More old articles? Golly gosh gee. Maybe I should write some new ones? Probably not, though. This is a review of Cinemaware's oddly-innovative 80s point-and-click mafia-em-up, with some sprinklings of history and some pointers on how to play it today.
The thing that makes King memorable to me, and which developers would do a good job to examine, is the way the story uses the advantages of a digital, interactive medium in its telling. Simply put, numerous elements are randomized at the start of the campaign, meaning the story isn’t quite the same twice. This is most apparent in the intro in the Northside HQ – Pinky may start at different times and places within the HQ. The gang may or may not have a bombing planned for later in the evening. The gang’s aging leader may be strong or ineffectual, and the rest of the gang may be for or against the idea of someone else taking his place.
This keeps things far more interesting than the usual static, forked-paths storytelling that most adventure games adhere to, with surprises still able to crop up on a second playthrough, and designer Sharp was rightfully very proud of the “Dramation” system that drives the game and animates the characters. Unfortunately, though, a lot of this is pretty front-loaded – once you take over the gang, the variations tend to thin out a bit, and the game tends to react to the player more than it makes the player react to itself like in the opening.
Ugly embed link? Ugly embed link.