Adventure The Legend of Kyrandia - Book 1: Fables and Fiends 1

The kingdom of Kyrandia is a place where magic once was abundant, due to a gigantic gem (The Kyragem) that rose from the earth to lend a hand to King William The First. Generations later, the court jester Malcolm murdered the reigning king and queen, and occupied their castle. A group of mystics sealed Malcolm in and sought refuge in the country-side. Deprived of the power of the Kyragem, their power is dwindling, and the magic seal deteriorated to the point where Malcolm managed to free himself.

You are Brandon, and one fateful day when you return home, you find your grandfather turned to stone. You must try and work with the remaining members of the mystics to free the land of the evil Malcolm! Your sister helps you decipher an enchanted message, which directs you to use an amulet.

You will have to figure out how to activate the amulet and unlock the gems on it, each of which will unlock a very useful new power for you to wield.



Controlling Brandon is very straight-forward. You click somewhere, and Brandon will go there. Objects that can be picked up will be liften by clicking on them, after which you can store them in your (limited space) inventory. There are many objects, including a whole bunch that serve no real purpose. Luckily you can drop items in the world, though I'd recommend finding easily identifiable places to do so. You can always pick them up again by returning to the area later. The puzzles are fairly linear and easy, though if you do not have the right objects in your inventory at the correct time, you might find yourself having to track quite a bit back.

There are also many ways to die in the game, so be sure to save often. I found some of the puzzles somewhat obscure. For instance, at a certain point you need to use a set of gems in the correct order, though the game offers no hints on what that correct order is. Having a safe game makes that process a bit easier, though I guess it's also possible to simply collect the gems again, which could prove to be quite cumbersome. Likewise, there's a giant labyrinth you have to navigate through. It's dark, but you can use fireberries to light rooms. Without the use of a map, this would very much be a trial and error approach, as the bushes providing the berries are scattered across the labyrinth, and the berries only last a limited amount of rooms before they burn out and thus leave you with no other option than to retrace your steps. Thankfully, once a berry was dropped, the room will remain safe.

I found the maps provided on vgmaps.de to be quite useful. Find them in the spoilers.