''King's Quest'' is an

adventure game An adventure game is a video game genre in which the player assumes the role of a protagonist in an interactive story driven by exploration and/or Puzzle video game, puzzle-solving. The Video game genres, genre's focus on story allows it to draw ...

developed by

Sierra On-Line Sierra Entertainment, Inc. (formerly On-Line Systems and Sierra On-Line, Inc.) was an American video game developer and publisher founded in 1979 by Ken and Roberta Williams. The company is known for pioneering the graphic adventure game genre, ...

and published originally for the

IBM PCjr The IBM PCjr (pronounced "PC junior") was a home computer produced and marketed by IBM from March 1984 to May 1985, intended as a lower-cost variant of the IBM PC with hardware capabilities better suited for video games, in order to compete mor ...

in 1984 and later for several other systems between 1984 and 1989. The game was originally titled ''King's Quest''; the subtitle ''Quest for the Crown'' was added to the game box in the 1987 re-release, but did not appear in the game. It is the first official part of the long ''

King's Quest ''King's Quest'' is a graphic adventure game series, released between 1980 and 2016 and created by the American software company Sierra Entertainment. It is widely considered a classic series from the golden era of adventure games. Following th ...

'' series (not counting 1980's ''

Wizard and the Princess ''Wizard and the Princess'' (also ''The Wizard and the Princess'', with a leading article) is a graphic adventure game written for the Apple II and published in 1980 by On-Line Systems. It was the second title released in the '' Hi-Res Adventure ...

''), in which a young knight, Sir Graham, must save the Kingdom of Daventry to become the king. Designed by

Roberta Williams Roberta Lynn Williams (; born February 16, 1953) is an American video game designer and writer, who co-founded Sierra On-Line with her husband, game developer Ken Williams. In 1980, her first game, ''Mystery House'', became a modest commerci ...

, the game was revolutionary and highly influential in the evolution of the

graphic adventure game An adventure game is a video game genre in which the player assumes the role of a protagonist in an interactive story driven by exploration and/or Puzzle video game, puzzle-solving. The Video game genres, genre's focus on story allows it to draw ...

genre by introducing more detailed graphics and animation. An official remake titled ''Roberta Williams' King's Quest I: Quest for the Crown'' was released in 1990. An unofficial remake was released by Tierra Entertainment in 2001.

Gameplay

''King's Quest'' features interactive graphics that were an enormous leap over the mostly static rooms of previous graphical

interactive fiction '' Interactive fiction, often abbreviated IF, is software simulating environments in which players use text commands to control characters and influence the environment. Works in this form can be understood as literary narratives, either in the ...

. Earlier typical

s present the player a pre-drawn scene, accompanied by a text description. The player's interaction consists entirely of typing commands into the game's parser, then reading the parser's response, because the on-screen graphics rarely change except when the player moves to a new location. ''King's Quest'' is the first adventure game to integrate graphical animation into the player's view of the game world. This shifts the focus away from the static scenery, to the player's character, which is animated on-screen. Animation sequences are in most player interactions reachable through the normal course of exploration. For example, animation sequences show Graham picking up objects from the ground, opening doors, and wading through water. Depth perspective is simulated; Graham can walk behind objects, causing his character to be hidden from view, or walk in front of them, obscuring the object. This attention to graphical animation, commonplace in

action game An action game is a video game genre that emphasizes physical challenges, including hand–eye coordination and reaction-time. The genre includes a large variety of sub-genres, such as fighting games, beat 'em ups, shooter games, and platform gam ...

s, earned ''King's Quest'' the distinction as the first "3D-animated" adventure game. The original version of the game relies primarily on textual input as its interface. As the player uses the keyboard to explore the game world, the on-screen character, Graham, is animated walking to the chosen destination. The fantasy world of Daventry consists of an 8×6 cyclic array of screens (or rooms) that make up the outdoor world in which the player can navigate freely, plus about 30 additional screens for indoor, sky, and underground places. ''King's Quest''s innovation includes 16-color graphics for the IBM PC platform. The game uses the

PCjr The IBM PCjr (pronounced "PC junior") was a home computer produced and marketed by IBM from March 1984 to May 1985, intended as a lower-cost variant of the IBM PC with hardware capabilities better suited for video games, in order to compete mor ...

and

Tandy 1000 The Tandy 1000 is the first in a line of IBM PC workalike home computer systems produced by the Tandy Corporation for sale in its Radio Shack and Radio Shack Computer Center chains of stores. Overview In December 1983, an executive with Tandy C ...

