Quest for Glory I: So You Want To Be A Hero

aka: QFG1
Moby ID: 16075
DOS Specs

Description official description

Quest for Glory I: So You Want To Be A Hero is a remake of Hero's Quest: So You Want To Be A Hero.

The remake features 256-color VGA graphics. Locations have been re-drawn, and character portraits appear during conversations. This version also has an icon-based interface instead of the text input of the original, very similar to the one used by Sierra for their adventure titles. The player selects dialogue choices from a dialogue menu, as opposed to typing in conversation topics in the earlier release. A few changes have been made to the dialogue, adding (or altering) some of the easter eggs and references to other games.

Combat now features clay models for the enemies and stop-motion animation. The perspective has been switched to an over-the-shoulder view farther away from the player. Battle commands (two types of attacks, parry, and dodge) are displayed as icons on a shield in the corner of the screen. The player can switch to the spell menu at any time, and also click the middle of the screen to escape from combat.

Spellings

  • 영웅의 길 I: 당신도 영웅이 되고 싶은가 - Korean spelling

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Credits (DOS version)

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Reviews

Critics

Average score: 82% (based on 9 ratings)

Players

Average score: 4.1 out of 5 (based on 52 ratings with 8 reviews)

Yes, sir, I want to be a hero

The Good
The last of the remakes Sierra produced, Quest for Glory is an adventure/RPG hybrid made by the same people that brought us the original game. An unnamed hero enters the town of Spielburg overrun by brigands, and discovers a curse placed on the Baron's daughter by the witch Baba Yaga. And it is up to the hero to find someway to break the curse, even if it takes him days to do so.

I already covered the game mechanics in my review of the original, so I won't go into detail into those here. What I didn't say in that review is that each of the classes offer different solutions to puzzles, but all of them require a certain trait to be built up. For instance, you are supposed to climb a tree so you can collect the Healer's ring from a bird nest. If you try to climb up the tree, you will fail. If you do it often enough, you will be able to climb up in the end.

Being a remake, the game benefits from running on Sierra's newer SCI engine. You direct the character through a point-and-click interface, rather than typing commands. There are actually two icon interfaces. The main one is found by pointing the cursor to the top of the screen, and if you played other Sierra games, you know what that looks like. The secondary icon interface can be found by clicking an icon in the main one, and it is there you can make your character walk, run, sneak, choose to rest for a period of time, or check your statistics out. Both icon interfaces are well designed and I could easily tell what each one does just by looking at the pictures on them.

The hand-painted backgrounds are wonderful, and the animation of each of the characters is smooth. The character portraits were done with clay models, but I didn't like some of them. Baba Yaga looks like the Joker's wife. I love the monster fights. The monsters themselves are drawn and animated nicely. I almost felt sorry for having to kill them.

I enjoyed listening to the game's soundtracks, especially when you go into combat mode. The soundtrack itself blends in with what you are doing. Now, I know I said this in my original QFG reviews as well as my others, but I'll say it again: If you happen to have a Roland MT-32 sound module, you get to hear the soundtrack with real instruments rather than MIDI.

As I said earlier, the game offers different solutions to most of the puzzles, depending on what class you have selected, so it's well worth replaying the game again and taking a different approach. I have the strategy guide, which contains a brief walkthrough and there are specific instructions for each of the classes. There is enough interesting information that already made me play the game at some point.

The Bad
In the original version, when you were in combat mode, you could still type commands in that allowed you to escape or to cast spells at the monsters, among other actions. The remake has none of this. In the remake, however, it has been replaced by eight icons, four which are hidden from you unless you click on the big shield in the middle. I still can't get used to this system, and found out typing commands are much easier for me. Also, when you try to escape, the monster which you are escaping from reappears right next to you, making it hard to run to the next screen. This becomes so annoying if you are escaping because you don't have the health/stamina to kill them. For this reason, you are forced to restore a game and then try again.

Not a lot of effort was put into the ending. It is even worse than the one from the VGA remake of Police Quest. There is no background music, and there is only one closing scene, then there are the credit.

The Bottom Line
If you haven't played the original Quest for Glory, you're not missing out on much. The remake boasts wonderful graphics and a soundtrack. The point-and-click interface may have replaced the text parser, but that's Sierra remakes for you. Any QFG fan should at least try the remake to see whether they like it or not. For me, it's just the new combat system that I found tedious.

DOS · by Katakis | カタキス (43092) · 2015

Almost completely superior... almost

The Good
What's there not to like about the game? The hand painted graphics still hold up almost two decades after the game's original release, the claymation monsters and models would never really get old, and the overall story would be best dubbed a classic.

Compared to the EGA version, the land of Spielburg (contrary to popular myth, is not named after Steven Spielburg, but is a pun: Spielburg means 'game town' in German), is much more alive and easier to explore, with the added benefit of a few new easter eggs (such as finding Earl Sinclair from Dinosaurs) that were more from the early 90's than the late 80's. the level of detail and quality of the artwork is better than the original as well. This wasn't surprising, since Quest for Glory was the last major 'quest' series to be launched by Sierra (though not the very last, EcoQuest held that title, but it wasn't nearly as big as any of the rest), and when they got about to making the remakes, it was the very last game to be remade. For that, I'm wiling to assume that the artists had had enough experience with graphic design to make this game the best looking of the original EGA and VGA remakes.

The interface was also quite good, with the icons looking better than most early sierra VGA games actually. What really was improved dramatically I believe I was the combat. Beyond better graphics, I believe that the game play, while not perfect (The series was never that good on combat mechanics), was much better than the original EGA, which for the life of me, I never quite got. Also the tie-ins from other QFG games and sierra series never fail to put a smile on my face. The dialogue trees were also some of the best in the entire series, if overtly simplistic (but that could be excused by the fact that they are not tied to any in-game event, and as such are available in their entirety from the start). And in my own opinion, the inventory interface is still the best in the series.

