Unused Material from the original King's Quests (and other Sierra games)!
Hello all,
I plugged this site in another subforum, but with the recent announcement from Telltale that resulted in the addition of this nice new subforum, I figured that I'd advertise it again here.
Occasionally, I like to poke into the resource files of old adventure games to see if I can uncover anything interesting. Sometimes I find sprites, backgrounds and dialogue that never appear in the final product (sort of like deleted scenes on a DVD). I found so many interesting items in the files of Sierra On-Line's games that I decided to put together a small site to showcase them. Here's a trio of teaser backgrounds I found in King's Quest V, VI and VII:
Wow, the quality of King's Quest V's backgrounds sure improved a lot since this scene was made.
I don't remember this part of the Realm of the Dead...
...And I don't remember this part of Vulcanix either!
Here's a link to the page covering King's Quest V and VI[/URL] (along with several other Sierra games), and here are the first and second of King's Quest VII. I also have a page for "Inside the Chest" and "Behind the Developers' Shield", two programs that came with the first and second KQ Collections (but not the 2006 collections -- Thanks, Vivendi Universal). There's a lot of behind-the-scenes art shown in those programs, but there's even more of it hidden in the resource files. And it doesn't really need to be said at this point, but SPOILER ALERT!!! (And enjoy!)
(By the way, this whole site originally started out as a couple of pages full of stuff I'd found just in the resource files of King's Quest VII -- that game is bursting at the seams with unused material...including this. I don't know what the heck the story behind this picture is -- it looks like it's straight out of Space Quest 6!)
I plugged this site in another subforum, but with the recent announcement from Telltale that resulted in the addition of this nice new subforum, I figured that I'd advertise it again here.
Occasionally, I like to poke into the resource files of old adventure games to see if I can uncover anything interesting. Sometimes I find sprites, backgrounds and dialogue that never appear in the final product (sort of like deleted scenes on a DVD). I found so many interesting items in the files of Sierra On-Line's games that I decided to put together a small site to showcase them. Here's a trio of teaser backgrounds I found in King's Quest V, VI and VII:
Wow, the quality of King's Quest V's backgrounds sure improved a lot since this scene was made.
I don't remember this part of the Realm of the Dead...
...And I don't remember this part of Vulcanix either!
Here's a link to the page covering King's Quest V and VI[/URL] (along with several other Sierra games), and here are the first and second of King's Quest VII. I also have a page for "Inside the Chest" and "Behind the Developers' Shield", two programs that came with the first and second KQ Collections (but not the 2006 collections -- Thanks, Vivendi Universal). There's a lot of behind-the-scenes art shown in those programs, but there's even more of it hidden in the resource files. And it doesn't really need to be said at this point, but SPOILER ALERT!!! (And enjoy!)
(By the way, this whole site originally started out as a couple of pages full of stuff I'd found just in the resource files of King's Quest VII -- that game is bursting at the seams with unused material...including this. I don't know what the heck the story behind this picture is -- it looks like it's straight out of Space Quest 6!)
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I think the mystery woman with the neck ruff from the KQ6 character portrait sketches in Inside the Chest/Behind the Developer's Shield has to be Valanice. Her hairstyle is the same.
Plus, she's dressed in an Elizabethan gown with a neck ruff. Likewise, KQ6 Alexander wears a variant on a Tudor-era men's doublet: green with slashes of yellow fabric. Besides Daventry, no "culture" in KQ6 has clothing resembling Elizabethan England, although each has its own distinctive Earthly counterpart.
(To break it down: the Isle of Wonder is based largely on the story of Alice in Wonderland, the Isle of the Sacred Mountain is modeled on Ancient Greece/Rome, the Isle of the Mists is Druidic pre-Roman Britain, the Isle of the Beast is Baroque Louis XIV France, and the Isle of the Crown is Moorish/Arabian in style. Beast's Isle being 17th century French in culture is particularly fitting, since that's when Frenchman Charles Perrault was collecting fairy tales such as Beauty and the Beast.)
I'll also direct you to this thread on another forum, in which I analyze the original appearance of the Winged Ones in these early portrait sketches.
I actually saw your thread about the Winged Ones on the AGDI forums a while ago and I've been meaning to reply to it for a while. I never thought of those portraits of Azure and Aeriel depicting them as living statues. That would certainly have been a different experience if they had remained that way in the final draft of King's Quest VI.