Video Gate Array Tandy Graphics Adapter (TGA, also Tandy graphics) is a computer display standard for the Tandy 1000 series of IBM PC compatibles, which has compatibility with the video subsystem of the IBM PCjr but became a standard in its own right. PCjr grap ...

and enhanced sound, and

Color Graphics Adapter The Color Graphics Adapter (CGA), originally also called the ''Color/Graphics Adapter'' or ''IBM Color/Graphics Monitor Adapter'', introduced in 1981, was IBM's first color graphics card for the IBM PC and established a de facto computer display ...

(CGA) computers can display 16-color graphics with

artifact colors Composite artifact colors is a designation commonly used to address several graphic modes of some 1970s and 1980s home computers. With some machines, when connected to an NTSC TV or monitor over composite video outputs, the video signal enc ...

on a composite color monitor or television. Selecting

RGB The RGB color model is an additive color model in which the red, green and blue primary colors of light are added together in various ways to reproduce a broad array of colors. The name of the model comes from the initials of the three additiv ...

mode at the title screen instead results in the usual 320×200 CGA graphics mode, limited to 4 colors. In this mode,

dithering Dither is an intentionally applied form of noise used to randomize quantization error, preventing large-scale patterns such as color banding in images. Dither is routinely used in processing of both digital audio and video data, and is often ...

simulates extra colors. Like previous static-screen Sierra adventures, ''King's Quest'' uses vector graphics rather than pre-rendered bitmaps, which would take far too much disk space. Each screen is drawn line-by-line and painted in. This technique is in all Sierra adventure games up to ''

King's Quest V ''King's Quest V: Absence Makes the Heart Go Yonder!'' (also known simply as ''King's Quest V'') is a 1990 graphic adventure game by Sierra On-Line. Originally released in November 1990, it featured a significant improvement in graphics (achieved t ...

''.

Plot

''King's Quest''

In the original version for the

, the story is simple. The Kingdom of Daventry is suffering from recent disasters and hardship. King Edward calls his bravest knight, Sir Grahame, to his throne, and tells him he has heard of three legendary treasures hidden throughout the land that would end Daventry's troubles. If Grahame succeeds, he will become king. In later releases, the knight's name was changed to Graham.

''King's Quest: Quest for the Crown''

Since the game's fourth release (1984) and the repackaged fifth release (1987), the backstory was greatly expanded. The Kingdom of Daventry is in serious trouble, after its precious magical items have been stolen. One day, King Edward the Benevolent rescued a beautiful young Princess Dahlia of Cumberland, but on the night of their wedding she was discovered to actually be an evil witch who stole the king's treasure. Knowing that he had to save the kingdom, the dying King Edward sends his bravest knight, Sir Graham, to Cumberland. His quest is to rid the land of the treacherous witch, outwit the other assorted villains, and retrieve the three lost treasures. Because he had no heir, if Graham should succeed, he would become the next king. Sir Graham embarked upon a quest for the items through Daventry, climbing a magic

bean A bean is the seed of several plants in the family Fabaceae, which are used as vegetables for human or animal food. They can be cooked in many different ways, including boiling, frying, and baking, and are used in many traditional dishes th ...

stalk to the Land of the Clouds where he recovered the chest of gold, facing leprechauns to retrieve the shield and a dragon to get back the mirror. After retrieving all the items, Graham returned to the throne room in time to present them to the king before he died. As the king died, he passed on rule of Daventry to Sir Graham as promised.

Development

In late 1982, IBM contacted

for

launch game This list includes terms used in video games and the video game industry, as well as slang used by players. 0–9 A ...

s for its forthcoming PCjr home computer, announced in November 1983. Among the software Sierra developed was ''King's Quest'', the first animated adventure game. To create the interactive animation, the ''King's Quest'' development process deployed a prototype version of what would eventually become the

Adventure Game Interpreter The Adventure Game Interpreter (AGI) is a game engine developed by Sierra On-Line. The company originally developed the engine for ''King's Quest'' (1984), an adventure game which Sierra and IBM wished to market in order to attract consumers ...

