King's Quest: A Knight to Remember Review

Just hearing the name “King’s Quest” is enough to take any old-school PC gamer back to the days of DOS-run PCs and spending countless hours in front of one of these point-and-click adventure games, wondering where in the world you need to go to get that damn Mirror (Aye. – Ed. Vader). King Graham of those olde days is indeed back, but not how we remember him. He is now quite the old man, and as he lies on his sickbed, he retells his grand tales of adventure in Daventry to his granddaughter, Gwendolyn. And since he is telling individual stories to Gwendolyn, what better way to present them than in an episodic format? Graham’s first story, A Knight to Remember, captures all of that nostalgia from the days of yore, which means bad puns, crazy puzzle solutions, and a twinge of seriousness. In other words, King’s Quest is back, and it’s back with enough modern glory to appease the young whippersnappers.

In keeping with the current trend of point-and-click adventures, King’s Quest will ask the player to make various choices throughout the game and these will impact what happens to King Graham and Gwendolyn throughout the episodes. Some of these choices are obvious, such as the advice Graham gives to Gwendolyn, and others are quite subtle. For example, in this particular story of Graham’s past, Graham is young and eager would-be knight who has to undergo a series of trials to be accepted in the king’s court at Daventry. One of the trials requires the candidates to retrieve an eye from a hideous beast. There are a few options for Graham, and which one he chooses affects the events of both this episode and what happens down the line. The choice also affects how the townspeople treat Graham. According to The Odd Gentlemen, there are several subtle choices that will affect the storyline that the player won’t realize until trying out multiple playthroughs. I personally can’t wait to experience those differences.

I know I have to do something here and it probably has nothing to do with logic.

It would be a shame to have a game like this without and kings and castles in it.

The choices Graham makes in his stories also affects how Gwendolyn reacts to and handles situations in her own life in the castle. If Graham is compassionate, then it leaves an impression upon Gwendolyn. If he’s sneaky and pulls a few dirty tricks, well, you get the idea.

The original King’s Quest games effectively hurled the player into the frying pan with very little instructions or guidance (You can say that again. I can remember it being one of the most difficult P&C series I ever played. – Ed. Vader). The later games provided slightly better tutorials, but most of the learning with these games was from trial and error, mostly error and a lot of death screens and prayers for a decent save spot. King’s Quest starts a lot like the original games, throwing Graham and the player both into a sticky situation and the player gets to learn on the fly how to think the King’s Quest way. The controls are simple enough (move, interact, talk, open inventory, blah blah blah)—they really haven’t changed much over the last 30 years. Like every other point-and-click adventure, it’s figuring out what items are needed to get other items needed to progress. King’s Quest will make you think, but the solutions to each puzzle are more akin to solving the puzzles in Portal than they are a Tim Schaefer game. I never sat in a daze in front of my monitor, trying to combine objects or throwing every item at every character in desperation to figure out what this game wanted me to do. Many of the solutions were silly, yes, such as using a badger to chase out the squirrels fiercely protecting a pumpkin Graham needed, but nothing was overly convoluted or frustrating. In fact, every puzzle has the solution hinted to it at some point; all it takes is plenty of exploration.

I only experienced frustration when I reached one inescapable dead end. The developers have said that there are no dead ends, but I found one. Due to choosing one particular route early on, I wasn’t able to continue any part of Graham’s quest. I couldn’t explore any further, and I couldn’t purchase what I needed in order to reach new areas. I had nothing in my inventory that anyone wanted, needed, or could use. Since the game only has automatic saves at checkpoints, I couldn’t load a prior save before I made the ill-advised purchase. Ergo, I had to start completely over. I can assure you that it doesn’t take very long to burn through the game when you know what you’re doing.