Kings Quest is one of the OG point and click adventures, and while it is certainly rough around the edges today it is very much playable and offers a story book experience for those who don't mind some obtuse puzzle solving.

The King of Daventry has had a hard life and it's up to Sir Graham to recover the kings magical artefacts - a magic mirror, a shield, and a magical chest of gold. Along the way you'll explore the region around the castle, encounter various quaint sights, some silly and mischievous characters, and a handful of murderous monsters. The graphics are certainly dated but they give the game a characteristic charm unique to it's time period akin to the CDi Zelda games - though I was fortunate enough to be playing the SCI remake with enhanced visuals. Music is sparse, there's no constantly looping track thankfully, and what little there is adds to the character of the game similarly to the graphics despite it's low quality.

Gameplay is a mix of point and click with text input to perform actions. The clicking part of the control is still somewhat rudimentary however, as you need to click on the edge most pixels to transition between screens - I ended up using the keyboard for most of the game besides a few twisty sections. The text input wasn't obvious at first but once I got in the routine of using it it became quite natural - though there are of course many non-obvious interactions you'll need to make progress at various points. It's hard to tell if the lack of intuitiveness is another product of it being out of time, my lack of experience with the genre, or a sheer fault of design.

Gameplay itself is built around puzzles. You search the environment, collect items, and eventually the interactions get you towards a goal. I started pretty strong and had a lot of fun mapping out the game even though there are a handful of cheap deaths that you're forced to learn and avoid. I managed to get the chest without resorting to guides but after that I was badly stuck and when I finally resorted to a walkthrough I knew I was never finishing this game without instructions. From interacting with specific scenery unprompted to interactions I had no idea were even possible and many red herrings in between, the game design is very unintuitive so I doubt I would have made any progress any time soon.

Overall, while it has retro charm and stands as one of the classics I feel it's too roughly hewn to be enjoyable by modern audiences. Perhaps I'm just too impatient? After all the first relic was fun to discover but the dagger and several other steps required to get the other relics would certainly have eluded me for some time. When players had less game options and more time I can see how this may have kept a person occupied, but that's simply not the case now days. It's nice to experience gaming history but not always necessary to live it, maybe just watch a youtuber do it in 20 minutes.