Kings Quest I - Quest for the Crown

Title             Kings Quest I - Quest for the Crown
Genre             Adventure
Company           Sierra
Players           1
HD Installable    Yes, see the end of this review
Compatibillity    All(?)
Submission        jfroholt@online.no (Joachim Froholt)

Review
In 1983, a group from IBM approached Sierra and told them that they were
coming out with a new computer, the PCjr. To help launch this computer
into the market, they needed a great new game which would show what this
new amazing computer was able to do. They told Sierra that they would fund
the development of this game as well as feature it in their tv-adverts. As
Sierra was in deep financial trouble at the time, they were very excited
with IBM's proposal, and accepted it. A year later, Kings Quest was
finished. It was immediately the industry's hottest game - with ground
breaking graphics and gameplay. Instead of being limited to still
pictures, this game featured a character you could control with the
joystick as he walked around in the animated game world (He could even
walk BEHIND objects!!).

The story goes like this: The kingdom of Daventry was once rich and
prosperous. This was because they had three great treasures: A magic Chest
filled with an endless supply of gold, a magic Mirror that had the power
to show the future, and a Shield which made it's bearer and his army
invincible. But, these items were lost and Daventry grew poor and weak.
Fearing that the country would fall into even greater disorder when he
died, the old and weak King Edward sent for his favourite Knight, Sir
Graham. He told him that if he could retrieve the three magic treasures,
he would become king when Edward eventually died.

You play the role as Sir Graham as he explores the kingdom of Daventry in
search of the three treasures. You can control him using a joystick or the
cursor keys. Whenever you want him to do something, you will have to type
it. If, for instance, you want him to climb a tree, you have to move him
close up to the tree and type CLIMB TREE. Unfortunately, the game doesn't
pause when you start typing a command. Because of this, you sometimes have
to type very quickly and avoid spelling mistakes at all costs.

As this is an adventure, there are plenty of puzzles. They are often very
simple (probably due to memory restrictions, as the PCjr only had 256 kb
ram), but they can still be difficult. Some of the puzzles have been
inspired from various fairy tales and folk stories. The logic of the
puzzles varies greatly, and if you don't know many fairy tales you will
have great difficulties.

Unlike many adventure games, you can actually die in Kings Quest. In some
ways, this is good, as it adds some tension to the game. Unfortunately, in
KQ you die far too often. It is very easy to step just a little bit wrong
and end up dead. This is extremely annoying in the long run.

The game world isn't very believable. The kingdom of Daventry is very
small and there are few characters to interact with. Character interaction
is also far too simple. It doesn't seem as Sierra put much thought into
where they placed the various important locations, as they are scattered
around in a very unconvincing manner. The biggest flaw (for me at least)
is that there are no barriers where the game world ends. When you go north
several times, you will eventually arrive at your starting point. This is
strange and extremely unrealistic.

As I said before, this game was created for the PCjr. Unfortunately, the
Amiga version is practically identical to the PC version. So, the graphics
stinks even by A500 standards. While the game animates smoothly, the
resolution is terribly low and there are only 16 colours on the screen.
The less said about the sound the better.

The commands you use to control Sir Graham are very simple. Again, this is
probably due to memory restrictions on the PC. Also, Kings Quest
recognizes too few words. This mean that you'll often have to search for
synonymous words when the game doesn't understand you (which happens
often). This can be really annoying, especially if english isn't your
native language.

The important question is: Should you buy this game? I guess this depends
a bit on how desperately you want a new adventure game. Personally, I
wouldn't spend money on this game. Ten years ago I would, but not today.
The best reason for you to get this game is probably because it is such an
important landmark in the world of computer gaming. If you're used to
modern adventures, you won't spend more than an hour with this game before
you reset your Amiga and never load it up again. And if you feel that you
have depleted the Amiga's supply of graphic adventures, I'd advise you to
try some Interactive Fiction games (like some from Infocom) instead of
this. I feel a bit sorry that I'm saying this, because Kings Quest do have
a certain amount of charm, but I just can't see the point of buying this
game in 1999.

*About HD Installation*
Sierra shipped this game with a really painful copy protection. On the KQ
disk you'll find a file with a read/write error. This can't be copied, and
KQ needs it to run. Luckily, a patch can take care of this. You can
download it from the Aminet:
http://ftp.sunet.se/~aminet/dirs/game/patch/KQ1-Fix.lha Note that you
still have to copy to HD manually.

Alphabetical list.