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The Wizard and the Princess (1980)

On-Line Systems

Apple II · Atari 8-bit · Commodore C64/128/MAX · DOS · FM-7 · PC-8800 Series · PC-9800 Series

3.33 from 12 ratings

37 members have it in their collection · 15 backlogged · 18 wish listed

How long? · with extras 4h · 100% 1h (from 2 logged playthroughs)

Princess Priscilla has been kidnapped and the player seems to be the only valliant hero willing to rescue the damsel in distress. This is the second text adventure with illustrating graphics released by Sierra. Communicating with the game works via entering commands which tell the player's alter ego where to go and what to do. Since the parser is a … Read more
Princess Priscilla has been kidnapped and the player seems to be the only valliant hero willing to rescue the damsel in distress. This is the second text adventure with illustrating graphics released by Sierra. Communicating with the game works via entering commands which tell the player's alter ego where to go and what to do. Since the parser is a very basic one it only understands two-word commands. Two years after its initial release, the game was renamed "Adventure in Serenia" for its PC release. This suggested sequel was, however, exactly the same game as in its previous incarnation. Read less

Details

Developers
On-Line Systems
Publishers
IBM, Melbourne House, On-Line Systems, StarCraft
Genres
Adventure
Themes
Fantasy
Series
Hi-Res Adventure

Release dates

  • 1980 (Full Release) (North_America) Apple II, Atari 8-bit
  • 1982 (Full Release) (North_America) DOS
  • May 01, 1983 (Full Release) (Japan) PC-8800 Series, PC-9800 Series
  • Jun 01, 1983 (Full Release) (Japan) FM-7
  • 1985 (Full Release) (North_America) Commodore C64/128/MAX

Rating distribution

5 stars
3
4 stars
2
3 stars
3
2 stars
4
1 star
0

Community All Reviews Statuses

giopep

Review giopep 4/5 · Dec 12, 2022

Wizard and the Princess is the second graphic adventure from the Williams and it's a concrete step forward from Mystery House. It's more ambitious in terms of story and world building and, more than anything, it adds color (with lots of dithering!), which in 2022 may not seem much but coming from Mystery House makes a huge difference in characterizing …

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Wizard and the Princess is the second graphic adventure from the Williams and it's a concrete step forward from Mystery House. It's more ambitious in terms of story and world building and, more than anything, it adds color (with lots of dithering!), which in 2022 may not seem much but coming from Mystery House makes a huge difference in characterizing the locations and giving depth to everything, even though the graphics are stil pretty rudimentary. As usual for those years, the map is basically a big labyrinth, which annoyed me already in the Eighties and is almost intolerable today, but overall I liked playing it (and finding out it was later retconned as part of King's Quest).

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scoopings

Review scoopings 5/5 · Jan 29, 2022

Excellent Precursor to the King's Quest Series

Look: 9/10 Great graphics, always love the apple ii graphics but graphic text adventure with a desert setting part, to boot. Lol wap! the snake. Great settings for great graphics, indeed. I love the transitional backgrounds between regions/settings, e.g., from the Desert region to the Woods region.

Play: 9/10 Basically just another fantasy text adventure, but this one had something …

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Look: 9/10 Great graphics, always love the apple ii graphics but graphic text adventure with a desert setting part, to boot. Lol wap! the snake. Great settings for great graphics, indeed. I love the transitional backgrounds between regions/settings, e.g., from the Desert region to the Woods region.

Play: 9/10 Basically just another fantasy text adventure, but this one had something special to its “feel.” It almoosssst got dry near the end with the Giant and the Shoe part, but otherwise it stayed fresh and exciting throughout the 100% playthrough. The puzzles are rational yet playful, solvable but not too easy. Well-balanced and well-executed game. Perfect length, too. I just love the Apple II, who would’ve thought. I had no expectation to prefer certain microcomputers over others. Oh, but thank goodness for online maps, cuz I think I would’ve gotten frustrated in the Castle “maze” esque part.

Feel: 9/10 “Seen as the predecessor to King’s Quest games,” which is a series I’ve been excited to finally play. I like the King of the Snakes part. And I like that saving him gives you basically a special power that you use later. It’s like a Metroidvania/RPG equipment upgrade or special ability to access secrets, etc. Simple plot but brilliantly executed: return the princess to the hometown. The settings all live thanks to their MS Paint-style graphics. Oh, and lol the transformations in general. I kept getting nostalgia for similar item retrieval puzzles, etc., in later console games like The Goonies and Zeldas; I definitely see how those action-adventure console games grew out of the early text adventure scene. Love it.

Attachment: 8/10 I definitely will be replaying this whenever I return to early graphic text adventures!

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