(re: Original King’s Quest (mainly to Orat, vintage-sierra.com))
I might wind up doing that (downloading a cracked copy) for Dagger of Amon Ra, but I would prefer to find a manual if I can. My Freddy Pharkas didn’t come with a manual and I’m glad I found a PDF online, because it was a lot of fun to read.
Funny — I played the CD version of PQ4 and never understood why there was a manual in there, either. Didn’t even occur to me that it would have been for copy protection! I recently picked up a floppy disk version — I bet the manual is needed to play that one. Maybe I’ll load it up just to see how it’s implemented.
Out of curiosity, what’s the copy protection for GK1? I’ve only ever played the CD version.
-emily