The first journey welcomes us to Daventry in a time of crisis, as King Edward is close to death. Calling forth his bravest knight Sir Graham, he asks that the young man retrieve all three of the kingdom’s magical treasures to restore its prosperity. After retrieving the Enchanted Chest, the Magic Mirror and the Magical Shield, Graham returns to the castle, and is crowned the new king by the ailing monarch.

Originally developed for the IBM PC Jr, the original King’s Quest had no mouse or joystick controls. In order to complete the game, you need to type what you action you want Graham to perform. It was eventually ported to many home computers of the age, with a special version made for the Sega Master System. A fan produced remake was released as freeware in 2001, which used the point and click system introduced later in the series.

After reigning Daventry for some time, King Graham sees a woman named Valanice in his magic mirror, who is being held captive by an evil witch. Travelling to the land of Kolyma, he journeys to collect the three magical keys which unlock the door to where Valanice is being held. After defeating the witch, Graham and Valanice return to Daventry, where she becomes his queen.

King’s Quest II was a much larger game than the first, and still required keyboard input to proceed through the adventure. Unlike Quest for the Crown, it is possible to complete various puzzles in different ways, with some of the solutions reducing your score, rather than increasing it. The same company that enhanced the first game also remade Kings Quest II, and released it in 2002.

The story of the third King’s Quest moves away from Daventry to a small kingdom named Llewdor, where a young man named Gwydion is being kept as a servant by a powerful sorcerer named Manannan. After discovering that a terrible fate awaits him on his eighteenth birthday, he defeats the sorcerer and escapes. After he rescues a princess on his journey, he discovers that he is Alexander, the crown prince of Daventry, and returns home with his sister Princess Rosella.

To Heir is Human is the first game to not star Graham as a playable character, as well as introducing a magic system to the series which allows Gwydion to perform spells and create items which will aid him in his escape. The same company that enhanced the first two games also remade Kings Quest III. The new edition, named Kings Quest III Redux, was released in 2011.

After King Graham falls gravely ill, Princess Rosella, King Graham’s daughter, chooses to journey to find a magical fruit that will save his life. Transported to the world of Tamir by a fairy named Genesta, Rosella is then bribed into working for a wicked witch as she searches for the fruit, and after killing said witch and returning a powerful talisman to Genesta, she is able to return home with her father’s medicine if she so chooses.

Unlike the previous games, a day and night cycle is present in Tamir. Although there are several joke endings in the Kings Quest series, The Perils of Rosella was the first to include a bad ending of sorts by not returning the fruit to Daventry. It was also one of the first PC games to utilise a sound card, instead of requiring hardware built in the computer itself. To date, King’s Quest IV is the only original game to be not remade with a point and click interface.

When Daventry’s royal castle is stolen by a sorcerer named Mordack, King Graham travels to the land of Serenia, where he is told that the man resides. Joining forces with a talking owl named Cedric, Graham travels Serenia in search of the sorcerer, eventually rescuing the castle and his family, defeating Mordack, and liberating Cassima, the princess of the Land of the Green Isles.

King’s Quest V was the first game in the series to use a point and click interface, as well as a full voice track for all game text, affectionately known as a talkie edition. The artwork also evolved, changing from simple coloured sprites to a hand-drawn storybook feel, further immersing the player in the game world.

Prince Alexander travels to the Land of the Green Isles to meet with the princess that his father rescued in Serenia, only to find that she is being held captive by an evil vizier named Abdul Alhazred and his genie Shamir. In order to free the princess, he must solve the problems the vizier has created on each of the land’s four islands, and then return with the knowledge he has gained to set her free.

The sixth entry in the series was co-produced with Jane Jensen, who created Gabriel Knight, another of Sierra’s best known franchises. King’s Quest VI was the first game to feature a Windows and DOS version on the same CD, with the former having higher resolution artwork and movie files. At the end of the story, players were treated to Girl in the Tower, a duet which makes Heir Today, Gone Tomorrow feel more like a romantic adventure movie rather than a video game.

Princess Rosella is tired of her royal life, and does not want to find a man to marry her because of her title. Unfortunately, her mother Valanice is not so accommodating. After falling into the land of Eldritch, the two royals are separated. Rosella is transformed into a troll, whilst Valanice falls into a desert. On their separate journeys, they must find a way to restore Rosella’s humanity, defeat the sorceress Malicia and then return home to Daventry.

King’s Quest VII’s graphics were completely different to anything previously seen, holding more in common with a Don Bluth animated feature than the pixelated watercolour backgrounds used in V and VI. Rosella also breaks into song at the beginning of the game, drawing further comparison to the animated films that were popular at the time of its release. There were fewer side quests in The Princeless Bride, but it is possible to achieve two endings, depending on your actions in the final cut scene.

The final game in the original series does not feature any of the royal family as playable characters. Instead, you are cast as Connor, a young knight who is tasked with restoring Daventry’s rulers from an evil curse that has left them petrified. After finding the legendary Mask of Eternity, Connor takes it to the top of the highest point in the Realm of the Sun, which restores everything back to normal.

Mask of Eternity was the first King’s Quest game to be in 3D, and used a dynamic context sensitive cursor to determine which action should take place. A combat system was also introduced, allowing for defeated enemies and destroyed environments to be used to solve puzzles. These changes were intended to evolve the traditional point and click genre, but critical reception did not treat King’s Quest VII with the praise that the other entries had received.

Now that you know the history of King’s Quest, does it make you excited to see how The Odd Gentleman will take the franchise forward? Let us know what you think in the comments below.