Leisure Suit Larry 1: In the Land of the Lounge Lizards is a video game programmed, co-written, and designed by Al Lowe (who also composed the soundtrack) and published by Sierra in 1987. It's the first installment in the Leisure Suit Larry series.
The game was conceptualized after a deal between Sierra and Disney about creating an adventure based on Disney's properties fell through, and a replacement was needed. Al Lowe was then called in to remake a game from Sierra's back catalogue, a little known title Softporn Adventure, a game that contained Exactly What It Says on the Tin that had been released in 1981. Sierra hoped that remaking the game with the new, more modern development tools at their disposal could bring in some quick cash. Well, Al looked over the game, and concluded that it was so poorly written and outdated that a straight-up remake would only be an exercise in bad taste. Instead, he came up with the idea of turning the protagonist into a rather pathetic, yet lovable loser and expand upon the thread-bare plot, while also playing it entirely for laughs. And presto chango:
Meet Larry Laffer. Larry is an aging computer programmer, who has been living his mother's basement for most of his adulthood.note But when his mother decides to sell her house and go on an indefinite cruise around the world, Larry ended up homeless and it was then that he came to a revelation: he has never found true love, even more shamefully, he is still a virgin!
In a desperate bid to turn his life around, Larry has takes a trip to the casino city of Lost Wages, in the hopes of losing his virginity, and maybe even finding true love. Easier said than done, especially for an aging, physically unimpressive nerd with poor taste in fashion!
The game runs on the AGI engine. Larry's movements are controlled with the arrow keys and commands must be typed into a text parser. Graphics are very simple EGA sprites except for the detailed pictures of women. There's a rather lax time limit, Larry has seven real-time hours to beat the game. This game also features a casino with blackjack and slots which Larry can get money from which is required at times to progress.
The game was remade in 1991 with VGA graphics and a point-and-click interface similar to the one used in Leisure Suit Larry 5: Passionate Patti Does a Little Undercover Work. It has also received a remake in 2013 titled Leisure Suit Larry Reloaded, which was funded through Kickstarter.
This game provides examples of:
- 555: Larry dials 555-6969 for a sex hotline and 555-8039 to have wine delivered to his honeymoon room.
- '80s Hair: There's a teenager with a mohawk in Reloaded, though ironically, Larry exclaims that his hair is so seventies.
- Adam and Eve Plot: As noted by Rule of Symbolism below, the ultimate goal of Larry.
- The Alcoholic: In the hallway of Lefty's, you will find a drunk man on the floor. He trades you a tv remote for another drink.
- Alliterative Title: Leisure Suit Larry 1: In the Land of the Lounge Lizards.
- All Men Are Perverts: To get past the pimp, you have to change the channel on his TV to a porn station. But then again, he is a pimp…
- Anticipatory Breath Spray: Larry starts the game with breath spray in his inventory and will periodically get suggestions to use it; if you're alone the game will tell you how horrible the inside of your mouth tastes, but if you try talking to a character they'll be put off by your horrible breath and refuse to interact with you until you take care of it.
- Anti Poop-Socking: A message pops up after the credits in the VGA version, saying "It's over! Quit!! Get a Life!!!" Doubles as The Stinger.
- Anything but That!: Turning on the program which starts with "It's a beautiful day in the neighbor..." makes the narrator respond with "No, no!! Anything but that!"
- Asian Speekee Engrish: The Quiki-Mart store owner even writes Engrish.THIS NO RIBLALY — NO LEEDING
- Asian Store-Owner: The store owner from Quiki Mart speaks with an Asian accent (stuff like "Lubber" instead of "Rubber") and if you try to shoplift from him, he will shoot you.
- Bankruptcy Barrel: This game featured a broke guy with just a barrel and an apple he'll sell for 10 bucks. You'll need to buy it. (The guy in question is implied to be Apple's Steve Wozniak).
- Bestiality Is Depraved: Larry quickly gets horny after taking the pills, wondering about the location of the cute dog he met. He then indulges in the deed of bestiality offscreen and goes to jail, which results in a game over.
- Betting Mini-Game: This game had casino games that could easily drain all the money from the player, and of course running out of money was a game over. However, you need to play the games because to win the game Larry needs more money than he actually has; Save Scumming, away!
- Between My Legs: Box art of this game's VGA remake and Steam header, as seen above, depict Larry smiling at the camera, framed by two legs in net stockings.
