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King's Quest 2016

Started by GrahamRocks!, March 14, 2016, 12:28:32 PM

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Numbers

I have no mouth, and I must scream.

GrahamRocks!


kyranthia

Yes, it was very cute.  Short, but cute.  :)

GrahamRocks!

Well, it's an Epilogue. I wasn't expecting it to be all that long.

Numbers

Now that it's all released, I'm finally interested in watching a full walkthrough of the game. Would you say that the chapters got shorter as they went? I just want to be prepared in case Chapters 4, 5 and the Epilogue each take less than an hour to beat.
I have no mouth, and I must scream.

GrahamRocks!

Chapter one is definitely the longest one at around 10 hours iirc. Chapter two is around six. Chapters three and four are around three to four hours I think. And chapter five I haven't gone through it again so I don't know how long it would take once you know what you're doing. Epilogue of course isn't very long.

Jack Stryker

I just now played the epilogue.  It was a pretty nice story, but...

[spoiler]I feel like the shot of Alexander and Valanice watching should have been saved until the very end and we should have seen them smiling at her.  And I still wish we could've gotten to see Cassima and Edgar at least once each, during the series.[/spoiler]

jen

Quote from: Numbers on December 23, 2016, 11:20:05 AM
Now that it's all released, I'm finally interested in watching a full walkthrough of the game. Would you say that the chapters got shorter as they went? I just want to be prepared in case Chapters 4, 5 and the Epilogue each take less than an hour to beat.

 

Numbers, I have a full walkthough (Epilogue just added)    https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLrWwuQDIdduqMiyM8mhou1OFGRNJDdqMM

Numbers

Thanks, I'll give it a watch. It'll be a while before I finish the playlist, so hang tight til then.
I have no mouth, and I must scream.

GrahamRocks!

I'm assuming you're only going down one path instead of all three?

kyranthia

Is anyone trying to get all the achievements in the game?  I got 37/53 myself.  I think i may go back and replay at least some parts to get more of them.

GrahamRocks!

I have all of them except one. Need help?

kyranthia

Quote from: GrahamRocks! on January 09, 2017, 05:03:13 AM
I have all of them except one. Need help?

Sure.  :)

Would it be easier to list off the ones I have or is there a list of all the achievements out there already?

GrahamRocks!

Eh, go ahead and list them. There are lists out in the internet, but there's also a lot of achievements.

kyranthia

I found a couple more while starting to replay Chapter 1.

Here's what I had so far:  (I used spoiler text since I kept in the descriptions too.)

[spoiler]
Misteak
Fed a steak to a Wedzel Wolf.

A Secret Entrance
Found a Mysterious Cave Entrance.

In The Mouth of Danger
Walk into a Dragon's Mouth.

Napping on the Job
Took a Brief Nap.

That's the Ticket
Presented an Eye to enter the Tournament.

Strong Minded
Defeated Acorn in the Duel of Strength.

Fast Feather
Defeated Whisper in the Duel of Speed.

The End?
Told the Story about becoming a Knight.

Unicorn Snack Food
Was a Snack for a Majestic Unicorn.

A Prickly Situation
Walked into the Spiniferous Thornweeds.

Helping Hat
Saved a Picnic, Got a Wedzel Patch, Completed the Potion.

Froggy Throat
Tried to Catch a Toad, Got a Frog in Throat.

Distressed Out
Got some air.

The King is in a Cent
Found all gold in Chapter 2.

Booked Em
Found all pages in Chapter 2.

The Lost Unicorn
Reunited two best friends.

Rubble Yell
Escaped the goblin prison.

Cell-ebration!
Escaped without any townspeople taken away.

Medicinal Majesty
Healed Bramble.

The Reign is Just Beginning
Completed Chapter 2.

Girls in the Tower
This tower was built to scale.

Moral Quarreler
Won a game of Moral Quarrel.

Wedzel Wolf Watch Waiver
Spared the life of a Wedzel Wolf.

Gears of Shore
Solved a puzzle on the beach.

Teenaged Townspeople
Discovered 3 portraits of younger townspeople.