The Bad
(Please note that these might contain some spoilers. You have been warned)

I mentioned in my title that I called it 'almost' completely superior. Are there problems? Yes there are, and sadly, many of them are so glaring that they seriously detract from the game play and immersion.

Firstly, in the bad old days of pre-DosBox, there was the Sword Master problem... in the game, as a fighter, you had to beat the sword master to get full points, and since the game ran on it's own clock, if you manage to get the game running without dosbox, it meant that he would move at lightening speed and defeat you before you were able to press the first attack button. Though this has been solved by DosBox, it still annoyed me for years on end before then, and I still resent it quite greatly (while other games had clock issues, none of them had problems of this magnitude).

The other big problems were the potions and goblins 'training' looting bugs. When buying potions of the from the healer, you had to open and close your inventory twice after every purchase to make sure you got it. What I mean is, if you buy two stamina potions in a row, but don't check your invention after every purchase, you will only end up with one potion. Same thing applies to looting the dead goblins you fight in the goblin training grounds screen. If you search one and don't double check your invention, you will only get the money from the latest one you searched. Though this isn't a gamebreaker, this issue makes it rather tedious to perform what is a routine game function.

Another bug (again solved by DosBox, but still annoying) is that Yorick does not leave the maze room even after you explain your purpose there, and unless you adjust the game cycles he would continue to throw things at you to hinder your progress through the maze. In the original game, after telling him/ why you were there, he would leave you alone. It was another notable error.

The graphics issue that almost everyone has experienced... well I suppose I could give it a notable mention, but to be honest I was never bothered by it as a kid, and as an adult, I just like to think it's the effect of the mushrooms that the hero would use to get his mind of the fact that every monster in the forest wants him dead.

But to me, the single biggest problem in the entire game is the dagger bug. In every iteration of QFG, before combat, you could throw daggers at your enemy, and then after combat you could pick them up. This includes QFG EGA, but in the VGA remake, if you throw a dagger at your enemy and then enter combat, that dagger is gone forever. You could avert it by throwing a dagger and then picking it up before combat, but that still does not excuse the original issue.

The Bottom Line
Have you ever wished you could leave the world and all it's problem and embark on a great adventure? Well this is it, and it gives a brilliant and colorful start to a great series of adventure games.

That being said, the game really was an overall great improvement and if it wasn't for the annoying bugs, it would have been a 100% improvement over the original in every way.

DOS · by Salim Farhat (69) · 2011

The start of an great adventure series

The Good
A remake of the original Quest for Glory, this game features improved graphics, a point and click interface, and easier combat. The storyline remains the same as the original game, and features one of Sierra's best musical scores, rivaling the King's Quest series. The character and world graphics are amazingly detailed for their time, and the land of Spielburg has a wide array of different environments to show them off. The point and click interface allows for easier interaction with objects in the world, the inventory menu, and dialogue options. Combat has been changed from keyboard commands to an action bar in the corner that allows you to click on your desired action, making it much easier for someone to just open up the game and start playing.

The Bad
Purists of the original game might find the new combat system a bit watered down from the original. Also, with the new engine came new problems. An occasional graphical glitch can occur for most users, causing the graphics to remain glitched until the user exits the game. Players may also find themselves not knowing what to do next in the game, due to some lack of instruction on where to go or what to do next.

The Bottom Line
The Quest for Glory series is an epic story that spans 5 games, and this is the one that started it all. It is a game that has wonderful storytelling, a diverse character ensemble, and quite a bit of humor that will want you playing the sequel immediately after beating it. If you have a few hours you can just sit down and spend with a game, I would highly recommend this title to any fan of fantasy or adventure games.

DOS · by Aaron Cole (7) · 2009

[ View all 8 player reviews ]

Trivia

Easter Eggs

  • If you walk right, straight out of Spielburg, then back to the Spielburg gates a few times, you'll meet up with the father from the TV series Dinosaurs
  • When you take a look at the lamp in the Kattas Tail Inn, it says "Lamp for rent. Inquire in Quest for Glory 2: Trial by Fire for information."

References

  • Keep clicking the eye icon on the trees, because you'll eventually get one called a "Daventree". This is a reference to Daventry, the main setting of King's Quest.
  • Every now and then when the Gargoyle above Erasmus's house asks "What is your Quest?" (obvious Monty Python joke) one of the answer choices is "I want to be a pirate!" This is, of course, a reference to The Secret of Monkey Island. If you select it, the Gargoyle says "Boy, have you got the wrong game," and sends you back down the mountain.
  • When the gargoyle above Erasmus's house asks the name of the hero, one of the answer options is "Call me Ishmael." This is a reference to Moby Dick.
  • The most common password to the thieves guild in the game is 'schwertfisch'. Schwertfisch is German for swordfish, which in turn is the password to a speakeasy in the Marx Brothers movie Horse Feathers.
  • The town of Spielburg is, of course, named after Steven Spielberg. Sam the beggar also makes a reference to Amblin, which is Steven Spielberg's production company.
  • In Erasmus' house there is a Sarcophagus tied in with a ribbon, called a Lara Bow (a reference to the character Laura Bow from The Colonel's Bequest and The Dagger of Amon Ra).

Information also contributed by Itay Shahar, Leofan93, OceansDaughter, Timo Takalo, and WizardX

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Contributors to this Entry

Game added by Unicorn Lynx.

Macintosh added by Terok Nor.

Additional contributors: PsOmA, Alaka, Pseudo_Intellectual, lee jun ho, Trypticon.

Game added December 27, 2004. Last modified January 20, 2024.