I also think you might be right about that woman being Valanice. It's kind of interesting, since she resembles Valanice as she appears in King's Quest VII (the neck ruff, the hair style, barely visible earrings) a lot more than Valanice as she appears in most of the previous KQ games (hair in a bun, large hoop earrings, no ruff).
Akril15, I like the video you uploaded on YouTube of the storyboard for "Land Beyond Dreams" from KQ7. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=52a6t_IPxn4
I also like the trailer for your KQ9 game. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2WILRh9LHdo
I skimmed through your fanfic to see the animations and pictures. I like them a lot. http://akril15.com/kq9/
By the way, have you been to this channel on YouTube? http://www.youtube.com/user/MusicOfDaventry#p/u/0/YVs-SwtjB6g
It's the entire soundtrack for KQ7, and what's neat about it is that it contains several unused and alternate tracks. http://www.youtube.com/user/MusicOfDaventry#p/u/0/YVs-SwtjB6g
MusicOfDaventry explains how he got the music: "I used a program called SCI Resource Viewer/Sierra Extractor which finds specific audio files in the actual KQ7 Directory. The song titles are all from me or from other people who have made attempts at the soundtrack in the past."
I actually didn't know about that YouTube channel. Thanks for pointing it out to me. Given how much other unused stuff is in KQ7, I'm not surprised that there were several unused music tracks as well.
NOTE: This is not graphic, disgusting or violent. However, it is the most scary thing related to King's Quest that I have ever seen. (And King's Quest managed to startle me many times.)
I'd rather pay you just to see the storyboard intro you have for KQ7, and an actual KQ9 game based on your fanfic. Have you ever considered doing it with Flash? Your Flash animations are quite good.
Hmmm... I am replaying KQV right now, from GOG.com, and that scene definitely *is* in the game.
Heh, thanks again. I've tried making adventure games in Flash before, but it wasn't really my cup of tea. I've gotten a lot more comfortable with Adventure Game Studio now. As for making an actual game out of that story...who knows? Maybe someday.
This is an early screenshot of Alexander confronting the Lord of the Dead in KQ6.
In the final game Alexander's sprite was completely redrawn and his costume altered slightly.
In the WIP screenshot, Alex's costume is modeled more closely on this drawing seen in the KQ6 hint book. Interesting that the image seems to show Alex with longer hair.
There are also four early concept sketches for Alexander's costume, which likewise show him with a mane of long, flowing hair.
Much as KQ7 Valanice's appearance reuses some things from an early sketch of her for KQ6, Alex's early long hairstyle was later given to Edgar in KQ7:
I should also mention that, as can be seen in the Making of KQ6 video found on the game CD, the actor who played Alex in the motion-capture sessions seems to have had long hair tied in a ponytail (visible at 2:36 in this video). Perhaps this was a remnant of the "long-haired Alexander" idea? Or was it just the actor's actual hair, and thus always meant to be edited out later by the artists?
---
Akril, a few notes on miscellaneous things on your site:
The early "granite" high-res Sierra logo from the KQ7 resource files is actually the one used in the Windows version of Gabriel Knight: Sins of the Fathers.
The motion-capture animation of a StarCon red-tuniced officer waving around a stick from SQ5 seems to be intended (in my guess) to be an officer cleaning a window with a wiper, as seen through the glass from the other side. It was probably scrapped because the guy isn't wearing a spacesuit.
you're pretty much a superhero..
I actually knew that logo was from GK1, I just never added that to the description for some reason.
That's also a pretty good guess as to what that officer is doing -- it's better than anything I could have come up with, anyway.
Interestingly, the KQ Companion describes Graham in KQ1 and KQ2 as having a long, flowing mane of dark brown hair. This is also seen in the Companion's illustrations; the 3rd edition replaced the illustrations from the 1st/2nd editions with new ones, but the various editions' drawings always kept Graham's hair quite long. Maybe that's where the idea for proto-KQ6-Alexander's and KQ7-Edgar's long hairstyles came from?
Notice the fountain in the upper part of the pool. In the final game there's no fountain there; instead, the north end of the pool is where Rosella can climb out if she's fallen in.
