RetroRewind: Leisure Suit Larry 6: Shape Up or Slip Out!

Welcome to another installment of RetroRewind. Today we bring you the sixth installment in our tales of Larry Laffer. RetroRewind is a few days delayed this week due to the unfortunate, cruel mistress that is real life. We do have a huge announcement on the subject of Leisure Suit Larry to bring you! Leisure Suit Larry in the Land of the Lounge Lizards: Reloaded is officially funded! As of this morning the Kickstarter campaign has concluded with Larry raising over $655k. What does this mean for Mr. Laffer? Well it means that the upcoming game will have assorted updates to the story, including a new “conquest” for Larry with her own storyline. Now with that news out of the way we take you back into the sixth of Larry’s journeys: Leisure Suit Larry 6: Shape up or Slip Out!

Larry Laffer is journeying along Venice Beach, checking out all the body-builders working their stuff. Suddenly a comically large limo pulls up with a producer in-tow looking for a gentleman to become a bachelor on a new dating show. Larry, being the superb example of male-perfection obviously accepts the gig. The show is Stallions hosted by Leisure Suit Larry 2’s Biff Stiff. Over the course of the game show Larry ends up losing out on his previous cruise ship dating show glory, but he does win a most-expenses paid weekend at La Costa Lotta Spa & Resort. Now Larry’s latest journey can begin!

RetroRewind: Leisure Suit Larry Goes Looking For Love (In Several Wrong Places)

Welcome back to RetroRewind. Yesterday we brought you back to the origins of Larry Laffer in Leisure Suit Larry in the Land of the Lounge Lizards. Now, we’re taking you back to 1988, or from Larry’s perspective, roughly a few days after the end of Larry’s last adventure. Larry fell madly in bed with the lovely Eve after stumbling into her penthouse suit at the aptly named, Casino. After a brilliant night of passion, watched on by Ken Williams, Larry decided to move into Eve’s apartment in Los Angeles. What prompted Larry to do this? Who knows and who cares? Well actually it appears Eve cared, because the moment the game starts she kicks Larry out of her house and leaves him in the street. Thus Leisure Suit Larry Goes Looking For Love (In Several Wrong Places) begins!

For those who do not know, Leisure Suit Larry 2 is one of the more criticized games of the Larry saga. “Sierra intentionally toned down the titular character’s sexual escapades for the sequel. According to series creator Al Lowe, this lack of Leisure Suit Larry’s trademark humor is an oft-cited criticism of the game.” (Source) During his Reddit AMA Al Lowe was asked by user MrOslo “If you get to remake all the Larry games, which one are you looking most forward to working on?” Lowe responded back with “Larry 2 because it had the most wrong with it. There is a lot of stuff to be fixed and i know i can make it better. There were dead ends and design flaws that im not proud of. It will be great to eliminate the defects and enhance the rest.” After having replayed the game for the first time since I was a kid, I would have to agree, but more on that later.

RetroRewind: Leisure Suit Larry in the Land of the Lounge Lizards

Welcome to the first edition of RetroRewind. RetroRewind will be a new series of articles appearing on Constantly Calibrating from time to time. The idea behind them is to review any games that elicit a sense of nostalgia or long-gone, but not forgotten, joy in gamers. This can be any game that is either 6 years or older and/or appeared on a prior console generation. The games can be from any console or handheld system as well as PC gaming. So sit back and enjoy as we journey back to 1987, and 1991, for Leisure Suit Larry in the Land of the Lounge Lizards.

A look at the title screens for both the 1987 original Leisure Suit Larry in the Land of the Lounge Lizards and the the 1991 remake of the same name.

Leisure Larry was, and still is, the brainchild of Al Lowe, former game designer of the sadly defunct Serra Entertainment Inc. As many of you know, Larry Laffer will soon be gracing your computer screen again in Leisure Suit Larry in the Land of the Lounge Lizards: Reloaded. As of this writing the Kickstarter campaign is only $30k short of its goal with 8 days left to go; so it is safe to assume that Larry will in fact be with us in time for the holiday season. Just what we need, a Larry Laffer Christmas…that in no way made my skin crawl.

With the Kickstarter campaign coming to a close I thought I would spend its last week replaying all of the Leisure Suit Larry for our new RetroRewind series of articles. Every day this week I will be replaying a game from Larry’s history all the way through Leisure Suit Larry: Love for Sail. No I will not be replaying Leisure Suit Larry: Magna Cum Laude or Leisure Suit Larry: Box Office Bust, and you can not make me. After each playthrough I’ll post a review up here to wet your glorious eyeholes, and hopefully only your eyeholes. For now let us start at the beginning with the original Leisure Suit Larry and it’s 1991 remake.