Quest for Glory: So You Want to Be a Hero

Covers Always Lie: The game feature neither dragons, broken swords nor stained glass windows.

Quest for Glory: So You Want to Be a Hero (formerly called Hero's Quest), is the first entry in the Quest for Glory series of games. Your character, the latest graduate of the Famous Adventurer's Correspondence School, answers a newspaper ad from the valley of Spielburg, which is in dire need for a hero, "No Experience Required".

The local Baron was once a major force for protecting the people of the valley, but long ago he was cursed by the ogress Baba Yaga to lose all that he holds dear. Sometime afterward, both the Baron's son and daughter went missing, and in his grief and despair the Baron has virtually abandoned his duties and holed himself inside the castle.

As a result the valley has been laid to ruin, bandits prey on all merchants, monsters run unchecked in the wilderness, and your adventurer just barely made it into the valley before a blizzard sealed off the eastern mountain pass. Now It's Up to You to break the curse while taking on ruthless bandits, an ogress that likes eating heroes (and we don't mean sandwiches), and the dreaded Antwerp.

Good luck.

The game is set in a backdrop of Germanic and Norse mythology (with a few exceptions, most notably the Katta innkeepers Shema and Shameen and the merchant Abdulla Doo, all three of whom are visiting from their native Arabian Nights themed land of Shapeir), and later received an Enhanced Remake with VGA graphics.

Tropes used in Quest for Glory: So You Want to Be a Hero include:

• All Trolls Are Different: The ones here are big, blue, dumb and violent. They carry a big hammer with which to smash you, and plenty of coin. You can also loot their beards to give to the Healer for a reward.
• Animorphism: In the first game, Baba Yaga turns the hero into a frog. Also the Dryad turns you into a stag or a flower if you piss her off.
• Berserk Button:
  • After dancing with the fairies in Spielburg Forest, try taking their mushrooms or stepping into their ring and see what happens. You should probably save beforehand.
    • Also, don't tell them you don't want to dance. They don't care.
  • Mention one of the guards' bald spot, and he'll spend the rest of the game pissed at you.
• Blatant Lies: Bruno will recommend the Dragon's Breath at the bar, and if you aren't a Thief, he'll tell you that the Thieves' Guild is in the graveyard and you can see them go inside it at night.
• Character Customization: More so in this game than in later installments of the series. You choose from the Fighter, Mage, Thief trio, but you can add skills from outside of your skillset with relative ease, and as long as you have a single skill point in a given skill, you can level it to its maximum by using it in the game. It becomes much harder in later games, as your hero becomes more and more specialized.
  • You can even solve certain puzzles using cross-class skills. It's very possible to be a Jack of All Trades in this game without the Master of None part.
• Cherry Tapping: You can constantly throw rocks at enemies. You can even whittle down Toro the Minotaur while hiding behind some bushes; while the EGA version keeps him moving, he'll be at zero health when you enter combat and fall instantly.
• Digitized Sprites: The remake.
• Even Evil Has Standards: The bandit leader prohibits the bandits from attacking the villagers. That's a big clue that the bandit leader is actually the kind-hearted daughter of the Baron.
• Exactly What It Says on the Tin: Subverted, Zara Shashina describes the Eastern Woods to be to the west of Spielburg Valley. This it later retconned/fixed in the later games which links the Eastern Woods to be by Mordavia, making them east of Spielburg as they should be.
• Explosive Breeder: The Antwerp, literally.
• Fast-Forward Gag: When you clean the stables, it's overlaid with a sped up version of the main theme.
• Gargle Blaster: "Don't drink the Dragon's Breath!". Also, Troll's Sweat, which tastes like Exactly What It Says on the Tin. Troll's Sweat is so strong, it knocks you out after one drink, and you wake up with a much lighter coin purse. Dragon's Breath turns you into a pile of ashes.
• Getting Crap Past the Radar: Some of the puns in the remake, such as Erasmus' comment that Baba Yaga doesn't believe in "Safe Hex".
• Goomba Stomp: The Antwerp will use one on you if you attack it.
• Got Volunteered: None of the fairies want to give you fairy dust, so they make a fairy named Mikey do it.
• Gratuitous German: We have places such as Spielburg and a band of brigands with the motto "Brigands Uber Alles", as well as a brigand trio called "Die Drei Knochelkopfen". The thieves' password in the VGA version Is Always Schwertfisch, and the random passwords in the EGA version are mostly German words.
• Gravity Is a Harsh Mistress: The Brigand Fortress' deep chasm and rug trap.
• In Name Only: The dreaded Antwerp has nothing to do with its namesake.
• The Lost Woods: Spielburg Forest. By day, you may happen upon the occasional goblin or brigand, but don't go out at night unless you're ready to fight (or run from) something much larger.
• Magic Dance: The fairies dance at night to make the flowers grow. They'll also make you dance if you do something they don't like.
• Magic Mushroom: There's a ring of them somewhere in the forest. The healer wants them for potion ingredients, just don't pick them at night because they're guarded by fairies. You can eat 'em, too! Just don't overdo it...
• The Maze: With the Trickster throwing items at you as you fumble through it. However, the bandits cross it quickly, since they've crossed it before, and don't have to deal with the Trickster.
• Nothing Is Scarier: The Night Gaunts. Averted if you're Genre Savvy enough not to sleep in the woods at night.
• The Password Is Always Swordfish: Well, it is , it's "Schwertfisch" (German for Swordfish) in the VGA remake, but knowing that doesn't do you any good unless someone actually tells you. In the original EGA game, it's random.
• Public Domain Character: Baba Yaga.
• Secret Test of Character: The gargoyle guarding Erasmus' house sometimes asks you what the Thieves' Password is. Only a thief would know the password (in theory), and Erasmus doesn't like thieves entering his home. The correct answer, whether you're a thief or not, is "I don't know". In the original EGA version, you can guess wrong and still be allowed in; in the VGA version, even pretending that you know the password will get you turned away.
• Wide Open Sandbox: Surprisingly, for an Adventure Game, you are dropped in an open world where you can pretty much go anywhere except for some hidden areas and you can complete the main quest (and a few Side-Quests) in a non-linear fashion.