- Big Applesauce: Although Lost Wages seems like the run-down little brother of Las Vegas otherwise, the only cabbie in town drives a clunky yellow Checker cab, and the pimp speaks with a Brooklyn accent.
- Big Ball of Violence: Several instances could lead to Larry getting caught up in one of these. For example:
- Running into a mugger in a dark alley. What's hilarious about the scene is that the mugger apparently bails out of the dust-up after a while, leaving Larry to carry on the Big Ball of Violence... by himself? It's clearly not a bug, due to both how long it lasts and the fact that the gag returns in both remakes. This actually counts as Yet Another Stupid Death, as Larry somehow manages to kill himself in the process after the mugger leaves.
- Stiffing the cabbie. You get into one of these outside the cab (in Reloaded, inside as the cabbie leaps into the backseat to murder Larry's sorry ass). After the dust settles, if outside, the cabbie then runs him over, turning him into a perfect pancake. Either way, Larry is dead and the game is over.
- Blatant Lies: The store clerk claims to be discreet about customers buying condoms, which he keeps stocked behind the counter. He asks a questionnaire about what kind Larry wants... then shouts out the "answers" while calling Larry weird, causing a crowd to appear out of nowhere from behind the display shelving and yell out "WHAT A PERVERT!". With one exception: No matter what size you request, the clerk will always say it's small.
- Boss Button: There's one which brought up a fake bar chart on command. However, upon closer inspection, the bar chart was not so innocent-looking (the bar labels were for different types of condoms), and when the player attempted to return to the game, they would have to restore from their last save, because, as the game puts it, "when you panic, I forget everything!"
- Can't Get Away with Nuthin': If you have sex with the prostitute without putting a condom on first, you will die of VD in the next minute.
- And if you forget to zip up and remove your condom when you step outside, you're arrested instantly for indecency. So Larry apparently forgot to put his underpants back on...
- Cash Gate: If you don't distract the pimp but still want to go upstairs, you have to pay him 100$ (EGA) or 200$ (VGA).
- Censor Box: Whenever Larry is in bed with a woman, a large "CENSORED" box covers them completely. In the brothel the box changes its shape in sync with Larry's movements, giving a very clear indication what Larry is doing. But in the hotel it stays static, then goes all wavy, before revealing Larry tied up and robbed, keeping the viewer wondering until the end.
- Chained to a Bed: Fawn does this to Larry after she finally reveals her true colors. If the player has failed to acquire the knife necessary for Larry to cut himself free before this happens, it's game over.
- Commonplace Rare: The game must be one of the worst offenders in video game history.
- The pills you need to get to the penthouse can't be bought or ordered, but can only be found in a room next to the fire escape at Lefty's; and you're only able to reach them if you tie yourself to the railing... using a rope.
- Said rope, again, can't be bought or easily found; instead you have to shower a sleazy girl in a disco with lots of gifts, pick her up, marry her, get some wine to your suite, let her tie you to the bed, and after she's robbed you blind and vanished for good, you can cut the rope with a pocket knife.
- The wine you need (among other things) to "seduce" said gold-digger can be bought in the shop... but you can't enter the cab with it because the driver will drink it, no way around it. So in order to get that wine, you have to order it to the suite, using a phone miles away.
- The pocket knife on the other hand you get by giving another bottle of wine to a drunk.
- And finally, the apple you need to woo the finally girl can't be found in any store or plucked from a tree, but has to be bought for 10$ from an impoverished guy. (Which, while in itself pretty egregious, is still on the tamer side considering that it's relatively easy to get, compared to the other items.)
- Couldn't Find a Pen: In Reloaded, Larry finds a password in the bathroom and writes it down by chewing his fingernail until he bled and scrawling it on a sheet of toilet paper with his blood.
- Creator Cameo: The disco is full of Sierra employees.
- Darkness Equals Death: Wandering into dark alleyways results in Larry getting beaten to death by a mugger.
- Death Is a Slap on the Wrist: Unlike the original, where dying forced you to restart or load a saved game, the Reloaded version resets the scene with no consequences. Since several of the death scenes are funny and/or earn an achievement on Steam, this makes it worth trying to get Larry killed.
- Didn't Think This Through: In Reloaded, Larry decides to tell Jasmine that he made her perfume with ambergris that he got by pouring hot sauce into her beloved whale's blowhole. You can imagine how well she takes it.
