While the classic Sierra adventures were part of my childhood in some way, somehow I’ve never played the original King’s Quest games to this day. I know quite a bit about the series and I do own it on GOG since forever ago, but for one reason or the other I’m yet to finally play them. The new game (well, it’s an episodic title from 2015-2016, so it’s not new anymore) didn’t quite interest me at first because I thought it would be yet another attempt to create a Telltale-type adventure with a bunch of QTEs, limited choices (which are far less meaningful than what they want to look) and all the other pitfalls of the type of games. The opening of the very first episode (they’re called Chapters here) only confirmed my expectations, so I’ve ignored this title for years. Until I’ve seen a few reviews that got my interest piqued and I’ve decided to give the game a go. Boy am I glad that I did.
The framing device of the game is perfectly handled. The concept is very simple – every Chapter of the game is a story the very old King Graham (main character of the original series and of this one) tells to his grand daughter (who is a new character). All of these stories contain retellings of the events from the original games, but with lots of changes and new twists. In-canon, all of the games did happen in some way, but have since became stories and legends, so even the events of these chapters aren’t necessarily “real events”, and are rather just an interpretation told by Graham, tweaked for the occasion. And while I fully expect to have missed lots of references that fans of the original series would be absolutely crazy about, this framing means that both new and old players can enjoy the story.
And what a wonderful story it is. I did not expect this at all from the opening, but the game manages to be some of the strongest and best written adventure narratives I’ve ever seen in a video game, and, frankly, other mediums as well. It starts as a simply wonderful and charming adventure with incredibly obvious references to The Princess Bride (to the point that one of the key characters in the series is voiced by one of the actors from the movie) and, if I’m being frank, it feels as witty and well done as The Princess Bride was. But then, as the chapters progress, the game becomes so much more. So many really serious topics are brought up in the most natural fashion, fitting the fairy-tale adventure of the games. You get to love and understand the characters and by the ending chapters it’s impossible to not get emotional.
The gameplay becomes far more involved as well. While it does have several really boring text-book QTE sections that are simply unfun, vast majority of them are in the first Chapter. Apparently, after an extremely negative reaction to them, the later chapters were seriously redesigned in terms of gameplay and while it is a genuine shame some of the work was apparently scrapped due to this, it improved the series for the better. Every chapter has some sort of a “gimmick” to them, a thing that makes the basic inventory collecting and puzzle solving adventuring feel fresh and different. Even if it never gets more clever than what you get in Chapter 2. Lots of problems have several solutions, there are consequences to the player choices which shape the characters and it flows really well.
Until it doesn’t and a really fun section suddenly turns out to be a puzzle with a fail state. While so many sections of the game are really well executed, there are numerous spots in the game where the pacing just dies. You would be doing something fun, with the narrative keeping momentum and then suddenly a pointless puzzle, which requires you to slowly run around several locations an has no clear solution until after you’ve wasted some of your time. Chapter 5 is, probably, the worst offender in this regard simply because of how heightened and emotionally invested the story becomes only to be stopped dead in its tracks for an hour of non-stop puzzles or something of the sorts. The game constantly recovers from these missteps, but at the same time it does them at the most inopportune times, seriously affecting the enjoyment.
Though, the worst thing about King’s Quest right now, I suppose, is that one piece of content that was previously available is simply not available anymore. The Epilogue or Chapter 6 was originally included only for those who bought a special edition of the game and not only it was never made available separately, the special edition was taken off sale as well. Which means that the said extra chapter, with all of the work put into it, all of the unique things it had, however short it was, is just lost in time. Just because Activision.
King’s Quest has a rough beginning, but it is a wonderful adventure game and an adventure story with a lot of wit, a lot of heart and a lot of strong writing. And I would strongly encourage checking it out.