Posted February 25, 2010
i know, i know.
"then why do i give it 4 stars?"
I'll explain after my quick review...
If you don't have an opinion about the king's quest series already, it probably means that you didn't play computer games in the 1980's.
If there is a "beatles" of adventure games, king's quest is it, in both popularity and universal critical acclaim.
So, obviously, king's quest had to do a lot of things right to get so much praise, and is deserving of it's good name on many levels; it is an innovative series in terms of puzzle and programming complexity, and it always pushed an interesting narrative to add some retro literary value to the text game community. This all had the pleasant effect of entertaining many older game fans and newer fans alike.
The 4 stars, well, the reason I gave it 4 stars is that, like the beatles, king's quest was all about being super accessible to pop culture.
King's Quest was a series designed to cater to the largest number of folks possible, and absolutely failed to ever tackle any really serious territory, or take any risks with it's audience.
While this approach, when done well, can yield really great results for profits, general recognition, and popularity, it is not the ideal approach for innovation.
For me, the "perfect" adventure game is something closer to "Quest for Glory," or the monkey island series.
Don't get me wrong, i LOVED playing king's quest, but i don't need to play them again, and I am also long done with the beatles.
people are different, and have different comfort zones; i prefer to be taken a little more "off guard" with art and leisure mediums and i do not have the patience for the formulaic as much i used to.
"then why do i give it 4 stars?"
I'll explain after my quick review...
If you don't have an opinion about the king's quest series already, it probably means that you didn't play computer games in the 1980's.
If there is a "beatles" of adventure games, king's quest is it, in both popularity and universal critical acclaim.
So, obviously, king's quest had to do a lot of things right to get so much praise, and is deserving of it's good name on many levels; it is an innovative series in terms of puzzle and programming complexity, and it always pushed an interesting narrative to add some retro literary value to the text game community. This all had the pleasant effect of entertaining many older game fans and newer fans alike.
The 4 stars, well, the reason I gave it 4 stars is that, like the beatles, king's quest was all about being super accessible to pop culture.
King's Quest was a series designed to cater to the largest number of folks possible, and absolutely failed to ever tackle any really serious territory, or take any risks with it's audience.
While this approach, when done well, can yield really great results for profits, general recognition, and popularity, it is not the ideal approach for innovation.
For me, the "perfect" adventure game is something closer to "Quest for Glory," or the monkey island series.
Don't get me wrong, i LOVED playing king's quest, but i don't need to play them again, and I am also long done with the beatles.
people are different, and have different comfort zones; i prefer to be taken a little more "off guard" with art and leisure mediums and i do not have the patience for the formulaic as much i used to.