Wow, seems it's a pretty popular opinion on KQ6. I share it! That game had pretty much everything. It had it's serious parts but wasn't so caught up in there that it forgot it's roots, including places like the Isle of Wonder. As I've said, I prefer the Windows version basically due to the gorgeous high resolution portraits (when the narrator describes Captain Saladin, only the SVGA portraits actually do that description justice). I also loved the Guidebook to the Land of the Green Isles. IT was actually fun copyright protection! Further, the clues you had to look up in the book weren't just direct answers (well some of them were), some were actually riddles in themselves! If they did a modern remake though, they'd have to let you view that book in-game whenever you wanted, perhaps being able to pick up a copy at the library early on. The only bad thing I could possibly say might be that there's still dead end paths possible in the game, but it's far less pronounced than in earlier titles.
After KQ6, I guess I'd say KQ4 (whale tongue and totally random monsters in the ocean and cave aside). I learned the word uvula from that game
. Then, I'd say either KQ3 or KQ7. Yes, I know the single cursor was rather simplistic, but it had a lot going for it. For one, it was the first KQ game to finally eliminate dead end paths completely from the game. That's a huge plus right there, and sorta defeats any need one might have in making multiple save points (though I agree that the bookmark system in this and Phantasmagoria really were too clunky). Further, this went on to deaths. Sierra didn't want to eliminate dying from their games like a Lucasarts game (and I agree with that, there's a certain thrill in knowing your life is possibly at stake, though Lucasart's style has something to be said for it too), but at the same time, reloading an old save, perhaps even one too close to the death, can get annoying. They fixed that easily by just allowing you to continue any time you died, and that continue point would usually be however far from the death you needed to be to be able to survive that time around.
After that, I'd say KQ5 and KQ1 kinda tie for me (I prefer the SCI remake of 1 actually), then KQ2 (which I think is guilty of the most illogical puzzles in any KQ game, seriously, why would I ever think to toss a bridle on a snake?).
If it counts, I'd put KQ Mask of Eternity last on the list. It's not like I absolutely hate the game. It had it's good moments actually, and it wasn't a terrible game, but it doesn't really add up. I always get the impression that this was a game made by marketting more than Roberta. First of all, the mood of the game was way off. Nothing felt like a charming fairy tale in the game at all, and cutting up ogres to a bloody pulp? Sure there's been blood in some deaths in other KQ games, but not to this ridiculous extent. It doesn't fit the mood of KQ at all. Why so serious? Heck and I actually LIKE Connor and the basic idea of the Mask of Eternity story!
Oh, and the combat... Aside from levelling, it's really more of a straight action game than RPG. The problem is, this sort of game, an action/adventure/puzzle game in a fantasy setting, had already been done, better, before this game came out, and it was called Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time. It's hard to fault Roberta here, she was out of her element working with a company already on a downward spiral competing against Miyamoto (without even really knowing it I suppose), a guy who had already figured out how to mix fighting with puzzle solving with the Zelda series and knew how to make the controls fluid and intuitive. I mean I played all of Mask of Eternity just hacking and slashing my way around, and if there was a horde, I literally could just sit back and fire with a crossbow while strafing very slow ranged attacks. That's compared to a series where you had to figure out to use a grappling hook to pull a cloud of eyes off something to weaken it before being able to attack the core, or use a boomerang to sever connecting tubes to bring something to the ground. If people at Sierra had taken the time to look at the Zelda series and delayed Mask a bit to develop their own ideas on how to mix puzzles and fighting, I think it could have been a far better game.