Harmonious Husband
Gave the perfect present to Neese.

Perfect Puzzle Partner
Gave the perfect present to Vee.

And They Lived...
Completed Chapter 3

Staring Superstar
Lasted as long as I could in the staring contest.


Road Trip Warrior
Won the road trip game.

Line Stepper
Solved the first Ice Palace puzzle.

Labyrinth Legend
Solved the Ice Labyrinth.

Ice Shaver
Shot an arrow at an Ice Guard.

#1 Daventry Dad
Completed Chapter 4.

Golden-Ager Graham
Sought treasure as an aged adventurer.

Treasure Trolled
Honored the bridges of the past.

Music Minded
Remembered a forgotten tune.

Escaped Elder
Escaped the Tournament Theater.

Quick Minded
Proved your mind is still quick.

Dancing Dead
Tickled the ivories of a bone xylophone.

Still Strong Minded
Proved your mind is still strong.

Papa Puzzler
Defeated all the puzzles on The Floating Island.  [/spoiler]

GrahamRocks!

Chapter 5 took about 2 and half hours for me to beat smoothly (AKA I know what I'm doing now! Yay!) and the Epilogue took around 20 minutes. I finally got that last achievement too! So the game (not counting the Epilogue here) takes 24-26 and a half hours, with the Epilogue making it 24-26 and fifty minutes. Not exactly the longest game in the world, but not something I'd say you can do in a single sitting, playing each episode back to back, either. Just letting you know, Numbers. :)

Anyway, Kyranthia. Hmmmm... Looks like you're missing...

[spoiler]
-Chapter 1.-
Opening Knight- Open the door to Achaka three times. (You do this when you're doing the archery tail shield puzzle thing)

Purple Badger Don't Care- A Dyed Badger ate Bees. (You have the opportunity to dye quite a few things purple before the tournament- a Pumpkin, the Starberries, the Sugarshrooms, and of course, the Badger. You get this achievement specifically when you knock down the beehive onto the picnic table, and you can actually the Badger on the Bees. It doesn't get rid of them, but the achievement as well as Graham's "Ew!" line is a reference to that famous Honey Badger video)

Dead End Dancer- Danced in the Dark. (Before you follow Achaka down to the "Watch me!" jumping puzzle in The Well, try retracing your steps that you took in the Prologue and you'll get a scene at a certain spot)

Horn Blower- Blew on many horns. (You get this by blowing multiple times on the various horns you find in Daventry. Just keep doing it on the same one until Graham stops talking and just the animation plays instead of a cutscene, and then move on to the next until Graham specifically says, "I should get a trophy or an achievement for how many times I blew on that horn!" and you'll get it)

Graham the Basilisk- Walked on Water. (You get this during the puzzle involving getting across the river, before making your raft. There's a patch of grass right by the river, next to the rocks you jumped across to get the guards' attention away from their post, that you can walk into and use a hidden path to walk across the river, and you'll get an achievement)

-Chapter 2.-
A Royal Pain in the Rear- Tummy troubles. (Got the Poisoned Sweetycake from Wente? Try eating it and see what happens!)

-Chapter 3.-
A Poisonous Snake!- Watch out, Graham! (You get this by refusing to help baby Cedric enough times by walking to the right, past the owl family, and you'll eventually hear Graham rant about Cedric and then you need to go right one more time and you'll get the achievement)

-Chapter 4.-
Disobedient Dad- Don't make me turn this story around! (You get this as soon as you arrive in Tanalore/Avalon if you avoid picking up the luggage and instead walk down the path enough times)

Pestering Padre- Pestered the Prince. (You get this during one of the puzzles in the Labyrinth, IIRC it's either the hidden path one with the ice spikes or the first sliding puzzle, keep talking to Alexander until you get the achievement)

Fostering Father- Heard everything Alexander has to say. (This is a difficult one because you need to keep talking to Alexander on *every* screen he's in and able to be talked to, until he either starts repeating his dialogue or you can't talk to him anymore, and it can be an easy one to miss if you don't keep track. This begins at King's Glen and ends at the flipping block pushing puzzle IIRC)

-Chapter 5.-
Raisin the Dead- Found some very old pastries. (This is the last achievement that I had to get, and it's quite easy. Like Dead End Dancer, try retracing your steps through Daventry before heading off towards The Well. Think back to how chapter 1's Daventry was laid out, map wise. What's missing?)
[/spoiler]

Numbers

Carrying over from this thread, I have things to say regarding Chapter 2-5, plus the Epilogue.