Here's the pool as it appears in the initial release (ver. #1.000.111, with green menu buttons) of KQ4 SCI.
Much of the background has been generally redrawn, including the small twin trees in the foreground.
Here's Cupid's pool as it appears in later releases of KQ4 SCI, which have different graphics (and white menu buttons).
Like many backgrounds in the game, it's been very notably altered from the original release. In this case, it's especially noticeable, because the two trees in the foreground are now gone!
Also note that the tree branch in the upper left corner is now depicted in shadow instead of being fully colored. In the later versions of KQ4, the art was altered so that the day and night versions of scenes could share art resources, which resulted in changes like this one. The original version of the game had included separate backgrounds of each location for day and nighttime.
Even some of the animations are different; for instance, the sprite of Rosella walking through the troll cave with her lantern lit is remarkably different in the two versions.
Interestingly, the earlier version changes Rosella's walking speed based on the scale of her sprite, so that if she's seen from far away on a particular background, she'll walk more slowly than when seen from closer up. In the later version she walks at the same (relatively fast) speed all the time, regardless of the size of her character sprite on-screen.
(On the box it was mistakenly mirrored, so I've corrected it here.)
Here's the pool at night as it looks in the original release of KQ4 SCI:
The starry night sky has been redrawn, and many of the trees are now visible in full color instead of appearing cloaked in shadow.
Also note the tree branch in the upper left corner. In the early version of the room, the branch bark was visible and the leaves were in shadow; now it's the tree limb that is shadowed, and the leaves which are visible.
In addition, look at the ground at the back of the screen; it was light green in the work-in-progress background, but now appears brown.
Here's the same pool at night in later releases of KQ4 SCI:
Because the new version overlays a night-sky backdrop directly on top of the daytime backgrounds, the whole scene is much brighter.
The small trees in the foreground are gone now, as with the daytime version of this screen, and the upper-left tree branch is now entirely in shadow. Plus, the sandy ground behind the pool is now much brighter.
Here's Cupid's pool at daytime from the AGI version of KQ4, just for comparison.
And here it is at night.
Here are more images to compare the three versions of KQ4.
In the following pictures, the upper left image is the first SCI version, the upper right one is the later SCI version, and the lower left one is the AGI version.
The Save/Load screen. Note the button colors on the two SCI versions.
The minstrel sitting on a tree stump.
Entering the troll cave. Note how different the lantern glow is in the early and later SCI versions.
The three witches' skull cave.
The ogre's house.
The haunted mansion at night. A marked difference in the SCI versions!
The waterfall at night.
The bottom of the path to Lolotte's castle at night.
In almost all cases the AGI graphics are modeled on those of the original SCI version.
This is how the gates of Castle Daventry originally looked:
And here's the original version of the castle's eastern bridge over the moat:
This is Castle Daventry as it appears in the final game:
In the WIP screens, the castle appears much older, more time-worn, and more vine-encrusted. Interesting that they went for a much "cleaner" look in the final game.
Also, where are the gate guards in the early pictures? Was the new introduction cutscene in place yet, or did the remake at this early stage mimic the original AGI KQ1's beginning more closely? I wish I knew.
Here are some screencaps of the early version shown in the promo, compared with the final game (the first SCI version, that is).
Here's an early version of the status bar.
In the version of KQ4 shown in the video, the narrator's text is captioned "Narrator," as with the dialogue of other characters in the game.
In the final game narrative text is not captioned in that way.
In this version of KQ4, the starting screen and closeup of Rosella with Genesta were different: Rosella started out standing at the base of a cliff.
In the actual release the cliff was removed. It disappeared from both the overall background and the close-up image.
An early pass at the haunted mansion with different, less grassy soil, seen at day and night.
The haunted mansion in its finalized appearance.
The mansion's west graveyard and the witches' skull cave at night, as they initially appeared.
The west graveyard and skull cave in the finished release. The graveyard scene was lightened considerably, and the skull cave was made to stand out more from the surrounding rock.
As usual, nice finds, ATMachine. They might be better suited to your site than mine, since I try to limit my finds strictly to unused material found in the actual game files.
Hey, wow, you're right.
That's really interesting too, since King Graham's outfit is modeled after the more traditional Robin Hood costume you see in older Robin Hood movies.
Wow -- like father, like son.
