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Delete the game’s installed folder to do a clean install of the game, following this guide:
http://community.vugames.com/WebX?14@151.92gHeUt2kbu.3@.1dd96917/0
I did everything Collector said to do (except delete that avi, which I couldn’t find anywhere), but KQ6 still won’t run. I get as far as the screen going black and the dos sound box popping up. Then the desktop comes back and the dos box has a prompt to press any key. I press any key and the box closes…then nothing else happens.
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“… (by emily) (re: Police Quest/Swat Collection for sale on ebay) Actually you can – one of the mug shots is Jesse Bains. Just keep typing in Bains. You’ll have to keep restarting the game until his picture gets up but it shouldn’t take all that long. I have the PQ collection without the manual and I have always been able to get into PQ2 relatively quickly doing it this way.(In theory, this would work by typing in any of the copy protection names – Bains just happens to be the one I remembered from when I played this game the first time around and actually had a manual.)
-emily
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Emily is right – I used to do this when I played the game all those years ago – there’s even more though: If you go into the filing cabinet in your division, all those pretty little files you see in there are the ones used
in the copyprotection. ¡Adios!That isn’t entirely true is it? I believe you gave the Gold Rush! designers (Doug and Ken MacNeill) the rights to their game before you sold the company. Or did you just give them partial/temporary rights? I did notice that they changed the name of the game before reselling it which makes me curious. Too bad you didn’t pull a few other fast ones and release a bunch of the older IPs back to their designers.
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“… (by Brandon Klassen) When showing the thread that the post is in, the email notification is now screwed up and doesn’t show it properly. It lists a bulletin board and thread but it’s not the right one.
…”Brandon:
Good catch!!!
I think I fixed this bug, but won’t really know until the next “notification” goes out.
-Ken W
There are some former employees of Sierra registered with this site. I guess they would speak up if they had time / interest to do so. At some point I could contact these individuals and ask if they’re willing to have their names listed so fans know who’s here so they can ask them questions. In the future I think we could also schedule chat sessions.
Sorry, I don’t have an answer for that specific issue. But there is a fan-made patch out for GK1 that solves many (if not all) of the issues this game has with XP. You probably won’t be able to use your saves once you apply it, but if you can’t find a way around this bug that doesn’t matter so much. 🙂 Anyway, here’s the link if you’re interested: http://www.gabrielknight2k.tk/
The one you want is the Gabriel Knight XP installer.
-emily
I’ve pretty much come to accept that with Torin’s Passage you’re either lucky or you’re not. It’ll run faultlessly on some systems (so I’ve heard), while crashing randomly on others. At least we know the DOS version is more stable (i.e. less prone to crashing) than the Windows version. You might want to visit http://www.driverguide.com to find DOS drivers for your hardware. Look in Device Manager to see what’s in your system. The drivers should have installers that will automatically add the necessary lines to your autoexec.bat and config.sys files (as well as installing the driver files themselves on your hard disk). You should then be able to run most DOS games under Win98 without any problems. After installing the drivers, you can also press F8 before booting, then choose to boot to DOS. Good luck!
The Sierra family obviously extends far beyond simply including those people who actually worked for Sierra. We, the fans, are/were also part of this family. Ken mentions at several places on this site how one of the major goals pursued by Sierra was to create and maintain a personal relationship with customers. Because of its original influence and impact, many fans still view this relationship (years after classic Sierra’s demise) as important. And I reckon Ken and Roberta should respect that, as I’m sure they do.
To coincide with these thoughts, I reckon this site is a wonderful place for fans to be put in contact with those individuals who crafted the games we loved. I have many questions myself. For example: Why wasn’t Dynamix allowed to make more adventure games – why cancel Willy Beamish 2 and the second Blade Hunter game? Why was QFG4 and Outpost released when they were obviously in unfinished states, thus undermining these games forever? And why pursue a partnership with a mediocre developer like Coktel Vision when there were many other, better options – it would seem solely for business reasons (giving Sierra a foothold in continental Europe)? Certainly Ken doesn’t have the time to provide the in-depth answers we seek to these and other questions.
Anyway, my point is: this site is about reliving the glory days of Sierra On-line, a magical place we all hold in high regard. Obviously many fans would love to have access, through this site (how else?), to the people who made up Sierra and produced those great games we all still cherish.
Hi Claire,
A game with graphics like KQ6-7 in todays graphic standard would be a very good game indeed.
We all here would buy it and love it,A great shame Roberta never made any more after Kq8.
Chris.Yes, it would truly be a tragedy if people could reconnect with the people who made their experiences with Sierra a truly unique and special one.