What made this game frustrating for me was that there was stuff in there that I actually got invested in. Chapter 3 was by far my favorite. But there were so many other things that I didn't like. For me, if the ending to Chapter 3 was TOG's KQ's Crowning Moment of Awesome, Alexander saying "I can't even" in Chapter 4 was its Dethroning Moment of Suck. In fact, Alexander in general in that chapter is the straw that broke the camel's back for me. I hated his voice, his mannerisms, and overall attitude. So that makes the number of interpretations of Alexander I like to...still none of them.

But my least favorite part of this game was, oddly, not the portrayal of Alexander, nor the portrayals of the other heroes. It was the villains. Read the spoiler text below for more details, as they go more in-depth, along with, obviously, spoilers.

[spoiler]Why are these villains so nonthreatening? I never felt any sort of tension when they were onscreen. Wallace Shawn's voice isn't intimidating in the slightest--not when he's in his goblin knight form, not when he's a cat, not even when he's in full Manannan mode. I would've accepted it if they altered his voice slightly when he was in his human form, but he still sounds like Wallace Shawn. And Wallace Shawn isn't scary.

Then there's the Goblin King. Was he even in more than one scene? I barely remember him. Although other characters (seemingly) got axed off in that chapter, I never felt Graham himself was in any danger.

Hagatha's up next, and I'll admit something straight up: I sorta like her design. It looks suitably slimy and grotesque. That being said, she's no more threatening than the other antagonists. There's giving your villain fatal flaws such as pride or arrogance, and then there's making her not only too weak to be a physical threat, but also too stupid to tell the difference between a man and a woman. Once again, Graham is in no danger. It doesn't help that she, like most other antagonists in this game, has a change of heart and is no longer an enemy to Graham by chapter's end.

Chapter 4 gives us the Sphinx--Manny in disguise, of course--who is probably the most legitimate threat thus far. Unfortunately, the Sphinx in this chapter works much like how Manny worked in Chapter 1, wherein the villain is inadvertently helping the hero along rather than just killing him right off the bat, like something from a James Bond movie. If the villains in the original KQ franchise were as stupid as Manny, they might as well have just had you play as Connor in each game, because even a meathead like him could out-think Manny. (Namely, by not playing along with him and just beating him to death bare-handed. Gotta take out the trash one way or another, eh, Connor?)

In Chapter 5, it rapidly becomes clear that the main antagonist is not Manannan, but the plot of Logan, as Graham's memories fade in and out in whichever manner is the cheapest to animate. Although, I'm not sure...it might have actually been more work to track down 2D sprite artists at the last minute. Also, Mordack is still alive because I guess he hid in the floorboards and he's really not such a bad guy after all and he just needed a friend. Point being, he falls victim to the same trap that Hagatha falls into--what could have been a great bad guy ends up becoming a good guy because the plot says he has to. There was literally nothing stopping him from killing Graham as soon as Graham stormed up to him--or rather, shuffled up to him (Graham can't move as quickly as he used to, as established). Nor was there anything stopping Manny from killing Graham directly in the final...showdown?...in fact, as soon as he tries, the plot demands that Mordack be a hero and save him, leaving Graham with almost no legitimate wins against his foes besides maybe the Goblin King.

And in the Epilogue, the main villain is...Achaka's great grandniece or something--I don't know, I only saw it once. But she's also not a bad guy, she's just engaging in the unhealthy habit of How to Maim Your Dragon. (Sounds like the title of a Seltzer and Friedberg movie.) It's okay, though, she'll turn to your side like literally every other antagonist in the series has up to that point, barring Manny, and maybe, just maybe, learn the true meaning of Christmas.

