly disappears in Part II, for instance, and a sudden deep dive into Dodger's history with his ex in Part III comes out of nowhere. It was probably easier to excuse these holes when the episodes were released separately on Itch, but when melded together, the framework feels flimsy.

Humour is at least interspersed among the flimsy, although it's not as funny as it initially lets on. Tachyon Dreams Anthology can be very amusing, straddling the line between toilet humor and referring to Canada as a mysterious foreign country that makes arthouse films, but large portions of the game are actually quite somber. In fact, much of Tachyon Dreams has a lonely, introspective feel, with Dodger exploring mostly-empty locales and reflecting on the nature of being a solo person stuck in the void of space, following the faded footsteps of long-departed aliens. The Space Quests also had their surprisingly serious moments, especially in Space Quest IV: The Time Rippers, my personal favourite which saw Roger Wilco travelling through past, present, and future. But Space Quest IV still offered levity through colourful item descriptions and kooky narration courtesy of the late, great Gary Owens. Tachyon Dreams Anthology doesn't have this, which isn't a bad thing, but results in a game that is far more philosophical and quieter than its promotional materials - which promise a rollicking '80s-style comedy - would suggest.

Ultimately, Tachyon Dreams Anthology reminds me of another project I've played by Cosmic Void, a first-person adventure game dubbed Blood Nova that was beautiful, but featured a lot of hints at grand space opera concepts that were never explored in a tangible manner. Tachyon Dreams Anthology has a similar quirk, flirting with a consistent story and a sense of humour, but not providing exactly what I'd hoped for in either arena.

That said, this game is still worth playing for classic adventure fans, if only to see an indie dev passionately channel the spirit of Sierra's yesteryear in a way that tips a hat to Space Quest while not quite being a Space Quest fangame. In a world where SpaceVenture, the spiritual successor to Space Quest crafted by the original Two Guys from Andromeda, crashed and burned in truly epic fashion, we could use more games like Tachyon Dreams Anthology. I wouldn't mind seeing more of Dodger - perhaps in a focused sequel that sees him abandoning his dishwashing roots and embracing his destiny as an unassuming guardian of the galaxy, just like his grandpa Roger Wilco did before him.

This review is based on a review build of the game provided by the developer.