The Keys of the Kingdom

Baf's Guide

Look at the release year (1988), and you will have a pretty good idea of the game. Yes, it features a crude two-word parser you sometimes have got to fight with, minimalistic descriptions, and primitive characters. To make things worse, it's a religious game. Therefore, the author constantly tries to convert the player to Christianity, and you might find his blatant and clumsy attempts rather naive (or annoying, if you are less forgiving). Furthermore, the religious theme stipulates that some of the puzzles can't be solved without a reference to The Bible, so that you better keep it handy during playing (if you don't know it by heart, that is). Alternatively, you could use the wonderful walkthrough by David Welbourn (see the link below); I only can take my hat off to him with admiration - if not for him, I'd probably still wonder how to get past the axemen. However, with all the game's sins and faults, it had at least one puzzle that was satisfying to solve. Together with the fact that (as far as I can tell) it's impossible to make it unwinnable, or to die (well, OK, there is one way to do that, but really, one have to do it on purpose; and at some points, you loose all your posessions, but after that, you can collect them again) it earns the game's rating an extra star.

-- Valentine Kopteltsev