/ Previews / Adventure / King's Quest: Mask of Eternity / Page 6
	The King's Quest series is hitting upon a rather strange concept that it hasn't had to deal with before: whether or not the series is going to have a future. Don't ask me why -- they're the ones making a big deal about it.

As has been said a million times before, hearsay doesn't mean crap. It's not worth a lot when a room full of 'experts' speculate on the future of the greatest adventure game in computer history. I mean, bits and pieces can be found there, but cold hard fact -- I don't think so. The only way to be sure though, is if you talk to the one and only source that might have an idea. If you haven't guessed already, I'm talking about the lady who started this whole King's Quest thing, Roberta Williams.

Williams is one of those people who you expect to do some major speculation about the future of their own idea or game. She has a lot that she's been considering, but there's one thing that it all falls back to -- sales. Here's the bottom line: a game can't go on forever if it's shooting blanks. Then again, a game can't stop going on if it's still successful. Williams knows that, and that's why she's not saying anything until after she sees how her game is doing in a world where millions of people who have never heard of the King's Quest series own a computer. This same world had merely a cult following of computer users back in the late 1980's and early 1990's. I don't want to see the series die out, but I don't want to see the series going any longer than it has to -- and it's getting somewhere near that point.

If the game series has a future beyond King's Quest VIII, expect a possible multiplayer release. Williams has thought it over very carefully, and she thinks that a multiplayer King's Quest is more than possible.

Finally, Williams puts it like this: "I think that the future of King's Quest lies with you… and all of the people out there. It's in the hands of the people. If this King's Quest does well… how can Sierra refuse to do another one?" With everything I've seen -- the graphics, the much-improved gameplay, the design, and the story -- I know that there's a good chance that Sierra won't refuse, unless nobody decides to buy it (which would be pretty dumb).