King's Quest V: Absence Makes the Heart Go Yonder (NES) Playthrough

Channel:

Eric Corp Incorporated

Subscribers:

1,960

Published on December 31, 2018 6:12:04 AM ● Video Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t3F4j_IPFi0

Game:

King's Quest V (1990)

Category:

Let's Play

Duration: 1:54:39

104 views

4

Finally bringing something to my wasteland of a main channel, here's a playthrough of the NES port of the point-and-click adventure game King's Quest V. Why this version instead of the PC one? I dunno... I'm weird that way.

Thoughts:
I'm conflicted with this one. On one hand, it's sorta impressive that they managed to put an entire point-and-click adventure on an 8-bit machine. Sure there were NES ports of adventure games like Uninvited and Shadowgate but there were mostly comprised of still pictures and limited animated sprites, and not a full world you can move around in like this. The only other one that managed this was Maniac Mansion, which did this about two years earlier. All of the locations, puzzles (questionable ones included), and most of the script (albeit censored due to Nintendo's policies) from the original are present here.

Then there's the other. There were some compromises to fit within the 8-bit machine that had to be done, mainly in the graphical and sound departments. To put it blunt, the visuals are awful. It's too drab, ugly, and simple for a NES game in 1992, and can be a detriment to the game, as certain key items blend in with the poor backdrops, making it easy to miss when you're not looking properly. The sound fares a little better, but it still rather sub-par, when the NES can do so much more.

The interface for this port is really clunky, as you have to press the SELECT button in order to access the icons. The B button is a hotkey to switch between the hand, mouth, and eyes, which is nice and all, but chances are you'll be utilizing SELECT more often. This could've been alleviated if you could move the cursor to the top to reveal the menu on top and then select any icon like in the original, but you can't. It doesn't help there were multiple times when I push a button on the controller and the game doesn't register the button press, especially in the menus. I'm no programmer, but how can you screw that up? At least you can move Graham with the d-pad if you have it set to walk (the first icon in the menu on the left), so that's at least something.

There's also a save feature, which is useful and you can make a lot of separate save files but it only works while the game is on. Otherwise, you have to record a rather long password to continue your progress.

Overall, there's no reason to play this over the PC original or even the underwhelming Amiga port, other than for curiosities sake. If you really wanted to enjoy a point-and-click adventure on the NES, just stick with either Maniac Mansion or the MacVenture games; those games translated to the system a lot better than expected, save for some censorship and clunkiness. It doesn't help they were trying to port a rather advanced PC game of the time period to the by-then 7-year old console. Still, it's an intriguing port to check out for ones that already played the game.

Grade: D+

Developers: Sierra Design, Novotrade
Publisher: Konami
Year: 1992

This is only for the sake of entertainment. No copyright infringement intended.

2018 Eric Corp Incorporated

Other Statistics