King's Quest I Remake v4.1 released (Now with Mac goodness)
Posted: Sat Jan 17, 2009 12:09 pm
Update: 18 November 2010:
Patch Update v4.1 to v4.1b. (Windows only)
Update: 12 September, 2010
King's Quest I: Quest for the Crown (Version 4.1) has been released for both PC and Mac. Thanks for Les Wavrychuk for assisting with the Mac version!
You can get the latest builds from the King's Quest 1 page on the AGDI website.
Important: Remember to uninstall any previous versions of King's Quest I: Quest for the Crown from your system prior to installing version 4.1. Since we have changed installer software, v4.1 shouldn't be installed over an existing installation, as this has the potential to leave ghost files behind when you later uninstall. Also, note that save game files aren't compatible between different game versions.
CHANGES TO VERSION 4.1
----------------------
WARNING: GAME SPOILERS AHEAD
- Fixed: a bug that caused the invisibility ring's expiration message to appear during the end credits
- Fixed: the Magic Chest sometimes disappearing behind trees when killing the giant with the slingshot
- Fixed: a bug where Graham could eat the mushroom while invisible, despite being unable to find his mouth
- Fixed: graphics filters in the winsetup.exe program crashing the game
- Fixed: a crash when loading save-game files by double-clicking on them and then clicking restart
- Fixed: a bug where opening and closing the Restore GUI on the title screen caused the icon bar to appear
- Changed: the appearance of Graham's hair in the dialog portrait without his adventurer's hat
- Fixed: a bug where CTRL+Q and TAB could cause glitches after the Sorcerer freezes Graham.
- Changed: the way the dragon behaves when the protection spell expires within close proximity to it
- Changed: the 'drowning' death GUI picture to one of Graham kneeling when eating the mushroom too early
- Changed: the appearance of the hole in the base of the slingshot tree, making it more visible
- Changed: save-games to be saved in the game directory again, rather than in My Documents/My Saved Games
- Changed: the game's installer to use Inno Setup for better compression and performance
- Added: an Apple Mac port of the game
- Added: a checkbox to the installer asking whether the user wants to create a game desktop icon or not
17th January, 2009
Greetings, citizens of Earth. After several months in development, AGDI's new website has finally launched. Eriq Chang, one of AGDI's lead artists and our web designer has created a fresh new identity, branding, and site design which greatly compliments the new "home" of our re-released and re-polished Sierra remake titles.
The new site design has been streamlined to make navigation easier and now also functions much more effectively to showcase the various games we have available. All pertinent information is now much easier to find. I'd like to shout a big THANKS to Eriq for the excellent, non-stop work that he's done to get this new site up and running and also for working alongside me to incorporate my ideas and suggestions. You can visit Eriq's own website and learn about other projects he's worked on (both game-related and otherwise) here: http://www.EriqChangStudio.com
Everyone feel free to check out the new AGDI site. Browse around and we hope you enjoy the new look! You'll find the new site online now at the usual URL: http://www.AGDInteractive.com
Next up is the announcement of our first re-release. That's right adventure game fans; King's Quest I Version 4.0 is now available for download from the AGD Interactive web site! Actually, the latest revision of the game isn't merely a re-release, but in reality, it's closer to a fully-fledged enhancement. You could essentially say that Version 4.0 is a remake of our original King's Quest I VGA remake!
The decision to enhance our King's Quest remakes to a higher standard came about three years ago. While working on Quest for Glory II, we had noticed that our skills and capabilities had increased with practice and experience, and that our earlier works no longer accurately represented our current pool of talent. What I personally found particularly jarring were the collaged and ripped elements of some backgrounds that had been taken from other Sierra games. When we first started creating Sierra remakes, we put less focus on artwork quality and more focus on simply finishing the games. Originally, we had no idea our King's Quest I would become so popular. We had only intended to remake the game for our own practice and never really intended to show it to anyone else. However, we eventually decided to release it to the public in August 2001 just to showcase the work that had already been done. With the widespread attention the remake received, it also drew various criticisms. We have taken note of these things and attempted to improve upon them in this latest enhanced version.
Another factor in creating Version 4.0 was that, at the time, Vivendi was going to include it on the new King's Quest Collection. Unfortunately, the company had an internal change of staff and the guy who had agreed to include AGDI's remakes in the King's Quest Collection was laid off. A new team was allocated to the project but the information that the AGDI remakes were supposed to be included was never passed along. Vivendi went ahead and released the Collection while we were still working on the revamp. Rather than scrap all the work that had already been done, we decided to finish them as intended and release them via our own website.