(AGI)

game engine A game engine is a software framework primarily designed for the development of video games and generally includes relevant libraries and support programs. The "engine" terminology is similar to the term "software engine" used in the software i ...

. This prototype engine was developed by Arthur Abraham, who was released from the ''King's Quest'' project in the middle of development. Some early reporting on the game referred to the development system as the "Game Adaptation Language" (GAL). In addition to the designer and writer

, six full-time programmers worked for 18 months to complete the game. IBM requested a sophisticated and replayable adventure game, and paid for much of the $850,000 development cost. IBM stated in advertisements that ''King's Quest'' "runs on the IBM PCjr and makes good use of some special PCjr capabilities", with "unusually smooth and realistic" animation and "an impressive variety of sound effects". Its discontinuation of the computer in March 1985 stunned Sierra. Due to the PCjr's poor reception, ''King's Quest'' did not sell very well. With the advantage of the development system, Sierra was able to quickly release versions for the Tandy 1000, standard PCs, and the Apple IIe, which helped propel sales. Self-booting IBM PC compatible versions require 128 KB of memory: The game was re-released for

DOS DOS is shorthand for the MS-DOS and IBM PC DOS family of operating systems. DOS may also refer to: Computing * Data over signalling (DoS), multiplexing data onto a signalling channel * Denial-of-service attack (DoS), an attack on a communicatio ...

in 1986 using Sierra's updated AGI version 2 engine. It was also ported to the

Amiga Amiga is a family of personal computers introduced by Commodore in 1985. The original model is one of a number of mid-1980s computers with 16- or 32-bit processors, 256 KB or more of RAM, mouse-based GUIs, and significantly improved graphi ...

and

Atari ST The Atari ST is a line of personal computers from Atari Corporation and the successor to the Atari 8-bit family. The initial model, the Atari 520ST, had limited release in April–June 1985 and was widely available in July. It was the first pers ...

at the same time, and eventually to the

Sega Master System The is an 8-bit third-generation home video game console manufactured by Sega. It was originally a remodeled export version of the Sega Mark III, the third iteration of the SG-1000 series of consoles, which was released in Japan in 1985 and ...

. This 256K DOS version of ''King's Quest'' lacks some sound effects present in the booter versions, including birds chirping and distinct sounds for each enemy. It also adds some musical cues from ''

King's Quest II ''King's Quest II: Romancing the Throne'' is the second installment in the ''King's Quest'' series of graphic adventure games by Sierra On-Line. It uses the same AGI game engine as '' King's Quest I: Quest for the Crown'' and features King Graham ...

'', including "

Greensleeves "Greensleeves" is a traditional English folk song. A broadside ballad by the name "A Newe Northen Dittye of ye Ladye Greene Sleves" was registered by Richard Jones at the London Stationer's Company in September 1580,Frank Kidson, ''English Fol ...

" replacing the original simple fanfare at the title screen (the original fanfare still plays when the doors of Castle Daventry open). Background pictures are now drawn into an off-screen buffer to avoid the painting effect of the original game. This was not done merely for the sake of tidiness, but because the booter versions inadvertently reveal some puzzle solutions by drawing hidden objects first, followed by scenery. IBM PC compatible versions require 256K memory. All versions were published by Sierra. *November 13, 1986, Version 1.0U: Updated version, says "New version" on the title screen. Displays text in windows. Supports EGA graphics and runs from hard disks as well, although a key disk is required upon startup. Requires DOS 2.0, IBM PC with CGA graphics or PCjr/Tandy 1000. Unique in showing a discolored leaf at the title screen. Sold in the same gray flip-lid box as the 128K self-booting versions, with a gray triangular sticker denoting the 256K version, and a gold sticker stating "Now supports EGA". *May 5, 1987, Version 2.0F, interpreter version 2.425: Adds pull-down menus. Supports

Hercules Hercules (, ) is the Roman equivalent of the Greek divine hero Heracles, son of Jupiter and the mortal Alcmena. In classical mythology, Hercules is famous for his strength and for his numerous far-ranging adventures. The Romans adapted the Gr ...

