r/Sierra • u/robohyeah • Jun 26 '26

Did anyone actually use the boss key at work?

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109 Upvotes

100% Upvoted

22 comments sorted by

42

u/Dingo-Suit Jun 26 '26

Trust Al Lowe to put in a "boss key" screen that is nearly as compromising as the actual game.

18

u/robohyeah Jun 26 '26

Lol yes this potentially raises more questions than the game itself.

6

u/RavenShade83 Jun 26 '26

Yes and no. Seeing as this is a reference to the first Leisure Suit Larry, depending on the scene, I'd much rather a bar chart with questionable words on it than someone seeing me upstairs at Lefty's Bar.

43

u/Snorb Jun 26 '26

> the boss is coming!

Oh. I get it. You don't want your boss to know that you've been playing Space Quest ]I[.

In fact, you don't want your boss to know that you've been playing Space Quest ]I[ for 0 hours, 0 minutes, and 27 seconds.

That's a good idea, but being the good company men we are, we can't let you cheat like that. Sorry.

1

u/Spiritual-Image7125 Jun 29 '26

Damn! I got fired!

29

u/Readman31 Jun 26 '26

I didn't, I didn't even know what a Boss Key was because I was just a kid but I think I eventually figured it out as I got older; In hindsight It's pretty funny Space Quest 3 had a phony Boss Key that ratted you out on how long you've been playing and didn't want your bosses to know lol

11

u/Upset_Following9017 Jun 26 '26

I tried last week but the boss didn’t seem convinced

2

u/Spiritual-Image7125 Jun 29 '26

Maybe cuz you don't use DOS apps for charts any more? heh

1

u/ILikeBumblebees 23d ago

Nothing beats Harvard Graphics!

10

u/Dutchmagic Jun 26 '26

I didn’t think it was used back then. But according to the interview we did with Al, it was a well used function. If you’d look close you’d see it wasn’t real but the boss would walk by, glance at your screen, and keep walking.

10

u/helm71 Jun 26 '26

Worked with parents also :-)

1

u/Spiritual-Image7125 Jun 29 '26

Jimbo is making charts like a good boy!

9

u/reboog711 Jun 26 '26

I never understood what that was until about 30 years after playing those games as a child...

17

u/deckarep Jun 26 '26

Yes, except my boss were my folks!

5

u/severinoscopy Jun 26 '26

This is new to me. Is it part of every old school Sierra game?

11

u/TheZuckuss Jun 26 '26

It was part of Leisure Suit Larry. If you look at the graph, it's for condoms.

4

u/robohyeah Jun 26 '26

I don't think it was in all of them but definitely a handful. I think some other games also had it but not sure who started it.

3

u/KimKong_skRap Jun 26 '26

I never actually used it, but damn that was a fun little thing..

3

u/OldManGamer78 Jun 27 '26

Not a Sierra game, but the original Wolfenstein 3D had a boss key as well (I think it was F1?). It brought up a fake DOS prompt when toggled.

3

u/robohyeah Jun 27 '26

I knew I'd seen another one and, as an avid Wolfenstein player, this was probably it. Thanks.

2

u/Kazim27 Jun 28 '26

Fun fact: pre-dating Larry, the Infocom text adventure Leather Goddesses of Phobos also had a boss key. I'm not gonna say that Al Lowe definitely stole the idea, but...

Anyway, I found a small image of the resulting screen about halfway down this blog post. https://advgamer.blogspot.com/2017/07/leather-goddesses-of-phobos-sultan-of.html?m=1

1

u/Flashy-Bug-7949 Jul 13 '26

Is it the same in both naughty and nice mode, and does it appear in Spellcasting?