Legends of Valour

WHERE GAMING LORE MERGE AND

The Grail myth

If your knowledge of the Holy Grail begins and ends with Monty Python, fear not, lords and ladies: Conquests Of Camelot will set you on the path towards enlightenment. From Chrétien De Troyes to Malory, the sacred chalice is a crucial part of the Arthurian legend and is pivotal to Arthur’s quest.

the elements of the story, a listing of maps, a listing of all the screens, all the animation assets, bios of all the characters. I put it in a three ring binder and presented it to them, and they’d never seen anything quite like it!”

Both Conquests games are rich in history, lore and detail. “I love doing research! It’s one of my favourite things,” says Christy. “This was pre‑web, so it wasn’t like you could just go and Google something. You had to actually go and… do your research! Buy books, read books, track stuff down the hard way.” For Conquests Of Camelot, Christy drew heavily upon Geoffrey Of Monmouth’s Historia Regum Britanniae, a 12th‑century chronicle that blends history and fiction in a sophisticated, politically resonant take on Britain’s legendary past.

Peter Ledger’s artistry lent a sensuous, romantic edge to the first game’s Arthurian visuals. He didn’t enjoy the process, however, and opted not to return for Conquests Of The Longbow. “He hated working on computer graphics! He was a gentleman, barbarian and hedonist, and someone who liked physical contact with art – painting or sculpting or carving leather,” remembers Christy. “There were tremendous restrictions on the first game, where you only had 16 colours, and some of those were accomplished by dithering colours together. It was so limited that it drove him crazy.

The Round Table

Arthur’s Round Table is first mentioned by the Anglo-norman poet Wace in his Roman De Brut, written in 1155. It’s a useful bit of furniture, the shape of which maintains equality between the monarch and his brave knights. Shame about all the unfortunate business with the queen. On that note…

Consequently, he did not work on the second game at all. He said, ‘That’s it, I don’t want to do it anymore!’” Peter was tragically killed in a car accident in 1994, aged just 49. He left behind him a legacy of achievement in comic art, among other media, that would lead to the foundation of Australia’s Ledger Awards, created in his honour in 2004.

After the success of the first game, Christy was ready to get started on her chosen subject of ancient Greek mythology, with a specific focus on its goddesses. Roberta Williams, keen to capitalise on the popularity of Robin Hood on the big screen, had other ideas, but Christy politely ignored her suggestions. “Then a little more time goes by, and Roberta comes up to me, and she says, ‘I had a dream last night, and you were working on a Robin Hood game!’ The penny dropped, and I realised that, in their very clumsy way, what they were trying to say to me was, ‘We really want you to do it!’ So I said, ’Yeah, that’s a really cool idea,’ and at that point, I pivoted over to doing Robin Hood.”

1991’s Conquests Of The Longbow presented its own challenges, as Sierra shifted from the text‑based SCI0 system to its object‑based, mouse‑driven SCI1 replacement. “With the text parser, you have to spend a lot of time thinking about all of the possible entries and answers, and working out a structure that goes from very specific to less specific to a sort of global response,” says Christy. “It’s a very

Arthur and Guinevere

Arthur’s love for his consort, named Gwynhever here, is deep and undying, as is hers for him. Her passion for his most noble knight, Sir Launcelot, is of a different order. Thankfully, Arthur’s bromance with the dashing fellow is ardent enough to keep things ticking over, most of the time.

different way of having to think about things, but it also gives you an awful lot more leeway, like doing riddles, for example, because I could count on people being able to type in the answer. I did come up with a workaround [for Conquests Of The Longbow] by coming upon something I found in my research, the druid hand code, which is probably nonsense. They could then just click on different parts of the hand to spell something, but it’s a painstaking way to do something, so I wanted to keep it limited.” It also provided an ingenious method of copy protection, as players who’d mislaid their copy of the manual would learn.

Once again, research was key to developing the game’s compelling story. Christy contacted Nottingham Castle Trust’s curators, who sent her drawings of the fortress’s layout as it would have been in the 1190s, along with information on its underground tunnel network. That particular historical detail and its connection to Ye Olde Trip To Jerusalem pub played a crucial part in the game’s plot, though it wasn’t until years later that Christy had the chance to take a trip to Nottingham and visit the locations she’d brought to life on the screen.

In addition to some issues with the archery sequence, which Christy had to fight to get fixed in time for release, she clashed with art director Kenn Nishiuye over the game’s music. He pushed for a more modern score, but composer Mark Seibert agreed with Christy

The Merry Men

Knights and outlaws are two sides of the same coin in medieval literature, and there’s plenty of scope for soulful bonding in Conquests Of The Longbow with the appearance of Robin Hood’s trusty band of rogues. Down a tankard with Little John and endure Alan-a-dale’s bad jokes like the legend you are.

that a more period‑appropriate soundtrack was the way forward. Unfortunately, some of the interesting strategic options Christy had hoped to include in the game fell victim to budget and time constraints. “I had in mind all these different sequences for the assault on the castle, where you can gain and lose followers. I had a complex system in mind for that, and it just had to be scaled back to almost nothing.”

Like its precursor, Conquests Of The Longbow won both praise and awards. Sadly, there would be no more entries in the series. “I had signed up to do three games with them, so after I finished Longbow, I was feeling pretty burned out after all the years of very, very tough work on these two games,” Christy laments. She settled on another medieval topic: the real‑life conquests of Holy Roman Emperor Charlemagne. Just as her research was getting underway, contractual negotiations hit a glitch. “They wanted me to sign up to do another three games after that one, which was great, but the negotiations did not go well, and they kept doing things that pissed me off. I walked

St Mary’s Abbey

The real St Mary’s Abbey is actually located in York, but it’s moved to Nottingham for Longbow. It features in many ballads of Robin Hood, along with its grasping abbot. Was he a real-life figure or a symbol of clerical avarice? Possibly a bit of both. That’s history for you…

away, which in retrospect was really stupid of me,” she laughs. “I should have hung in and done it, but I was feeling like I needed to get out at that point.”

Nonetheless, Christy retains fond memories of her days at the company, where she was one of several pioneering female game designers in an era that, as she notes, was distinguished by appointment based on creative merit rather than the cyclical hiring of tech bros by other tech bros. The diversity of talent at Sierra is a treasurable aspect of the company’s history, and one for which it’s rarely given credit.

Christy’s departure, though, was Sierra’s loss. While she has added to her impressive CV with credits on shows as diverse as Babylon 5, Beast Wars: Transformers and Captain Simian And The Space Monkeys, all while authoring a number of books and developing hidden object games for Zynga, her work at Sierra, alongside Peter Ledger and their talented teams, brought us two games that any fan of point‑and‑click adventures will be beguiled by. Legends, indeed.

“I HAD SIGNED UP TO DO THREE GAMES WITH THEM, SO AFTER I FINISHED LONGBOW, I WAS FEELING PRETTY BURNED OUT AFTER ALL THE YEARS OF VERY, VERY TOUGH WORK ON THESE TWO GAMES ” Christy Marx