>>11877842
It wasn't just a Sierra thing, and it was present throughout, until the genre fell from mainstream popularity. Back then, the lack of fail state in LucasArts games was considered a deliberate design choice to make their games accessible to a younger/more casual audience. Modern gamers simply have no patience for finding out that they fucked up and need to start over, but it honestly was not that big of a deal back then. People didn't sperg out and ragequit the game, they just started over and did better next time.

A somewhat similar situation is how younger gamers these days defend rewind features and savestates in platforming games/re-releases on the grounds that it's a waste of time to have to redo the whole section over again if you fall into a pit or run into something that was off-screen. You can argue with them that it's better to have to redo it and learn from it, but they'll roll their eyes and similarly say that's just bullshit design and there to waste your time. Don't even get them started on lives mechanics.