King's Quest VI: Heir Today, Gone Tomorrow

The Good
Finally, a King's Quest game that is less linear than the previous titles. There are multiple ways to solve some of the puzzles, and different paths and endings. It's also one of the last of the great breed of graphic adventures that allows the player to become stuck in dead ends and die in many different ways. In this respect, and because some of the puzzles are quite involved, the gameplay and difficulty are on par with most other challenging Sierra games of the day.

The graphics and sound are top-notch. At times I thought the otherwise beautiful hand painted artwork was too disjointed from location to location, though. I thought the art for the previous title -- King's Quest 5 -- was more suitable.

The opening scene was totally amazing in its day, especially on faster 386 or 486 PCs. Additionally, nicely integrated animations help bring out the artwork that serves as the backgrounds throughout the game. The sound is atmospheric, but sometimes a little too quiet, and carries one fatal flaw...the closing theme!

The Bad
GIRL IN THE TOWER. This has to be one of the most solid examples of a game company overextending that I can think of. (short of the FMV nightmare which came a little bit later). Although there are countless worse examples of music, "Girl In the Tower" was as excruciating for me to listen to then as it is for me to remember now, 8 or 9 years later. Go ahead and have a listen, I dare you.

"Girl in the tower, i'm reaching out, please tell me what to do....." Bad. Very bad indeed.

Aside from than that one song, there is not much that is wrong with KQ6. Unfortunately, it also doesn't stand out as being great. KQ6 is one of those games lost in history that few people, other than King's Quest and Roberta Williams fans, will likely want to go back and play. Put simply, there are many better graphic adventures.

The Bottom Line
King's Quest 6 carries this adventure series' storyline off on another tangent, this time as Alexander in the land of the Green Isles. The uninspired story is along the boring lines of 'rescue the princess' and helps put this game squarely on the "Good Games" pile instead of with the memorable classics.