The largest improvement in version 4.0 of the game is undoubtedly the complete revamping of all game backgrounds. Huge thanks goes our to our very talented artists John Paul Selwood, Emily Selwood, and Johan Botes for their tireless efforts in re-editing all of the original backgrounds to a standard that matches the classic Sierra quality and is right up there with the some of the best Sierra artists! Every collaged area has been removed and re-edited with unique artwork done exclusively by the artist's own hands. This process has improved the visual look of the game tenfold and it really does feel like playing a genuine Sierra game all the more! This trio of background artists have worked extremely hard to tirelessly complete re-editing all of the in-game backgrounds, which is no small feat. So, when you play 4.0, take the time to admire and appreciate all the fine details that weren't there in previous builds. The difference in graphical quality is like night and day.
Britney (AGD1) also spent time redoing all of the character dialogue pictures so that they match the quality of the backgrounds. Additionally, all character dialogue pictures now have full lip-syncing in place when they speak for added effect.
Another major element that was missing from the game in former versions was the presence of a narrator vocal track for background and in-game descriptions. I'm pleased to announce that this is no longer the case! The extremely talented and always hilarious voice actor, John Bell, has spent countless months recording the narration track for the KQI project in a crisp, professional tone to match the atmosphere of the game. I really can't say enough good things about this guy's great attitude and professionalism in all aspects. A true pleasure to deal with! Do yourself a favor and check out his hilarious free podcasts at Bells in the Batfry and subscribe. He's very talented and versatile and certainly deserves wide support!
The next notable feature about v4.0 is "No Dead-Ends" mode. Based on fan feedback, it seems that King's Quest I is a mighty frustrating experience for some newbies! In fact, some newcomers find the dead-ends (which often force them to restart the game) to be a complete turn-off and make them abandon the game entirely. For this reason, I have implemented a new feature that can disable all dead-end experiences from gameplay, and ensure that the game is always finishable from any point. Of course, classic mode (with all dead-ends included) is still included for the benefit of sadis... uh, purists!
Among other things, a few of the other features include Windows Vista support, Native Ogg Theora movies (meaning in-game cutscenes/movies will now play under Linux and PC emulation under Mac), and the fact that the full digital Speech and Music tracks are now included as part of the download, rather than being separate downloads.
Thanks also to Prio, Thepal, Deltamatrix, Renodox, and Angelus for beta testing the hell out of this thing, and to Chris Jones who was on-hand to assist with any teething problems as we transitioned across to using the new AGS engine.
Anyhow, I think that's enough rambling for now. Remember to uninstall any previous version of the King's Quest I remake (as well as previous Voice and Music add-on packs) from your system before installing this new version. Oh, and I should also mention that translation packs no longer work with this build. It's too hard for us to verify the quality of 3rd party translations, so we opted to ditch them all together. Have fun!
Patch Update v4.1 to v4.1b. (Windows only)
Update: 12 September, 2010
King's Quest I: Quest for the Crown (Version 4.1) has been released for both PC and Mac. Thanks for Les Wavrychuk for assisting with the Mac version!
You can get the latest builds from the King's Quest 1 page on the AGDI website.
Important: Remember to uninstall any previous versions of King's Quest I: Quest for the Crown from your system prior to installing version 4.1. Since we have changed installer software, v4.1 shouldn't be installed over an existing installation, as this has the potential to leave ghost files behind when you later uninstall. Also, note that save game files aren't compatible between different game versions.
CHANGES TO VERSION 4.1
----------------------
WARNING: GAME SPOILERS AHEAD
- Fixed: a bug that caused the invisibility ring's expiration message to appear during the end credits
- Fixed: the Magic Chest sometimes disappearing behind trees when killing the giant with the slingshot
- Fixed: a bug where Graham could eat the mushroom while invisible, despite being unable to find his mouth
- Fixed: graphics filters in the winsetup.exe program crashing the game
- Fixed: a crash when loading save-game files by double-clicking on them and then clicking restart
- Fixed: a bug where opening and closing the Restore GUI on the title screen caused the icon bar to appear
- Changed: the appearance of Graham's hair in the dialog portrait without his adventurer's hat
- Fixed: a bug where CTRL+Q and TAB could cause glitches after the Sorcerer freezes Graham.
- Changed: the way the dragon behaves when the protection spell expires within close proximity to it
- Changed: the 'drowning' death GUI picture to one of Graham kneeling when eating the mushroom too early
- Changed: the appearance of the hole in the base of the slingshot tree, making it more visible
- Changed: save-games to be saved in the game directory again, rather than in My Documents/My Saved Games
- Changed: the game's installer to use Inno Setup for better compression and performance
- Added: an Apple Mac port of the game
- Added: a checkbox to the installer asking whether the user wants to create a game desktop icon or not
17th January, 2009
Greetings, citizens of Earth. After several months in development, AGDI's new website has finally launched. Eriq Chang, one of AGDI's lead artists and our web designer has created a fresh new identity, branding, and site design which greatly compliments the new "home" of our re-released and re-polished Sierra remake titles.