Remember I mentioned how I surmised (based on close scrutiny of black-and-white character portrait drawings from Behind the Developer's Shield) that the Winged Ones of KQ6 were originally going to look like living statues?
Well, today I watched KQ6ART.AVI, a movie file on the KQ6 CD which contains almost all the high-res background art from KQ6. It's a treasure trove of unused stuff, incidentally, and is really fascinating to look at. (However, I had to run it on Windows 3.1 emulated in DOSbox; the .avi file doesn't like modern media players, in which the picture tends to get glitchy.)
So, look what I found:
It's the background drawing of Lord Azure and Lady Aeriel as they originally looked--white-marble-esque, blank-eyed living statues.
I actually found KQ6AVI.EXE on disk 2 of the Roberta Williams Anthology. I tried opening it in Windows 3.11 (whice I also have installed), but I kept getting the error message "Disk 1 is required. Please insert disk 1 to continue." I wonder if some files required for that program to run weren't transferred from the KQ6 CD to the RWA.
EDIT: Oops -- I somehow got "KQ6AVI" confused with "KQ6ART". Sorry about that.
I thought this picture of Caliphim and Allaria was odd, not only because of the strange pictures and text framing it, but because I've already seen a variant of that picture before in one of the "behind the scenes" programs included with the KQ Collection, only that one hasn't been touched up yet (the actor playing Caliphim has brown hair, not gray). I wonder where this picture was going to be featured in the game (if it was meant to be used in the game at all).
It's interesting to see how the City of the Winged Ones was moved away from the labyrinth -- and the beach of the Isle of the Sacred Mountain isn't blocked off on both sides like it is in the final game, either. The screen with the stone archer on the Isle of the Beast has a lot more trees on the right side in the final game. I also think it's odd that the hole in the large tree at the crossroads on the Isle of the Crown wasn't in the original painting -- it doesn't serve any purpose at all in the game other than being a slight red herring.
-The shape of the Isle of Wonder on the magic map closeup was originally less markedly a comma, and it was changed to be more obviously so for the final game.
-The main entrance door of the Castle of the Crown was touched up a bit for the finished game.
-The name of the bookshop on the Isle of the Crown was changed, but it's hard to make out the original name.
-In the closeup of the lamp seller's lamps, the merchant's costume was changed for the actual game, and the background was mirrored.
-There was an attempt to use an odd camera angle in the closeup of the spellbook. I can see why this was abandoned.
-The items on the counter in the pawn shop originally did not include the flute.
-You've mentioned how at first the Winged Ones city was clearly visible from the labyrinth entrance. But in that same background, it also looks like it might have originally been possible to walk eastward. In the final game there's a mountainous crag added to the east edge of the screen, blocking you from doing so.
-The Winged Ones Oracle is wearing a blood-red medallion, which was later recolored to be less prominent.
-The peppermint leaf cave had its entrances redrawn, possibly to look better when reduced to low-res and 256 colors.
-The original version of the catacombs floor-tile puzzle background had the camera on the opposite wall. In this early version, Alex would enter the screen from the left and cross it from left to right. In the final game, he enters from the right and crosses from right to left. (Plus, the outline of the fourth wall has a notable blue glow, which isn't present in the final version.)
-The starting screen in the Realm of the Dead has a large stone pillar in the foreground, which was later removed.
-The mystery screen in the Realm of the Dead is present here too. From its position in the video, I wonder if this was originally where Night Mare left Alexander, so that he had to advance one screen to meet Allaria and Caliphim.
-In the area in the Underworld at the bank of the River Styx, where Charon waits with his boat, originally the Styx water was full of waves, and had a purplish hue. In the final game it's a tranquil, solid black sea.
-There were originally a couple of extra doors in the Castle of the Crown hallways, one in the basement and one on the second floor. The second-floor back hallway also later had a carving of Pegasus added to the wall.
-The closeup of a paper in Alhazred's trunk, which in the final game says ZEBU, originally read SHAZA.
-There's an ornate close-up of a keyhole. I have no clue where it was to be used.
-The background of the west hall in the Castle of the Crown has the staircase banister in a different place.
-This closeup of Alhazred and "Cassima" about to be married was later modified to include the figures of Alex and Saladin.
.. I do not want to use my data plan on my phone