I got King's Quest 2: Romancing the Throne in a bargain bin years ago for $4.00. It came in the original box with the little 3.5-inch floppy diskette. It was definitely a great find! Before then, I had just finished playing King's Quest 6 on CD-ROM, so this was the first classic Sierra game I ever saw. I was a bit surprised by the graphics, but I was like, "Hey! It's a lot better than those old Pacman graphics!" The typing feature was a bit to get used to, but once I got the hang of it, the gameplay was no problem. I just saw Alexander's quest to find Cassima, so this quest of Graham finding Valanice was an odd twist in backtracking! *laugh* It was awesome all the way!

This game has a charm to it that is characteristic of the very early games in this series. Like the original game, this game relies heavily on strategy and thinking in order to solve puzzles and overcome certain situations. There is more structure and order to this game than in the original one in that Graham must solve or finish certain obstacles before certain places or items are available to him. The original game had less of this sequential playing aspect, giving more freedom to do things in whatever order the player wishes. Therefore, it was fun and frustrating at the same time to figure out where to go next or what to do next in this game. For example, you do not find out what the ever-present poisoned lake is for until you are over halfway done with the game, so it can be frustrating to figure out if it is important or not. The order does give a nice scene changing aspect to the game. Once Graham completed something, I always ran throughout the lands to see if anything in the scenery changed ... which it does sometimes!

There is less of a clear direction in King's Quest 2 than in King's Quest 1 because most of the puzzles do not seem to make much sense to your end goal. In the original game, Graham had to find three treasures in Daventry, and a significant portion of the game is geared toward that main goal. In this game, Graham has to find Valanice, but the majority of the game is not geared toward finding her. You solve all these little side puzzles to open doors, and they do not always seem connected to each other. Therefore, there is not a great sense of initial direction, leaving some players confused about what they are doing. However, I personally find this very aspect giving the game a lot of fun challenge. Like the original game, some situations allow for multiple solutions as well, but there are not many of them.

Just as in the original game, the superb use of fairy tale, mythical creatures, and other legends really make this game worthwhile. Graham gets to help Little Red Riding Hood and Grandma, ride a seahorse to the undersea world of King Neptune, and survive Count Dracula's eerie castle all in the same lands just to mention a few!

If it is a cute, woven storyline that you desire, then this is a great classic game to play. The only slight setback to it is the fact that it is text-driven (if you are the type who prefers using the mouse instead). You will have to type in commands in order to perform tasks, but the vocabulary base in this game is greatly expanded over Roberta Williams' earlier games. Therefore, hunting for that certain command word is much easier now. Also, the addition of a FAST speed makes Graham move faster (but not too fast) on newer computers. The graphics are a bit less sophisticated than today's standards of graphics, but keep in mind that the original was made around 1985. For its time, this game was one of the fore-runners in graphical gaming technologies. 4 out of 6 stars. -- Kimmie