graphics and modifies the EGA graphics code to run on machines with an 80386 processor. Sold both in the original gray flip-lid box as well as a gold slipcover box. The gold slipcover box adds the sub-title "''Quest for the Crown''" for the first time, even as it is not mentioned in the game itself. First version of the game that was also available on 3.5" 720K disks. *December 1, 1987, Version 2.0F, interpreter version 2.917: Adds support for MCGA graphics. All floppy-disk based releases of the 128K and 256K versions use different forms of on-disk copy protection. Other versions: *1984, Apple IIe & IIc: A version for Apple, based on the self-booting PC/Tandy 1000 version. Requires the 128k IIe or IIc to run. *1986, Amiga/Atari ST: Ports for 68000-based machines based on the 256K PC version 1.0U. *1988,

Apple IIGS The Apple IIGS (styled as II), the fifth and most powerful of the Apple II family, is a 16-bit personal computer produced by Apple Computer. While featuring the Macintosh look and feel, and resolution and color similar to the Amiga and Atari ST ...

: Based on the 256K PC versions, adds PCM sound effects and new music composed by

Al Lowe Albert William Lowe (born July 24, 1946) is an American video game designer, programmer, and musician who developed several adventure games, mostly for Sierra On-Line. He is best known for creating the ''Leisure Suit Larry'' series. He has also ...

. ''King's Quest'' was not ported to the

Commodore 64 The Commodore 64, also known as the C64, is an 8-bit home computer introduced in January 1982 by Commodore International (first shown at the Consumer Electronics Show, January 7–10, 1982, in Las Vegas). It has been listed in the Guinness ...

, the most important computer game platform. Roberta Williams said that the limitations of its graphic system (three colors per 8x8 block) did not permit the level of graphics detail Sierra wanted. In addition, the computer's 64k of memory is too small for the complex AGI engine. She said that she had always wanted to make an adventure game with animation, but it was not possible up to then.

Sega Master System

The 1989 Master System port uses its own engine, with a verb/noun interface similar to early

LucasArts Lucasfilm Games (known as LucasArts between 1990 and 2021) is an American video game brand licensing, licensor that is part of Lucasfilm. It was founded in May 1982 by George Lucas as a video game development group alongside his film company; as ...

games. It has original tile and sprite-based graphics and was published by

Parker Brothers Parker Brothers (known by Parker outside of North America) was an American toy and game manufacturer which in 1991 became a brand of Hasbro. More than 1,800 games were published under the Parker Brothers name since 1883. Among its products wer ...

, who in turn outsourced development to micro smiths, as had been done for ''

Montezuma's revenge Travelers' diarrhea (TD) is a stomach and intestinal infection. TD is defined as the passage of unformed stool (one or more by some definitions, three or more by others) while traveling. It may be accompanied by abdominal cramps, nausea, fever, ...

''. The game is based on the original ''King's Quest'', and shares the puzzles and points-list of that game. Some of the puzzles and rooms have been modified a bit (for example, the boulder covering the dagger rolls a different direction than in PC). An extra item exists — it is now possible to pick up the three-leaf clovers. There are some extra places to die (including a dangerous staircase added to an exit of the Leprechauns' realm). It is non-linear, and the three treasures can be collected in any order, like in the original PC version. Game saves are done through passwords.

1990 remake

''King's Quest I: Quest for the Crown'' is a 1990 remake of ''King's Quest''. This release is the "Enhanced" version of ''King's Quest''. It uses the Sierra's Creative Interpreter (SCI) engine, the same engine used in games such as ''

King's Quest IV ''King's Quest IV: The Perils of Rosella'' is a graphic adventure game developed and released by Sierra On-Line for the MS-DOS, Amiga, Apple II, Apple IIGS, and Atari ST computers in 1988. The player takes on the role of Princess Rosella, daughte ...

''; while it still uses 16-color graphics, it features twice the resolution, and music card support instead of the PC speaker. There are two different box variations for this release: one with the same gold slipcover box as the 1987 256K version 2.0F and a box created specifically for the remake. The game is described as a 1.5 (1 1/2) remake of ''King's Quest I''. The 1990 SCI EGA "Enhanced" version of ''King's Quest: Quest for the Crown'' was announced for the Atari ST line of computers and later canceled. It was announced via ''Sierra News Magazine'' in spring 1991, saying owners could send disk #1 or the front cover of the manual along with a check or money order for $20 to upgrade their copy to the enhanced version.