I understand your reasons for discouraging a specific attempt to ask about just general persons who may have worked for Sierra (I’m sure Ken didn’t have the opportunity to personally know each of them well enough to know their names and e-mail addresses), but that is a really important part of what made my relationship with Sierra so special: that people did care enough to write letters back, to make connections, to put a human element to things.
In a world over-run by corporate and commercial interests, is it so wrong that people still want to feel like there are people out there on the other end?
(Hmm, there seems to be a limit on how many characters can be posted! Didn’t realize I had typed so much! :D)
……
But by blindly turning your back on them without giving them so much as a chance, this realistically will never happen, as you’re shunning the handful of people with the experience and desire to make it possible.
People learn best by observation. Pulling apart the old Sierra games and analysing them has many, MANY advantages. It teaches you what made these games so special and how to plan out a similar game so that it maintains the classic charm. Because you have to program every little detail, you discover things that the casual player would never notice. The whole process gives a fan game creator much insight into how a good adventure game should be constructed.
In addition to our current Sierra remakes, we’ve also been very hard at work on our first commercial adventure game, Al Emmo and the Lost Dutchman’s Mine. Trust me when I say that this commercial title would not be turning out the way it is without the experience we’ve gained from remaking Sierra classics. So thanks to Ken, Roberta, Josh and all the other former Sierra employees who helped out and offered words of advice and encouragement — and for making all these great games in the first place! The experience of remaking games is also educational and personal… it is about learning as much as it’s about giving starved fans more old school games to play. In the end, it all seems to work out for everybody – even the dissenters! 🙂
Oh, and just to touch on a point raised earlier in this thread by various posters, absolutely no disrespect is intended to the Williams’ whatsoever. To even suggest so is absurd! Honestly, we would not spend 2+ years working on a remake if we didn’t utterly enjoy the original and want more people experience it who otherwise wouldn’t have the chance. The statement about the illogical puzzles and dated technology are not jabs at the Roberta, they’re simply retrospective facts that are stated by many modern gamers. Every game has its flaws, and the creators learn from these and use the experience to make a better product next time around. KQ2 was no exception…it had it’s memorable faults, and Roberta did a good job of making sure they weren’t carried over to later KQ games. Something to note is that these things were deemed flaws by public consensus…not merely by our own dev team. This was the majority’s opinion, and we took it into consideration when planning the remake.
In it’s time, KQ2’s puzzles were, no doubt, deemed challenging. However, this was in the days before the Internet and hint lines, so players were required to think much harder and for longer periods of time without the temptation of resorting to a walkthrough. Most modern players do not have the same kind of persistence. Particularly not non-adventure game players. In order to adapt the game to modern standards of playability (and keep the story flowing at a reasonable pace) we decided to add more logic to some puzzle solutions. In fact, most ‘illogical’ solutions from the original actually remain the same… it’s just that more information was added to hint at why the player should use item X to solve puzzle Y.
As a remaker, rather than a ‘continuer’ of the KQ series let me reply to some of the points you’ve raised, Barry.
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“…
* Why I care about a release date : I’ve seen so many pretentious announcements for fan games that afterwards slowly withered and died that I am highly sceptical about any fan game that doesn’t have at least an indication of a release date. Even though KQ9 has stuck around for quite a long time now, I believe that without a release date (or a release) even the most hardcore groupie will eventually lose interest and the project will just fade away.
…”Most fan game teams (and even many commercial ones) make it their policy not to estimate release dates, as customers will then hold them to their word and cry foul if the game isn’t released when they specified. In the world of game development anything can happen. Things often end up running over schedule and taking much longer than was originally anticipated – even when you get a good run and things go smoothly. Sometimes things have to be redone from scratch, redrawn or reprogrammed. Beta testing itself always takes up an indeterminate amount of time, because by that point in development, you’re searching for bugs that even the developers aren’t aware of. There’s no telling about the severity of bugs that may be found, nor how long they may take to fix. All of these things factor into releasing a game, and make it near impossible to give an accurate estimate. KQ1VGA took 6 months to make. KQ2VGA took 1 year. I originally expected QFG2VGA to take about 2 years to finish, but it’s been in development for 4 now. Even judging by past experiences, predicting release dates doesn’t get any easier.