- Dissonant Serenity: The sun is smiling during Larry's suicide.
- Double Entendre: If you try getting fresh with Faith, she responds, "Try it, and I'll blow your head off!" The next line: She is referring to her use of the gun, Larry.
- Driven to Suicide: Larry commits suicide with a gun once the sun rises. Weirdly enough, the sun is smiling as he does it.
- Drunk Driver: If you enter a cab while possessing liquor, the driver will down the whole container and crash the cab, killing you both.
- Early-Installment Weirdness:
- This game is rather different from the rest of the series: there's an overall time limit, you have a specific amount of money that you can spend on things and replenish by gambling (rather than just having a "money" item that is exactly enough for whatever you need to buy), the game world is divided into smaller areas that you can only get between by taxi (which costs money), and one of the women (the prostitute) is completely optional to interact with to beat the game. Later games play more like traditional adventure games, and every girl somehow brings you closer to the "final girl". Most of these differences are probably due to being an adaptation of an already-existing game, Softporn Adventure, which was not written or programmed by Lowe.
- You use breath spray to freshen your breath at certain intervals (and you can run out). Fail to do so and the various characters will be grossed out at your breath, or refuse to talk to you altogether. Future Leisure Suit Larry games will remove the breath spray entirely.
- Larry is depicted as fairly normal looking and his height is 5'10". Later games (and the remake) make him very short and exaggerated, to the point of being Super-Deformed. He is also lacking the bald spot he would have in all games afterwards except 3.
- Erotic Eating: Eve, with an apple."She's really turning you on! You had no idea fruit could be so exciting."
- Fan Disservice: The hooker. She tends to be drawn as unattractively as possible while still being just attractive enough to retain her current line of work.
- Fireworks of Love: As Larry is about to go to bed with Eve, the game cuts to the night sky with plenty of fireworks.
- Flushing-Edge Interactivity: This game has a toilet in Lefty's Bar that can be flushed. Doing so floods the room up to the ceiling. Have a Nice Death!
- The Freelance Shame Squad: Happens when Larry buys a condom, the cashier will announce his choice to the (seemingly) empty store, and shoppers will pop out from everywhere and say "WHAT A PERVERT!"
- Generic Graffiti: The filthy restroom has graffiti all over the walls of the toilet. If you read enough of them, you find a clue.
- Gold Digger: Fawn. Her "modest" demands includes a lot of cash for a cheap-ass wedding and a diamond ring.
- Groin Attack: You can do this to the drunk that passed out in the hallway of Lefty's bar, simply by walking into him so your foot connects with his privates. The second time you do this, he asks if you're trying to make him into a soprano.
- Guilt-Based Gaming: If you try to quit the game, Larry will beg you not to do that, saying that you can't imagine the things the CPU does to him when you're not watching.
- Hotter and Sexier: When this game was adapted for the Japanese market, scenes were far more graphic and explicit.
- Idealized Sex: Averted with the prostitute at Lefty's bar — Larry finds the deed with her very unsatisfying (the fact that the prostitute is fairly hideous doesn't help) and will continue on for true pleasure. Played straight in the end after he seduces Eve — Larry finds it so pleasing and ideal that we see fireworks in the sky at the game's conclusion!
- Intentional Engrish for Funny: Saddam, even though he seems to be a mixture of just about all available stereotypes from anywhere between Greece and Guam. The real kicker, however, is that he has a sign in his shop that reads,THIS NO RIBLALY - NO LEEDING
- Intoxication Mechanic: When you drink an alcoholic beverage at Lefty's Bar, the directional controls will randomize for a few seconds, making Larry stagger around the bar.
- Japanese Ranguage: Though stereotypically Indian, the Quiki-Mart shopkeeper sells "lubbers." The store has a sign that says, "This no ribrary, no leeding!"
- Joe Sent Me: The pimp won't let you into his room until you give him the password: "Ken sent me." The name is, of course, that of Ken Williams. "Al sent me" is also accepted in the AGI version.
- Key Under the Doormat: Checking under the front mat of Lefty's gets you a snarky comment from the narrator, wondering why you'd expect to find a key there when the door is unlocked.
- Lewd Lust, Chaste Sex: After a game's worth of dirty jokes and innuendo in the quest to get Larry laid, impending success causes the game to switch to a black screen for fireworks and a developer's congratulation.
