King's Quest: Quest for the Crown
King's Quest: Quest for the Crown is the first game in the King's Quest series. Players control Sir Graham, a knight of Daventry, who is tasked by King Edward to find three lost treasures in order to save the kingdom. The game takes place in a fairytale world where Graham must explore, solve puzzles and interact with various characters and creatures. Players control Graham through different locations, collecting items and overcoming obstacles. The game was a pioneer of the graphic adventure genre, combining text commands with visual elements. As the first title in the series, Quest for the Crown established many of the themes and gameplay elements that would become hallmarks of the King's Quest series, including the fantasy setting, the puzzle mechanics and the character Graham, who would play a central role in the series' story.
Story
The kingdom of Daventry was once a prosperous kingdom. King Edward the Benevolent ruled justly over his subjects - there was no poverty and no wars. The only thing missing was an heir to the throne, but unfortunately King Edward and his Queen were unable to produce one. One day, a wizard appeared and promised to cast a spell on the queen that would produce an heir. In return, he demanded the magic mirror that could predict the future. As King Edward did not want to let the mirror out of his hands, he decided to consult it first. The royal couple saw a gallant young man wearing the king's insignia. Believing that the mirror showed them their future son, they gave in to the magician. But months later, the queen had still not had a child. Worse still, a famine spread across the kingdom of Daventry because the mirror, which had been predicting the right time for the harvest for generations, failed to warn the king of an early autumn storm that would destroy the entire crop. After the famine came the plague, which also struck the queen, whose health quickly deteriorated. Help seemed to be on the way again - this time in the form of a dwarf who promised to heal the queen in return for the king's shield, which had been worn in every battle since then and made the king victorious every time. In desperation, King Edward agreed to save his beloved queen. But the dwarf and his medicine were wrong and the queen died. Word spread to the neighboring kingdoms that King Edward no longer had his shield of conquest, and so their troops rallied and brought war to Daventry. Although Edward was able to fend off the invaders, the battles brought devastation to his kingdom, which was a shadow of its former glory. Many years passed and one day King Edward was riding out when he heard cries for help. It turned out that they were coming from a beautiful young woman who was being attacked by a pack of wild wolves. After fending off the wild animals, he invited the beautiful lady to his castle, where she stayed for some time and King Edward and she fell in love. Finally, happy times seemed to return to Daventry as the wedding between King Edward and Princess Dahlia of Cumberland, for that is what it was, was soon announced. But unfortunately, the night before the wedding, Princess Dahlia stole the keys to King Edward's royal treasury to steal the magic chest, which magically filled to the brim with gold coins no matter how many you took out. As it turned out, Princess Dahlia was not a princess at all, but an old and ugly witch. Stripped of all its magical treasures, Daventry became poor and weak. King Edward summoned his favorite knight, Sir Graham, who bore a striking resemblance to the gallant young man King Edward had seen in the magic mirror so many years ago. Sensing that his end was near, he promised Sir Graham the kingdom of Daventry if he could retrieve all three magical treasures that had been lost through theft and deceit...