<!--
	Title: Arthur & Quests for Camelot: Adventure Comparison
	Author: Millie Miller
	Source: Enchanted Realms #3
	Date: November-December 1990
	Transcription by Steve Derby
-->

## Arthur: Just A Lad

Ah, Arthur ... you are just a boy now. But, soon you will become a man.
You have much to learn and a vast amount wisdom and experience to attain.
Although the rightful heir to the throne, your birthright has been stolen by the
evil King Lot, who has whisked away the sword and the stone. In order for you
to regain what is rightfully yours, you must prove yourself. You must grow in
wisdom, experience, chivalrous deed and questing ability. But you will not go
alone, Arthur. You will have help - just look deeply into this crystal and you will
feel my presence.

## Eye Of Eel And Wart Of Toad

Thus begins the adventures of **Arthur: The Quest for Excalibur** from
Infocom. Merlin, in his wisdom, has given you, Arthur, a small magic crystal
into which you can peer to gain some much needed help. But be careful and do
not rely on this crystal too often (unless you don't mind receiving a lot of help).
By having this source of help so handy, it could get to be too easy to
automatically look into the crystal at every tight spot. This could take away
from the pleasure of discovery. Fortunately, only so many hints will be revealed
depending upon where you are in the game. Of course, you can put the crystal
away so that you are not tempted to seek out its hidden mysteries.

In addition to the crystal, Merlin will also give you the ability to change your
form. Once you visit Merlin and he grants you this power, you will be able to
transfonn into an owl, a badger, a salamander, a turtle or an eel. This is very
useful magic, but it must also be used wisely as you can find yourself in the
wrong place at the wrong time and in the wrong form. This could be quite
dangerous and/or embarrassing!

<img class="float-right-half" src="/public/img/articles/enrealms-review-arthur/crossed-swords.png" alt="Clip art of crossed swords">

## Tapestry Of Color

As in all other Infocom games, **Arthur: The Quest for Excalibur** is mainly
a text adventure. However, **Arthur** includes a graphics window in the upper
one-third of the screen where the current image can be viewed. The graphic
image is placed in a small rectangular area on a tapestry background. Other
options to be viewed in this location are the auto-mapping feature, inventory and
Arthur's status. I particularly enjoyed the auto-mapping feature as it showed me
where I had been and what directions were available to me. Also, there are no
sounds to be found in **Arthur**, which did not bother me too much as this is a
more cerebral type of game.

In **Arthur**, you will have many enjoyable hours traipsing about the
countryside, exploring a castle, meandering your way through a swamp and even
going for a swim. You will soar over the land as an owl and slither through the
waters as an eel. There are knights (some not so friendly) that you will
encounter and a prisoner to rescue from the depths of a castle.

Overall, I found **Arthur: The Quest for Excalibur** an enjoyable game. I
must admit, however, that I have not yet finished this adventure, but am looking
forward to doing so with a little (make that a lot ot) help from the crystal.

## Camelot: From Boy To King

Arthur is now the High King of Britain and Merlin is still his friend, advisor
and confidant. Several of Arthur's faithful knights have gone off searching for
the Holy Grail – and none have returned. Word has come back to Camelot,
reaching the ear of the King, as to the possible fate of the knights, including
Launcelot. This will be King Arthur's greatest quest – to find out what has
happened to his knights and to seek out the Holy Grail.

## Same Old Sights, But Oh, The Sounds!

**Conquests of Camelot, The Search for the Grail**, takes place much later
than **Arthur: The Quest for Excalibur**. Unlike **Arthur**, **Conquests of
Camelot** is much more graphically oriented. However, it does take textual
input, which is necessary to play the game. Also, there is no help feature as
there is in **Arthur**. Most of the puzzles you will encounter in **Conquests** do not
need an on-screen help feature, as many of them (if you don't get them right
away) will come to you in time.

The music in **Conquests** is outstanding and lends itself to the game play.
Sierra has really done an excellent job providing sounds and music that use the
Amiga's capabilities. The graphics, however, only rate as fair by Amiga
standards, still being primarily a direct port from the MS-DOS platform.
(Hopefully, this will change with the release of **King's Quest V** and **Space
Quest IV** this next year with Sierra's new Cinemagraphics.)

## Shish Kebabs, Anyone?

In **Conquests**, you will not only have puzzles and riddles to solve, but you
will also need to know how to use a boar spear (for those heathen swine – pigs
that is), a lance and your sword, Excalibur. You will come upon many people –
friend and foe; choose your words and actions wisely during these encounters.
Examine everything and ask many questions when the opportunity arises.

<img class="float-left" src="/public/img/articles/enrealms-review-arthur/holy-grail.jpg" alt="Clip art of the holy grail">

**Conquests of Camelot** is an animated adventure, as you will be moving
Arthur around from place to place, with some textual input and some small
"action" sequences. When **Conquests** begins, you will find a small image of
Arthur on a layout of the castle. Move Arthur on top of the room you want him
to enter and click. When you enter the room, you will then have full graphics.
After Arthur has completed his tasks in the castle, he must then leave Camelot
and go on his search for his missing knights and the Holy Grail. Once outside
the castle walls, an overall map of the region appears and Arthur becomes
minuscule again. You then travel from city to city by clicking on them, and then
clicking once more to enter. If there is nothing of interest in that city, it will let
you know and won't allow you admittance. Once inside a city, however, you
return to the full graphics view.

## Courting A Legend

I thoroughly enjoyed playing **Conquests or Camelot, The Search for the
Grail**. I found the puzzles intriguing and the music mood-setting.

Neither **Arthur** nor **Conquests** are copy-protected and both are hard drive
installable (good thing, as **Conquests** is a six-disk game). **Arthur** can be played
on 512K machines; however, **Conquests** requires 1 MB to run. The parser on
both games also did not detract from game play. However, I did encounter
occasional messages in **Conquests** or **Camelot** from Merlin telling me that he
really didn't understand why I wanted to do something. This did not seem to be
as much of a problem in **Arthur**.

I can heartily recommend either of these Arthurian adventures. However, I
would have to say that **Arthur**, being primarily a text adventure, is a bit
over-priced in comparison to the more state-of-the-art graphic adventures.
Documentation for both games is excellent, especially for **Conquests**.
(However, be forewarned, if you are not a text adventure fan, **Arthur** may not be
for you.) Both games include an historical and legendary background to the
story of King Arthur and Camelot (**Arthur**, on disk; and **Conquests**, in the
manual). And, both will provide many hours of riddle solving enjoyment.

<img style="max-width: 80%; display: block; margin: auto;" src="/public/img/articles/enrealms-review-arthur/box-score.png" alt="Ratings: Arthur 70, Conquests 82">