The new site design has been streamlined to make navigation easier and now also functions much more effectively to showcase the various games we have available. All pertinent information is now much easier to find. I'd like to shout a big THANKS to Eriq for the excellent, non-stop work that he's done to get this new site up and running and also for working alongside me to incorporate my ideas and suggestions. You can visit Eriq's own website and learn about other projects he's worked on (both game-related and otherwise) here: http://www.EriqChangStudio.com
Everyone feel free to check out the new AGDI site. Browse around and we hope you enjoy the new look! You'll find the new site online now at the usual URL: http://www.AGDInteractive.com
Next up is the announcement of our first re-release. That's right adventure game fans; King's Quest I Version 4.0 is now available for download from the AGD Interactive web site! Actually, the latest revision of the game isn't merely a re-release, but in reality, it's closer to a fully-fledged enhancement. You could essentially say that Version 4.0 is a remake of our original King's Quest I VGA remake!
The decision to enhance our King's Quest remakes to a higher standard came about three years ago. While working on Quest for Glory II, we had noticed that our skills and capabilities had increased with practice and experience, and that our earlier works no longer accurately represented our current pool of talent. What I personally found particularly jarring were the collaged and ripped elements of some backgrounds that had been taken from other Sierra games. When we first started creating Sierra remakes, we put less focus on artwork quality and more focus on simply finishing the games. Originally, we had no idea our King's Quest I would become so popular. We had only intended to remake the game for our own practice and never really intended to show it to anyone else. However, we eventually decided to release it to the public in August 2001 just to showcase the work that had already been done. With the widespread attention the remake received, it also drew various criticisms. We have taken note of these things and attempted to improve upon them in this latest enhanced version.
Another factor in creating Version 4.0 was that, at the time, Vivendi was going to include it on the new King's Quest Collection. Unfortunately, the company had an internal change of staff and the guy who had agreed to include AGDI's remakes in the King's Quest Collection was laid off. A new team was allocated to the project but the information that the AGDI remakes were supposed to be included was never passed along. Vivendi went ahead and released the Collection while we were still working on the revamp. Rather than scrap all the work that had already been done, we decided to finish them as intended and release them via our own website.
The largest improvement in version 4.0 of the game is undoubtedly the complete revamping of all game backgrounds. Huge thanks goes our to our very talented artists John Paul Selwood, Emily Selwood, and Johan Botes for their tireless efforts in re-editing all of the original backgrounds to a standard that matches the classic Sierra quality and is right up there with the some of the best Sierra artists! Every collaged area has been removed and re-edited with unique artwork done exclusively by the artist's own hands. This process has improved the visual look of the game tenfold and it really does feel like playing a genuine Sierra game all the more! This trio of background artists have worked extremely hard to tirelessly complete re-editing all of the in-game backgrounds, which is no small feat. So, when you play 4.0, take the time to admire and appreciate all the fine details that weren't there in previous builds. The difference in graphical quality is like night and day.
Britney (AGD1) also spent time redoing all of the character dialogue pictures so that they match the quality of the backgrounds. Additionally, all character dialogue pictures now have full lip-syncing in place when they speak for added effect.
Another major element that was missing from the game in former versions was the presence of a narrator vocal track for background and in-game descriptions. I'm pleased to announce that this is no longer the case! The extremely talented and always hilarious voice actor, John Bell, has spent countless months recording the narration track for the KQI project in a crisp, professional tone to match the atmosphere of the game. I really can't say enough good things about this guy's great attitude and professionalism in all aspects. A true pleasure to deal with! Do yourself a favor and check out his hilarious free podcasts at Bells in the Batfry and subscribe. He's very talented and versatile and certainly deserves wide support!
The next notable feature about v4.0 is "No Dead-Ends" mode. Based on fan feedback, it seems that King's Quest I is a mighty frustrating experience for some newbies! In fact, some newcomers find the dead-ends (which often force them to restart the game) to be a complete turn-off and make them abandon the game entirely. For this reason, I have implemented a new feature that can disable all dead-end experiences from gameplay, and ensure that the game is always finishable from any point. Of course, classic mode (with all dead-ends included) is still included for the benefit of sadis... uh, purists!
Among other things, a few of the other features include Windows Vista support, Native Ogg Theora movies (meaning in-game cutscenes/movies will now play under Linux and PC emulation under Mac), and the fact that the full digital Speech and Music tracks are now included as part of the download, rather than being separate downloads.
Thanks also to Prio, Thepal, Deltamatrix, Renodox, and Angelus for beta testing the hell out of this thing, and to Chris Jones who was on-hand to assist with any teething problems as we transitioned across to using the new AGS engine.
Anyhow, I think that's enough rambling for now. Remember to uninstall any previous version of the King's Quest I remake (as well as previous Voice and Music add-on packs) from your system before installing this new version. Oh, and I should also mention that translation packs no longer work with this build. It's too hard for us to verify the quality of 3rd party translations, so we opted to ditch them all together. Have fun!