A Short, Official History Of Chex Quest

Chex Quest is pretty iconic in the United States and around the world as a video game you got with a box of cereal. Originally, however, the game would have been set in a cornfield with a flashlight.

Making something educational in the form of a video game–that was the original idea for Chex Quest. But the creative team behind Chex Quest wanted to make an FPS, thanks to the popularity of DOOM and its ilk.

So make an FPS they did. But as they soon discovered, there’s other quirks when it comes to making a video game within six months. For one, they needed FDA approval–because the FDA needed to be sure it was OK shipping millions of CD-ROMs along with food that people would consume. The brand requirements meant that weapons had to be redesigned so they looked as nondescript as possible, and the audio composer had to create sound for the lowest common denominator.

It’s all part of an official short documentary into the promotional game. Chex Quest HD is still in the works, but amidst that General Mills (the owner behind Chex and other cereal brands) has endorsed Chex Quest 3 as canon, and re-released the game on their website.

There’s no difference with Chex Quest 3 if you played the fan game from Charles Jacobi, an artist on the original Chex Quest. But hey, at least the owners are fully on board with the idea. And maybe they’ll start doing game promotions in cereal boxes again–it’s a lot easier these days when you just have to include a code on a piece of cardboard.

And speaking of cereal boxes, maybe we could get that promotion going again…

[referenced url=”https://www.kotaku.com.au/2018/08/the-best-games-in-cereal-boxes/” thumb=”https://www.kotaku.com.au/wp-content/uploads/sites/3/2017/07/sgEoKB31-410×231.jpg” title=”The Best Free Games With Food” excerpt=”One of the best things about the CD-ROM era was that it was a great promotional tool. And the best kind of promotions were free games. Specifically: free games with food.”]

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