That's why the plot didn't work for me. There's no sense of danger in this game like there was in the original run. In the original run, you were lucky if you successfully made it from one side of a screen to the other, because anything bad that could possibly happen would most definitely happen. In this one, there are huge stretches of time where nothing happens, and you're stuck with incredibly dull puzzles in the meantime. *cough* Chapter 4 *cough* In fact, the final round of puzzles on the floating island in Chapter 5 could be the most boring part of the entire game. Even Mordack looks like he'd rather be anywhere else. I interpreted his rescuing Graham as his way of saying that he was sick to death of Manny's obtuse puzzles and would do anything to get away from them.

With all that being said, what did I actually like?

For one thing, the music is actually quite nice. There are cool little callbacks to the main theme of KQ5, along with a beautiful rendition of the Sierra fanfare played at an appropriate moment in Chapter 5. Also, I've never liked Girl in the Tower, so hearing a version of it that actually sounded kind of cool during Chapter 3 was a miracle.

The hand-painted backgrounds also look very good. It's kind of a shame that they're just that--hand-painted backgrounds--and we get stuck with the ugly design of the actual characters in the foreground.

In Chapter 3, I liked that Graham had grown up a bit, and wasn't nearly as wimpy as he was in the first two chapters. He obviously still didn't think things through in the intro to the chapter, but he had much more self-confidence and restraint, which is why his goofy characterization in Chapter 4 was a big step backwards. In fact, I don't think I liked any of the royal family during Chapter 4. And in the present day, Gwen and Gart spent the whole chapter hating each other. As I said before, Chapter 4 is unpleasant.

But we're talking about the positives here, and moving on from 4, we have Chapter 5, which is the most beautifully bizarre chapter in the series. It was obvious that TOG had run out of money by the time this chapter came out, but it was presented in a unique enough way that it satisfied me. Seeing random screens turning into a white void, the visuals of Daventry in flames, and yes, those retro scenes, were all pretty cool to look at. And it makes sense to me that the climax would be right back in Daventry, where everything started.

(That's one of my complaints about TSL, incidentally; even though it was originally supposed to be the finale of all things KQ, way too much time is spent on the Land of the Green Isles, and as of yet, we still haven't seen any of Daventry. Hopefully the Dreamworlds in Episode 5 will help.)

Finally, Grahampa seeing Achaka's ghost right before he slipped away into the unknown brought everything full circle. I imagine Graham's last words being "Screw you, Valanice. Achaka was my one true love."

As for the Epilogue...I'll be honest, I didn't enjoy any of it. Seeing everything go right back to being goofy in tone again after the more mature subject matter of Chapter 5 rubbed me the wrong way.[/spoiler]

So, that's my stream-of-consciousness "quickie" on the remaining chapters. I didn't go in depth this time, because I'll be honest, I haven't slept for the last 48 hours, and lack of sleep does wonders for one's disposition and coherency. See ya later, I'm going to bed.
I have no mouth, and I must scream.

GrahamRocks!


Numbers

Well, clearly, my favorite is the hidden third princess that Daventry wishes was in the game.

On a more serious note, probably Neese. She surprisingly was feisty and spunky without being annoying. Vee acted like she had a stick up her butt. It's telling that when you start the fourth chapter from scratch, it automatically defaults to Graham being married to Neese instead of Vee.
I have no mouth, and I must scream.

GrahamRocks!

I'm genuinely surprised!  :o

I mean, I love Neese too, and she's my headcanon wife alongside a Compassion aligned Graham, but considering that she's got a similar goofy personality to Graham when he was younger, which you disliked, I figured that you'd go for Vee since she's more serious and mature. Not that I would have minded if you said Vee, I like her as well because she's snarky and punny (and puns are my favorite type of humor), just not as much as Neese.

"Is that a randomly placed raw steak in the middle of the woods?! If it's not nailed down, we grab it!" is the line that sealed the deal for me and I KNEW she was perfect.

I'd respond to the rest of your post, but I'm tired ATM. I'm glad we both have the same favorite chapter, though!