Once upon a time, Sierra had a substantial reputation for their Adventure games. They had several series that featured over numerous installments and enjoyed much success during their heyday. I myself never really bothered much with them. Yes I played about two installments of the Leisure Suit Larry (keep in mind I was ten/eleven at the time), and I had seen the first Police Quest being played but was largely unfamiliar with the Sierra adventure games.
In the years since, time has not been kind to the Sierra adventure games with most of them being dismissed for obnoxious difficulty, game-killing puzzles (one slightest slip up and it's game over), cheap deaths and solutions to problems that make absolutely no sense whatsoever. Still I was interested to take a look so I may as well try one of the best: King's Quest 6.
Now coming into Kings Quest 6 I had absolutely zero knowledge about the series beforehand - thus leaving me with little idea as to what to expect. And the first thing that struck me about this game was that it was genuine attempt to build a fairy tale within game - something that doesn't happen very often. Okay so the Super Mario and Zelda games may have taken their inspiration from fairy tales whilst Braid and Shadow the Colossus seek to deconstruct them, but for me King's Quest 6 feels genuine in it's attempt to present a prince going around a fantasy world to rescue a princess.
But at the same time, one feels this was trying to deconstruct the fairy tale genre whilst celebrating it. Thus the prince, Alexander, comes across as committed to his quest to the point of tunnel-vision that one starts questioning his mental state. Likewise the princess, Cassima, is revealed to be practical and hardly the type to sit around waiting to be rescued.
In fact a lot has to said for the writing: The characters are well written and likeable, there are some interesting allusions to other fairy tales, the puzzles actually make sense, the humor is well handled (ie the Chess Piece queens) and the climax is actually really exciting.Okay the amount of deaths were stupid but the setting and characters that inhabited it were compelling enough to see me through.
Also, I particularly enjoyed the voice acting - I'm still trying to wrap my head around Alexander being voiced by the same guy with did the Beast from Disney's Beauty and the Beast. And special mention must go to that guy who voices Saladin - He's great!
But I'm not quite sure what to make of the ending theme though ("Girl in the ToWAAAAHHH!!!").
Now considering Sierra's reputation this game didn't cause an epiphany to inspire me to check out more Sierra games. Still, I enjoyed it a lot and its fun to see a genuine fairy tale in gaming - I mean you can't keep shooting zombies forever....
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