King's Quest V: Absence Makes The Heart Go Yonder

From King's Quest Omnipedia

King's Quest V: Absence Makes the Heart Go Yonder was the most innovative King's Quest since King's Quest I: Quest For The Crown in 1984. Released in November of 1990, its graphics were amazing and it became the best-selling computer game in history at that time. It was later released as a "talkie" CD-ROM, in which Graham looks very young and well-built for his years.

[edit] The Story

The evil wizard Mordack, brother of Manannan, shrinks Daventry's castle and its inhabitants and imprisons them in a bottle. Mordack threatens to feed the royal family to Manannan, transformed into a cat during the events of KQIII, unless Prince Alexander can restore him to his human form. King Graham, out for a walk when Mordack shrank the castle, is the only one unaffected by the spell. With the help of the wizard Crispin and his familiar, Cedric the owl, Graham travels to Mordack's castle to free his family.

[edit] The Game

The owl Cedric accompanies Graham through the entire game to provide commentary and advice. He has to be rescued from danger at several points, but the owl rarely says or does anything useful. Cedric was unpopular with many gamers, and easter eggs in future Sierra games showed Cedric being harmed in some way. (In Space Quest 4, while playing the Ms. Astro Chicken game, you net 50 points for hitting Cedric. In Freddy Pharkas Frontier Pharmacist, you can see vultures eating Cedric.)

The game KQV is infamous for its large amount of dead ends and difficult puzzles. Late in the game Graham must navigate a frustrating maze where each room is rotated according to the character's perspective rather than being shown with north always at the top of the screen. There are several actions the player can take that render the game impossible to finish if they are not careful. This makes KQV difficult to complete without resorting to hints if the gamer does not save often or uses items carelessly.

The name of the wizard Manannan (named after a figure from Celtic mythology) is consistently spelled Mannanan in this game. This is likely a typo, albeit a pervasive one.

[edit] Version Differences

The dos version had slightly different menu system and an extra walk icon. The game also had a copyprotection measure involving using the magic wand to cast spells at various points throughout the games. The character portraits were slightly different between the two games, with the cd-rom version removing subtitles.