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“…* Why I do not like fan games : I believe that only the original author may decide what happens next in the story and world of a game. No matter how hard you try you can never continue the story in the way that the original author intended. Consider it this way, maybe you can paint just as good as Van Gogh but no matter how good you are, your painting will never be a real Van Gogh, at best it’s just a really good forgery….”I’m not going to try and alter anyone’s opinion here. Believe me, we’ve had our share of dissenters over the years and doing so is an act of futility. So instead, let me give you the information, straight from the horse’s mouth. 🙂
In many cases, the original author often fails to live up to the expectations of their fans. (And I’m NOT speaking about Roberta Williams here; this is just a general comment about many writers/designers.) Take for example, Dawson’s Creek. Halfway through, the original series creator (Kevin Williamson) quit writing for the show because he didn’t like the way things were turning out. They hired new writers and carried on for another few years. When the producers finally wanted to end the show, they decided out of respect for Kevin Williamson as the original writer, to ask him to pen the story so he could finalize things the way he wanted. He did so, and basically undid everything that had been covered in the series up until he stopped writing. He tried to cram everything that he would have liked to have done (had he continued writing for the series) into a double episode! The result was a very awkward series finale that stood out like a sore thumb and was not a very good ending in most fans’ opinions. And although I don’t personally agree with this one… look at what the overwhelming majority people are saying about the Star Wars prequels – despite the fact that George Lucas is behind the helm.
I believe it to be false that only the original author can continue their own story in a believable way. That’s like saying that there’s no writer on earth talented enough to emulate the original writer’s style. The Curse of Monkey Island wasn’t written by Ron Gilbert, author of the first 2 Monkey Island games, but it’s still accepted as an unforgettable part of that series, and does a fantastic job of matching the previous games’ humour. I think some people take issue with the ‘legitimacy’ of fan sequels masquerading as an official continuation of the original author’s work (rather than the fact that the writing has been taken over by somebody else).
That said though, AGDI will never make any Sierra game SEQUELS. Personally, I do believe that in order to forge new destinies for the characters (and story) it should be left up to the original designer of the series (or at least they should have dibs on the opportunity). This is why we at AGDI stick only to remakes. That way, even with an overhauled remake such as KQ2VGA, the defining events of the original story are still left in place. So, for example, if a person who’s played only KQ2 AGI talks to someone who’s only played KQ2VGA, they could both have a lucid discussion about the skeleton plot elements and understand what Roberta intended regarding Graham in his travels through Kolyma.
Now, this certainly doesn’t mean that I wouldn’t PLAY a fan-made sequel like KQ9. Like any form of fan-fiction, these works exist for us to peruse if we desire. They can easily be ignored if one doesn’t believe in them. Each of AGDI’s remakes credits the original designers and carries several visible disclaimers that the game is NOT an official Sierra product, and also that we don’t receive any money (nor even true credit, due to the whole anonymity thing) for our many years of hard work. Really, if someone hasn’t tried a fan game, then they’re in no position to complain as this information is made known to anyone who downloads and installs the game. Everyone else can sleep easy, ignoring it without fear that the original product’s image is being tainted.
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“…* Why I read about fan games, even though I don’t like them : Pure curiosity. I visit the same forums as the people who make fan games (because we both share an interest in Sierra games and adventure games in general), so when a new game is announced I take a look….”AGDI’s remakes are fan fiction. Nothing more. They are merely interactive fan fiction in a different form. There are a plethora of sites on the net where fans have written their own stories based on the KQ, QFG, SQ universes. The people who write these stories and create fan websites are the very fans who sustain a public interest level in these vintage Sierra adventure games. This is why they’re still popular today. You say that you enjoy visiting such adventure gaming sites and forums to discuss these issues… consider that without these various forms fan fiction, or fan games for that matter, the legacy of classic Sierra may have died out years ago and you might not have this luxury today.
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“…* Why I feel that we need original adventure games : The adventure genre has been declared dead by many. For the genre to get back some of its mainstream appeal you need to attract new gamers. A game such as KQ9 has a considerable back-story and this makes it virtually inaccessible to new gamers. A new game with a fresh story doesn’t have this problem. “So what?” you may think. Well, keep in mind that you need to keep running to stand still. If you’re only developing games for the in-crowd then eventually there will be no one left to play those games and the adventure genre will have truly died….”Today’s fan
Hi –
I bought KQ2 for the Atari ST back in 1987 – indeed, in that version, if you type “What is Graham’s last name?”, the response is “Cracker.” I also have a faint memory of the “synonyms” thing you described… I think I actually tried it once, and thought “Hmm….”
OK, let’s try it on my version from “The King’s Quest Collection” (a 3-CD set from the mid-to-late ’90s)… The “Graham Cracker” question doesn’t work, but the synonyms do. If you don’t have a game saved in the quartz tower, then press ALT-D, type “TP,” then enter 90. Then you can type “look [synonym]” (racy slang for “woman”). I tried a few off the top of my head, and they all worked… some programmer was having too much fun.
