Sierra On-Line (now Sierra Entertainment) kickstarted the graphic adventure game genre way back in the 1980s with their first few releases Mystery House and Wizard and the Princess. Shortly afterwards came a full adventure game called King’s Quest, which was met with a warm reception and went on to enjoy critical acclaim and eight sequels (with a ninth allegedly in development).
Today we’re lucky enough to be able to enjoy a selection of the Sierra On-Line back catalogue without dusting off floppies or paying a penny. Not only are there some originals online for your retro-inspired pleasure, but there are also a few decent modern remakes and a series of free independent King’s Quest-inspired titles to enjoy as well.
Let’s take a trip down memory lane and spice it up a bit…
Old-School Originals @ Sarien.net
Hosting a smattering of classic Sierra adventure games that you can enjoy from the comfort of your browser, Sarien is the place to begin if you’ve never played any of the original Quest series of games. There are three flavours to enjoy, starting off with King’s Quest: Quest for the Crown. In addition to the original, Space Quest I: The Sarien Encounter and Police Quest: In Pursuit of the Death Angel are also present.
As this is a Sierra-themed vault of video gaming goodness, both The Black Cauldron (a Disney film given the Sierra treatment) and Gold Rush! are included too. We’re very lucky that Sarien is still serving up tasty, retro content as the website came under legal scrutiny from Activision in the past, a blip that took 2 years to resolve.
Why not spend an afternoon pretending it’s still the 80s by watching The Breakfast Club and checking out a few of the links below?
Note: Sarien have a mobile site that is optimized for the iPad, and works a treat.
- King’s Quest: Quest for The Crown
- Space Quest I: The Sarien Encounter
- Police Quest: In Pursuit of the Death Angel
- The Black Cauldron
- Gold Rush!
King’s Quest Remakes by AGD Interactive
Anonymous Game Developers Interactive have been hard at work taking the original King’s Quest trilogy and injecting new life and compatibility into the series with their faithful remakes. Best of all the team have released them for free, and they’re all compatible with both Windows and Mac OS X machines.
Each game is accompanied by its own introduction, FAQ and hints collection, whilst at the same time keeping in-line with the originals despite the obvious changes. For an overview of the third game in the trilogy, check out Angela’s article. Another Sierra adventure game, Quest for Glory II has also been revamped and released for free by AGD Interactive.
You can download full versions of each adventure at the following links:
The Silver Lining
Originally titled King’s Quest IX: Every Cloak Has A Silver Lining, this fan-made continuation of the King’s Quest series was forced to change its name by Vivendi Games and Activision due to its completely unofficial nature (nice try guys).
There are currently three episodes available: What is Decreed Must Be, Two Households and My Only Love Sprung From My Only Hate. Two more additions to the series are planned and slated for a 2011 release, which makes for quite a lot of free entertainment.
You can grab individual episodes from the links below for the Windows operating system:
- Episode 1: What is Decreed Must Be
- Episode 2: Two Households
- Episode 3: My Only Love Sprung From My Only Hate
Conclusion
In many ways it’s a shame that this breed of graphical adventure is endangered. ADG Interactive are attempting to bring back the genre with its remakes and recent seperate commercial release, but 2D adventures are always going to be niche.
If you enjoy this kind of game and would like the opportunity to play more then you’ll probably want to read all about SCUMMVM, a point-and-click adventure game emulator which supports a considerable amount of the Sierra back catalogue.
Do you have any favourite Sierra games? Any favourites from this article? Love your SCUMM? Let us know in the comments!
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