What Went Wrong?

About This Column::

Good ideas, good qualities...BAD flaws; that's the trouble with many promising entertainment products. Every once in a while there's that one product (movie, television, video, or game) which had it all --concept, sound, visuals-- yet fell like a rock because of a few grating mistakes. Techtite's "What Went Wrong?" commentary examines such titles.

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Some Of The First What Went Wrong Columns :

---Montezuma's Return

---Trespasser

---Quantum Leap (TV)

---Living Dolls (TV)

---3Dfx (!!!)

For the current What Went Wrong page, click here.

An Analysis Entertainment Column, by Techtite

A Thorough Critique of entertainment gone awry

Good ideas, good qualities...BAD flaws; that's the trouble with many promising entertainment products. Every once in a while there's that one title (tv, movie, video, or game) which had it all --concept, sound, visuals-- yet fell like a rock because of a few grating mistakes. This regularly updated page examines such titles.

The current entertainment product discussed is:

Quest for Glory III :

Wages of War

(IBM PC, Sierra On-Line, 1992)

Game Designers Lori and Corey Cole made some truly grest games, via Hero's Quest (aka, Quest for Glory 1) and it's sequel, QfG2 : Trial by Fire. The latter even made it onto Techtite's list of Top 50 Multimedia Classics. You'd think that the sequel would be a sure-sell, and a guaranteed hit. It wasn't. So bad was QfG3: Wages of War, many fans jumped ship, making sales of the following two sequels somewhere between abysmal and nonexistant. What Went Wrong?

First, as always, the impartial list, of positive aspects the product had :

What Went Right? Hand-Drawn art was a good touch, that's for sure, especially the backgrounds. The main "city" was apparently modeled after old Mayan/Aztec ruins and other similar temples of ancient times, and is placed in a jungle whose environment is equally well drawn. The resulting atmosphere created is very effective...presuming that it was put to good use (yes, gripes for this game begin, as early as this!).

The opening intro was admirable as well; again, thanks to well drawn, hand-painted art. The opening story also has all the glory you'd expect from the title, as the hero (ie, you) joins his newfound friends in front of a magic portal, revealing your next objective; following liontaur Rakeesh to his homeland, and helping him with a potential hostility that is brewing. So far, so very good.

Is that it for what went right? For this sole game, yes; and given the superb prior pair of games, that is quite a shame. With so little to work with in QfG3's successes, allow me to salute the initial "plan" of the Quest for Glory series, prior to this game's conception. The overall concept was (initially) to have a four-story saga, depicting the four "seaons" of a human life. The first would be a "Spring" type of starting-out environment for QfG1. Next, a "Summer" type of desert environment for QfG2, would show the Hero at his peak, getting his name known even more and even finding good friends for the rest of his travels. The following game was (supposedly) to be Shadows of Darkness, where an autumn-setting showed the arrival of a darker evil to defeat. The final game would be set in a winter-type setting, during the latter years of the hero's life, where he would deal in politics as much as heroism, and perhaps even end the saga as king. If Lori and Corey Cole kept true to this initial plan, everything would have been great.

 Unfortunately...

What Went Wrong? It is important to note that there was never meant to be a "Wages of War." The second game clearly states that the next game will be "Shadows of Darkness." Why add this game at all? Why indeed...especially when it was so bad, it ruined sales of both of the later two games.

So that said: what went wrong...seriously? First, there was the interface; the same icon-interface introduced in King's Quest V two years earlier. This "click, click, GAME OVER" interface is what many attribute to the beginning of the end of Sierra's long legacy as an adventure game company, of not the end of the entire adventure game genre. With this interface, games were easily completed in a weekend, if not a day. This is not the best attribute for an product priced at $39 or more. While game designers like Jane Jensen, Jim Walls, and Christy Marx (via Gabriel Knight, Police Quest III, and Conquest of the Longbow, respectively) showed that the game engine could be "tweaked" to provide top-notch adventures, the Coles attempted no such tweaks at all...and if they did, they weren't apparent.

No real "game" meant that the value of playing relied entirely on the story. It's bad enough that the game was easily finished in a weekend (at the longest), when other games that year lasted much longer, with far better stories to tell (Indiana Jones/Atlantis, Police Quest 3, Waxworks). This was particularly bad for Wages of War, which was far easier, far less fun, and worst of all, had an abysmal story.  To add insult to "injury" for fans of the series: this story was open ended! The resulting finale of this game is a failure to the highest degree; the villain wins the battle, as the hero is cursed with an evil spell. How stupid can an open ending be?

I know many people will say that all stories in the prior game(s) were not resolved. That's okay, since they were "side" quests, with the promise of being solved later on. Here's one good example. In the prior Quest for Glory game, Trial by Fire, there is a charming story arc involving a character called Julanar the Tree Woman. Julanar was once a broken hearted girl, who is under an enchantment. She must remain a tree forever, until she finds true love. Although you are not her true love, it is up to you to take care of the tree, to make sure she has the strength to wait for true love to arrive. Your gifts of fresh dirt, water, and a blanket to cover the roots, help keep her alive...and further prove your worth as a hero. While this story arc is not resolved by the game's finale, it doesn't have to be; it is inconsequential to the main storyline, and merely a sneak peek at a potential added love story, in the following sequel. It wasn't an open ending; just part of another, "side" story. This is opposed to Quest for Glory 3, which had no ending, and no story. See...?

So why even mention the "Julanar the Tree Woman" sub-story? Because it's another part of What Went Wrong for this sequel. In the prior game, Julanar's story was a poignant moment of the game, leading to many side quests for the soil, water, and blanket to keep her alive. Many fans expected a big resolution to the story in the sequel. There wasn't one. Quest for Glory III offers an el cheapo "resolution" to this story in one mere scene, in one short conversation! The resulting "true love" turns out to be, for all intent and purpose, a jungle hippie (a 1960's hippie in a jungle of ancient times??? How...DUMB!). While this may sound condescending, it's the game which makes it so. I don't mind if a loser was Julanar's true love as long as the quest to find this jerk is not as simple as telling him something like, "Hey if you're available there's this hot girl who is now a tree stuck in the forest." You don't even get to see the magical, fairy tale event, of "true love" meeting, and Julanar's curse being broken. You just get to see them as a married couple in a totally out-of-place cameo in QfG5. What a total waste of a good story!!!

This brings us full circle to how this error should never have been made. The biggest mistake of this "sequel" is that it wasn't even part of the original plan. They put aside a brilliant "four seasons of life" saga outline --Spring, Summer, Autumn, Winter-- to tell this side-tale about "whatever," and "wherever." I repeat again: the prior game, Trial By Fire, said by game's end that the real sequel would be Shadows of Darkness. Suddenly, Wages of War was squeezed in. Why? This story didn't need to be told. At best, this should have been a mere 30 second intro to an actual sequel: on his way to visit Rakeesh, the hero was cursed and abducted by an old villain. That's a lot more gripping, in 30 seconds, than this game was in 30 hours...or even minutes!

As biting as this comment is, gamers can lead to only one conclusion: the biggest mistake in making Wages of War was in making it at all. It's story was irrelevant to the saga. It's characters were uninspired. It's puzzles were nonexistent. It's only effect was in making the final release of Shadows of Darkness a forgettable nightmare for Sierra, which came very close to canceling the whole series. "What Went Wrong," indeed!

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