Collections

Both versions of ''King's Quest I'' have been released in assorted collections beginning with the ''King's Quest 15th Anniversary Collector's Edition'' (1994), followed by the ''King's Quest Collection'' (1995), the ''King's Quest Collection Series'' (1996) and ''Roberta Williams Anthology'' (1997). The 2006 collection lacked the original AGI version of ''King's Quest'', and contained only the SCI remake. This version was released on Steam in 2009. The original AGI version appears in the ''KQ1+2+3'' collection released on GOG, but the SCI remake is not included.

Fan remake

In 2001, the group

AGD Interactive AGD Interactive (AGDI), LLC. is a non-profit company given a fan license to remake Sierra Entertainment's popular classic adventure games from the 1980s and early 1990s. History Founded in 2001 by Britney K. Brimhall and Christopher T. Warren ...

(then known as Tierra Entertainment) released an unofficial remake based on Sierra's 1990 version, updating the graphics to use VGA colors, dropping the parser in favor of an interface that mimics that of ''

'', and full speech - including the voice of the original voice actor for King Graham in Sierra's official

CD-ROM A CD-ROM (, compact disc read-only memory) is a type of read-only memory consisting of a pre-pressed optical compact disc that contains data. Computers can read—but not write or erase—CD-ROMs. Some CDs, called enhanced CDs, hold both comput ...

full-speech versions of ''King's Quest V'' and ''VI'',

Josh Mandel Joshua Aaron Mandel (born September 27, 1977) is an American far-right politician who served as the 48th treasurer of Ohio from 2011 to 2019. A member of the Republican Party, he previously was the Ohio State Representative for the 17th distr ...

. This was later updated with original hand-drawn artwork.

Reception

The Master System version was given an average score of 6 out of 10 by reviewers in ''

Electronic Gaming Monthly ''Electronic Gaming Monthly'' (often abbreviated to ''EGM'') is a monthly American video game magazine. It offers video game news, coverage of industry events, interviews with gaming figures, editorial content and product reviews. History The m ...

'' who highlighted its difficulty and its lack of appeal to

Sega is a Japanese multinational corporation, multinational video game and entertainment company headquartered in Shinagawa, Tokyo. Its international branches, Sega of America and Sega Europe, are headquartered in Irvine, California and London, r ...

fans. The 1990 enhanced version was described by critics and fans alike at the time as "destroying a classic", and was compared to the controversial practice of

colorizing Film colorization (American English; or colourisation [British English], or colourization [Canadian English and Oxford English]) is any process that adds color to black-and-white, sepia, or other monochrome moving-picture imag ...

classic black and white movies. The remake was a critical failure and prevented the release of further remakes in the series. In 2020,

The Strong National Museum of Play The Strong National Museum of Play (known as just The Strong Museum or simply the Strong) is part of The Strong in Rochester, New York, United States. Established in 1969 and based initially on the personal collection of Rochester native Margaret ...

inducted ''King’s Quest'' to its

World Video Game Hall of Fame The World Video Game Hall of Fame is an international hall of fame that opened on June 4, 2015. It is located in The National Museum of Play's ''eGameRevolution'' exhibit; the hall's administration is overseen by The Strong and the Internationa ...

References

External links

* *
The History of ''KQ1''
at Adventure Classic Gaming

on the Sierra Help Pages

on the Sierra Help Pages
Review
in

GAMES Magazine ''GAMES World of Puzzles'' is a puzzle magazine formed from the merger of Games and World of Puzzles in October 2014. The entire magazine interior is now newsprint (as opposed to the part-glossy/part-newsprint format of the original ''Games'') an ...

{{Sierra Adventure Games, King's Quest 1980s interactive fiction 1984 video games Adventure games Amiga games Apple II games Apple IIGS games Atari ST games DOS games Fangames Games commercially released with DOSBox King's Quest Master System games Point-and-click adventure games ScummVM-supported games Sierra Entertainment games Tandy 1000 games Video games about witchcraft Video games set in castles World Video Game Hall of Fame Video games developed in the United States Single-player video games