Still, it could be worse! I particularly liked how Graham solved most of his problems here, not simply using wit to compensate for weakness, by doing so without either cheating or casually falling into adventure game sociopathy. and King's Quest isn't subtle about its pilfering, going as far as to hire Wallace Shawn show up to challenge King Graham to a game of wits involving sinister powders and goblet switching.
If you've seen or read The Princess Bride, you'll have a good idea of what the challenges entail. thankfully, a little more complex than just turning a wheel, as in the deathly boring prologue. One involving a rope arrow is particularly clever, as are a couple of sequences involving movement as well as puzzle solving. There's some interesting elements to this, including puzzles with multiple solutions and a smattering of moral choices that may or may not lead to anything interesting later on, but it's generally by the numbers stuff with a few excellent puzzles and set-pieces and mostly terrible QTE sequences that go on too long and are no fun at all. This first episode isn't the most exciting of stories, focusing on Graham's arrival in Daventry and the-oh, what a surprise-three trials he has to perform to become a pirate. It's not Game Of Thrones or anything, and the lack of a meatier story kicking off by the end doesn't offer much momentum for the next episode to coast on, but it does give Graham a much needed sense of nuance and texture and, crucially, drive. What I particularly liked though is that he also learns from the other side-the chances to steal, to do the wrong thing, that being a hero doesn't always end well. That sets a good tone for the rest, with Graham slowly earning respect on both sides of the screen and reinforcing that a hero isn't necessarily the strongest or the swiftest or even the bravest. Only one of them pauses to realise that without him, none of them would ever have made it across. There's a particularly good moment early on where Graham is trying to cross a river, only for every plan to be rudely stolen by the other knights competing with him for a place in the King's court. What primarily stands out in its favour though is how warm the whole experience is, with a real sense of heart. This new Daventry is a bit too happy to sacrifice that, as well as just preferring to wheel out stock fantasy instead of using folk and fairytales. One of the big reasons that King's Quest VI is the most beloved of the series, aside from the Jane Jensen factor, is that its Land Of The Green Isles setting had a strong sense of place and coherency to it.
It's not that King's Quest can't be a place to do gags about tourist traps and the like, though it never has been, but that every one makes it more generic rather than more interesting. For a nostalgia driven game, there’s little real nostalgia.ĭespite all this though, King's Quest still retains a certain amount of the spirit of the originals, not least in offering a sprawling world that can more or less be explored at will, as well as putting far more focus on character and world design the other games ever did-albeit often undercut by far too many modern jokes that don't fit the fantasy mood at all, and endless crap puns that cry out for a Josh Mandel or similar to come in and show the writers how they're meant to be done.
That means no pointing, no clicking, and not much in the way of puzzles. It's designed for gamepad instead of mouse, and an adventure that happily wears action's hand-me-downs-though one that never actually goes beyond the most basic QTEs. Aside from a few references here and there, from specific lines to a very familiar looking tunnel, this King's Quest has basically nothing to do with, cough, 'Master Storyteller' Roberta Williams' rather generously remembered games. New developers The Odd Gentlemen give it their absolute all here, and that includes not relying on nostalgia. Where it succeeds is in being worth rooting for, even during its struggles. The key difference is that by the end of the episode, Graham has learned to fire a bow, while King’s Quest is still struggling with design fundamentals. King’s Quest wants to combine Telltale's current episodic style with a little old-school sensibility. Graham longs to skip straight to being the kind of knight who can cross a chasm by firing a rope arrow across it.
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This reboot of the venerable King's Quest series has much in common with that young Graham-both well-meaning and full of confidence, yet frustratingly green when it comes to basics.
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