- LOL, 69: Reloaded has the disco club called "Club 69".
- Look Both Ways: The game would kill you if you walked out into the street, which meant the game could end mere seconds after you started.
- Love Potion: The pills. They are a strong aphrodisiac, which Larry gives to Faith (who thinks they are some kind of recreational drug). The pills work, and Faith becomes horny... but they don't make her attracted to Larry.
- They also cause Larry to become horny and indulge into bestiality, getting a game over.
- Lounge Lizard: The subtitle is "in the Land of the Lounge Lizards". Larry dresses like one, but (thankfully) doesn't actually sing.
- Mad Libs Dialogue: Purchasing a condom will lead to a series of questions regarding condom preferences, repeated back to Larry by the store clerk for all to hear. Using the payphone leads to a phone survey with a series of questions. When the payphone calls back, a message is given with the answers the player typed in. Game Grumps provides an
example. - No Kill like Overkill: Stiff the cabbie and he will not only murder Larry, but run his dead body over with the cab.
- Or Are You Just Happy to See Me?: Most girls have an "Is that an x in your pocket, or are you just y?"-styled line related to their occupation, though the hooker's line is unused and only present in the original.
- Overly Generous Time Limit: It is eight hours and a midgame event will cancel it. Again, restoring an earlier save also restores the clock. The game doesn't even tell the player that there's a time limit, so you'd basically need to open the source code to find out. Specifically, the game starts at 10 PM, and if the main character is still a virgin at 6 AM, he'll kill himself.
- Out with a Bang: Sleeping with the hooker at Lefty's Bar without protection causes your family jewels to explode a minute or so later.
- Paper Key-Retrieval Trick: Discussed in Reloaded:Larry: I've spent this whole night looking for a door I can open by sliding a newspaper underneath and poking the key out of the other side of the keyhole so that it falls on the newspaper. Every computer game character gets to do that except ME. It isn't fair.
- Note that the door he's looking at when he says this is a sliding door, so it wouldn't have worked anyway.
- Press Start to Game Over: Walk south on the road. You become an instant pancake. Game over. Walk into the alleyway to the west, get beaten to death by a mugger. Game over.
- Quest for Sex: The initial objective for Larry, but it is rather quickly done away with. If Larry has sex with the prostitute, which is relatively easy to achieve, Larry will realise that he is really looking for something deeper than just sex.
- Race Lift: In the 1991 remake, the prostitute and final girl Eve, who were originally White, have become Black. The shopkeeper, originally an Indian Sikh, became an Arab. The mugger was changed from a heavy Scary Black Man to a punk rock-ish muscular white guy.
- Reloaded has the hooker become Russian, Eve is Ambiguously Brown, and the Come 'n' Go Clerk is returned to being Indian.
- Rule of Symbolism: As with Softporn Adventure, the ultimate goal is to seduce Eve by giving her an apple.
- Secretly Wealthy: In "Reloaded", if the player has blown Larry's money enough times, Larry will address the absurdity of the vagrant being able to continue supplying Larry with money by asking him if he's secretly wealthy.
- Shoddy Knockoff Product: In-universe, Larry has a genuine "Bowl-X" (knockoff of "Rolex") watch. As the game points out, it's crap (which is probably why you can't, say, hock it if you lose all your money) but at least it accurately gives the time.
- Shoplift and Die: If Larry attempts to shoplift from Quiki Mart, the Asian guy behind the counter will shoot him, resulting in a game over.
- Sliding Scale of Linearity vs. Openness: A 4 on the scale. You can go to one of the five major locations immediately and there is some side content (stuff like screwing the hooker is optional), but some parts have to be done before others.
- Spontaneous Crowd Formation: During the scene in the convenience store, a crowd pops into view from behind various shelves to mock Larry's choice of condom. "WHAT A PERVERT!"
- Squashed Flat: If Larry walks into the street, a car will materialize and hit him, turning him into a perfect pancake. Ditto if the cabbie murders you. Then he will run your corpse over with his cab resulting in the same.
- Standard Snippet: Both the William Tell Overture and the Funeral March are used in the same cutscene when Larry commits suicide after failing to lose his virginity before sunrise.
