Leisure Suit Larry’s Last Two Games Leave Steam October 23 — 95% Off Farewell Sale

THE INTERNET

Larry Laffer has survived four decades of changing tastes, shifting platforms, and at least one extremely awkward transition into the modern era. What he apparently cannot survive is licensing paperwork. Publisher Assemble Entertainment announced this week that the last two Leisure Suit Larry games will be delisted from Steam on October 23 — and once they’re gone, the whole series disappears from the store for good.

The announcement came in a Steam news post titled “Larry Is Retiring Soon,” and honestly, the tone lands. “After a fantastic run, Larry is getting ready to hang up his leisure suit,” Assemble wrote. “We’ve had an amazing time bringing Larry back, and we’re incredibly grateful to everyone who joined him on his adventures.” Translation, from publisher to player: get them now or never.

Twelve days left, and a two-dollar goodbye

The delisting covers both of Assemble’s Larry revival games: 2018’s Wet Dreams Don’t Dry, which dragged the aging lounge lizard into the world of dating apps, and 2020’s Wet Dreams Dry Twice, which sent him searching for his missing love Faith across the Kalau’a archipelago. Both are point-and-click adventures in the classic Sierra mold — and both will be unbuyable on Steam after October 23.

Softening the blow: the “Last Chance” discounts began October 9, knocking both games down to $1.99 each from $39.99 — a 95% cut. VGC reports the discount is currently showing in the US ($1.99 / £0.89) and that both games are also discounted on GOG and Switch, though it’s not yet clear whether console storefronts will follow suit with the discount later. For two dollars, this is an absurdly cheap piece of gaming history to put in your library while you still can.

One important note from this week’s other delisting conversation: when games leave a store, people who already own them can still download and play them. Delisting kills the sale, not your library. So the move here is obvious — buy now, play whenever.

The slow vanishing of a comedy legend

This isn’t the first time Larry has started fading from digital shelves. Last year, the first seven games in the series were pulled from Steam: the six Sierra On-Line originals — Larry 1 through 7, skipping the number that doesn’t exist, because there was famously never a Leisure Suit Larry 4 — plus High Voltage Software’s Magna Cum Laude. When those left Steam, they stayed available on GOG. This time around, Time Extension is reporting the delisting will hit GOG too, which makes this one feel more final.

And here’s the sobering math: the only other entry in the series is Team17’s Box Office Bust, which VGC notes isn’t available digitally anywhere. So after October 23, a series that has been selling games on and off since 1987 — a series older than most of the people reading this — effectively has no legal digital storefront presence left. That’s the part that stings.

For context, this isn’t some obscure curio. Leisure Suit Larry was one of the games that defined Sierra On-Line’s golden age, right alongside King’s Quest and Space Quest. The early games were cheeky rather than crude — well, mostly — and the series has outlived every cultural shift that was supposed to kill it. Watching it exit Steam entirely feels like losing a small museum wing.

Why is this happening? Nobody’s saying

Assemble hasn’t given a reason for the delisting, which is pretty standard — publishers rarely explain themselves when games get pulled. But there’s a credible theory floating around from Video Game History Foundation library director Phil Salvador, who weighed in when the first seven games were delisted last year.

Salvador dug up a 2018 Steam message in which an Assemble staffer stated that the Leisure Suit Larry IP was owned by Codemasters and licensed to Assemble for exclusive online distribution rights. Then, in 2021, Electronic Arts bought Codemasters. Salvador’s read: the licensing deal expired or was ended, and Assemble no longer has the rights to sell the games. That would also explain why the series stuck around on GOG — the original message said the licensing deal didn’t include GOG publishing. It’s a theory, not a confirmation, but it’s the kind of theory that makes accountants nod.

Assemble’s own statement doesn’t add much to the mystery. “Unfortunately, we can’t share anything about his future,” the publisher wrote. “Give Larry the farewell he deserves.” Which, fair enough — if they can’t talk about it, they can’t talk about it. But “can’t share anything” has a way of sounding like “the lawyers are in the room.”

More from the newsroom: Daytona USA’s PC port and the preservation debate · this week in games