King's Quest VI: Heir Today, Gone Tomorrow/Controls

King's Quest VI uses the SCI mouse-driven interface that was used by all of Sierra's early 1990s adventure games. The icons are accessible via the icon bar at the top of the screen. The left mouse button performs the action dictated by the icon, and the right mouse button is used as a shortcut to cycle through the Walk, Look, Hand, Talk, and Current Item icons. The interface is intuitive and simple to learn.

Not all icons will be available at all times. In particular, all but the Controls icon are disabled during cutscenes, and certain cutscenes even disable Controls as well.

Walk Icon
Use this icon to move Alexander from one on-screen location to another. Be careful where you walk: the game will readily let Alexander walk off a cliff or other high surface to his death.

Look Icon
Use this icon to look at objects more closely. Make sure you look at everything: you never know when a closer look might reveal some useful information.

Hand Icon
Use this icon to perform actions on objects found in the game, e.g. picking up items, opening doors, touching things, etc.

Talk Icon
Use this icon to talk to people (or even things) that you encounter in the game. In general, talking to people is a good way to get information, but use your best judgment: some people are best left alone.

Current Item Icon
Use this icon to access whatever item Alexander is currently holding (if he is in fact holding anything). The icon shown here indicates that Alexander has nothing in his inventory.

Inventory Icon
Use this icon to access the inventory subscreen. From that subscreen, Alexander can select or manipulate any of the items he's currently holding. There are no limits on how many items Alexander can carry: his tunic has a surprisingly large number of pockets.

Controls Icon
Use this icon to access the controls subscreen. From there, you can save and restore games, restart the game, quit the game, view the credits, and set various in-game options, e.g. level of detail, game speed, and whether to use text or speech (CD version only).