Owen Wilson would be an interesting pick, but I’d go with Jeff Daniels. Owen Wilson is just too goofy for my tastes and his movies seem to be about him, Owen Wilson… and not so much about anything else. Don’t get me wrong, he’s a funny guy, but he’s pretty much the same guy in all his movies. Jeff Daniels gets my nod.
— Cody
My way of looking at it is to buy all the Sierra CD-ROM games off eBay, because you will most likely not find those on the net (due to being several CD’s each) and to download the older ones that I don’t have (I have originals for most of the old KQ,PQ games). I got every single Sierra talkie game off eBay last year, some of them new (budget release jewel case only versions), and it cost me about $100 U.S. including shipping.
A tip to those of you trying to find the old games in google – instead of searching for “kings quest 4 download” or something like that just type in the filename. E.g. “kq4.zip” – this is a more reliable way of finding them.
And I would recommend people looked on eBay as there were tonnes of Kings Quest and Space Quest collections available on there last time I looked, and they were pretty well priced too.
Put it this way. The age-old argument is that you’re stealing from the copyright owners, stealing their labour. Noone that was involved with these games has anything to do with at least the games’ side of it any more (at VU).. so abandonware is illegal, but certainly not immoral. Ken and Roberta should have no issues with it.. surely they’d like to see the games circulate rather than wither. They don’t lose anything from illegal distribution..
– Alistair
Alright! King’s Quest IV came out in both a SCI and AGI version. Unfortunately, KQIV used AGI3 and SCI0. Personally, I thought AGI3 was a bad idea. Everything was name coded. Anyway…
King’s Quest IV AGI was released only on 3.5 inch floppies for the AppleII series. Which leads me to believe that it was never released for the AppleIIe/c/+. Plus, the boot disk for KQIV used ProDOS16 which would never run on a AppleIIe/c/+. So, this leads me to beleive that the old AppleIIe/c/+ could not handle the requirements of AGI3. And, for some reason, the staff at Sierra thought that the AppleIIGS could not handle SCI0. Personally, from my programming experiences on the IIGS, I know for a fact that it could run SCI0, 0.1 and 1.0. I tried getting the 16-bit SCIW and SCI32 to run on my old GS, but it couldn’t handle it.
Yes, I wrote a SCI emulator on my GS and after upgrading the processor and memory, it handled KQIV, SQIV and SQ5 quite beautifully. Unfortunately, I no longer know where the emulator cd is anymore.
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“… (by Barry) …it’s just that I have a strong (and obviously unpopular) opinion when it comes to fanmade games. …”
No worries, man. I’m pretty cynical when it comes to fan-made content/games as well. When someone thinks they can just pick up wherever the original developers left off, I cringe. I do; and it’s not meant as a negative comment… I’m just being truthful. When you’re a fan of the original content… you become a fan of the people who developed the content as well (and sometimes, even more so). Fans can be very protective of what and who they admire. I think that’s why you, Barry, are so critical about fan-made games… or you might just be like me and love arguing for argument’s sake. 😉To be honest, I agree with some of Barry’s comments about fan-made games, but… I also realize that most fan-made games are simply tributes to the originators. Everybody should be allowed to worship his or her heroes… even in the form of a game. I honestly couldn’t see myself making a game based on someone else’s work, but I constantly use other people’s work for inspiration. That said, I’ll probably still give KQIX a try when it comes out… not because it’s based on the King’s Quest games, but because it looks like it has merit on its own.
I wish the KQIX team the best of luck.
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“… (by Cesar Bittar) This is our choice, our dream, and something that we really enjoy doing. If you don’t like it, we’ll respect that, but please, respect our views as well. …”
Well said, César.— Cody
Ken does not still have contact with everyone who worked at Sierra. Sometimes yes, sometimes no. Ken is really busy working on the website right now, and he doesn’t have the time to respond to 100 people who once got a letter from Roberta or from another former Sierra employee. Ken may or may not respond to you guys, but if he doesn’t, you know the reason why. So let’s not have everyone start posting these type of requests, please.
I know that this might sound a little odd, but back in 86, I did send some snail-mail to Mrs. Williams thanking her for her ideas for the King’s Quest games. However, she responded to it personally. I was kind of wondering if it might be possible to re-establish what little contact we once had. I mean, she was the one that got me into programming games myself. Granted, none of them have been as awesome or popular as her King’s Quest games, but still, she is the one that got me started to where I am now.
John Hawthorne
