The games of the Swordquest series (along with Atari 2600 "Raiders of the Lost Ark") were some of the earliest attempts to combine the narrative and logic elements of the adventure game genre with the twitch gameplay of the action genre, making them some of the very first action-adventure games. However, the last two contests along with the grand finale contest were never held, and the final game in the series was not released, due to Atari's financial problems related to the video game crash of 1983.