alessandro800 gamers tried to beat an '80s adventure without a walkthrough—only 2 did - Only .25% of players completed the AGAT, the Adventure Game Aptitude Test, designed by fiendish developer Woe Industries.
ArmchairAce1944A very common thing even back then. Finishing a game was not a given. It was an achievement.
‘Maniac Mansion’, depicted in the thumbnail, specifically has pathways for characters to die or the player to be stuck without a recourse — which later adventures avoided, allowing successful completion from any point in the game.
I recently tried playing through it for the first time (on an Android tablet with ScummVM), and pretty sure I hit such a dead end.