Item - Quest for King Arthur

I thought this was a weaker entry in the series. The writing was too simplistic, and many scenes fell into the pattern of: See historical event, listen to exposition pushing towards the right choice, make the right choice, repeat. This made my choices seem obvious and therefore pointless. There were times that clues were too oblique, however, but many choices led right back to the option I didn't choose after a few steps. Finally, the choice of bringing matches or sugar along in the beginning doesn't work at all; if you choose matches, you’re stuck in a loop starting at page 78 — which means you have to choose sugar at the beginning, making the choice at page 94 pointless (and impossible). You can see my map of the book here.

More reviews by DavidSky

The writing of this book was more or less inevitable; how long could a time travel series go without bringing King Arthur in somehow? Fortunately, despite the somewhat familiar subject matter, the book is well-done and interesting, even managing to have something of a message at the end. The game design is also quite challenging, requiring the reader to think carefully about where and when to go on several occasions. My biggest complaint is one that I've had about a couple of previous volumes -- if you pick the wrong item before starting the adventure, you get stuck in an infinite loop with no hope of escape! Once again, I wish the books had made better use of inventory management....

More reviews by Demian

[Rating: 0/10]
[Recommended? NO]

While the promising potential of the premise in the Time Machine adventure "Quest for King Arthur" is at least partially well-handled, there were particularly few redeeming components to save the quest from its prominent, pitiful weaknesses. It's unfortunate how the dangers are kept at arm's length even though the era's appealing visual-oriented choice-based design system fares well as far as reader immersiveness goes. The writing drifts from uninspired and clunky to very much aware of the narrative's potential, but - as with the majority of the books in the series - I think the adventure would've been more enjoyable had it avoided limiting itself to a single correct path; the inventory selection at the start is a bit arbitrary, I might add, and less seamlessly woven into the story compared to the databank, use of setting and handling of "characters". While the year it take place in may be 490 AD, you won't find too many pointers suggesting a whole lot of imagination was put into the writing of this quest apart from what had commonly been covered in existing documents/research books or documentaries at the time this was written; though the research isn't exactly dated, per se, retrospectively there are parts scattered about here and there which feel VERY incomplete.

These books, which in all truth are merely self-indulgent and hard-to-find excursions into a different point in time, appear hyper-focused on their short-lived novelty value - a real shame, since the design and the execution of the linear quest itself isn't all that great to begin with. With the exception of collectors of the series or the most ardent of pseudo-history buffs, I'm afraid I can't recommend this title or any of its time-traveling trepidations. ^^

(Mysteriously disappears into the shadows.)

More reviews by Shadeheart