- Surprisingly Realistic Outcome: Lefty's is not a 24-7 bar. He actually closes at 3 AM (depending on version). Time does not stand still in this game, like many other (Sierra) games of that era. The official hint book points out that "even Lefty has to sleep sometime". Though you have to intentionally wait several hours for this to happen as you either beat the game, or are outright stuck.
- Tagline: "Looking for a good time?"
- Take That!: Reloaded features the following jab at Magna Cum Laude and Box Office Bust:note Don't try to pee on that sign, Larry. That's the kind of raunchy, humorless prank your idiot nephew would pull.
- Teeny Weenie: Some of the women mock Larry for having allegedly this, with quips like "Is that a roll of dimesnote in your pocket, or are you just happy to see menote ?"
- Tempting Apple: Larry uses an apple to seduce Eve and win the game.
- Theme Naming: It may be unintentional, but all women in this one, including Jasmine in Reloaded, have names with a double meaning or referencing other people (Faith, Fawn, Eve...).
- Timed Mission: You have until 5:00 AM to complete the game before Larry is Driven to Suicide. And no, buying a condom and hiring the prostitute who is available from the beginning of the game will not remove the time limit; since Larry questions the validity of losing his virginity to a prostitute, it doesn't count. However, this takes seven real life hours (without pausing), so if you know what you're doing, you won't even come close to that time limit. In Reloaded, this time limit is removed, and you are now allowed to Take Your Time.
- Timey-Wimey Ball: Reloaded has Larry split between two versions of himself: the younger Reloaded Larry, who is 38 and still a virgin, and the original Sierra Larry, who is 64 and decides to make yet another attempt at finding true love.
- Toilet Paper Trail: Larry has this happen to him whenever he uses the bathroom in the bar. Walking close past the other patrons in the bar after a bathroom visit wil result in one of them pointing this out, and Larry nonchalantly removing the toilet paper.
- Totem Pole Trench: Larry can meet a trenchcoat flasher on the sidewalk by the hotel. When you look at the flasher, the narrator comments that it's really a little person standing on the shoulders of another. They're both still flashers, though.
- In the remakes, you can actually see their silhouettes through the coat.
- Tough Room: The comedian tries to tell jokes to people in the cabaret room, but nobody laughs at them (probably because nobody is sitting there except for Larry sometimes). He will complain about it with remarks like "Tough crowd. Tough crowd."
- Trade Snark: Taken to ridiculous extremes at one point in Reloaded, to the point where even the ™ symbol itself has been trademarked.Narrator: Note: the "™" Trademark symbol is a registered trademark® of Trademark Registry Inc., a wholly-owned subsidiary of Copyright© Registered Trademarks, LLC.
- Trash Landing: Larry leaves a brothel by jumping out of the window and landing in a large dumpster, in which he finds a hammer which he needs later in the game.
- Unrelated in the Adaptation: In the AGI original and SCI remakenote , the comedian in the Cabaret and the minister in the chapel were stated to be brothers. In Reloaded, their names are Jeff Schitzfelt and Jimmy-Ted Braggart, respectively, and there is no indication that they are still related.
- Useless Item: One of the items Larry starts with in the AGI version is pocket lint. It has no use and can't be given to other characters, with the game even saying "It's not for using; IT'S A JOKE!!" if you try.
- Video Game Remake: A triple example. It was originally intended to be a graphical remake of Softporn Adventure, but ended up becoming its own game when Al Lowe decided it was too old to be remade without significant changes. Leisure Suit Larry in the Land of the Lounge Lizards was in turn remade in 1991 with upgraded graphics and a point-and-click interface. Finally, the game was remade (with one girl added) and re-released in 2013 with the subtitle Reloaded.
- Virgin-Shaming: The objective is for the title character to lose his virginity. If he can't do it by next morning, he'll kill himself. And hey, to emphasize the challenge, prostitutes don't count (though he won't kill himself if he has sex with a prostitute).
- Viva Las Vegas!: This game takes place in the aptly named Lost Wages, where Larry is destined to lose his virginity before sunrise. The only way to gain funds in the game is gambling, so expect to do a lot of Save Scumming. The Japanese PC-88 version does take place in Las Vegas.
- Wildlife Commentary Spoof: There's a brief bit of the "Wild Kingdom" type when you are changing channels to try to distract the pimp.Not Marlon Perkins: And while my assistant is wrestling the tiger, I'm going to slip into this tent with our native guide and a pitcher of mai tais.
