Kingdom: The Far Reaches

31.12.1984
Genre: Adventure Arcade
In this adventure game, step into the shoes of Lathan Kandor, a young boy, to defeat the evil Black Wizard. Lathan will find help from his mentor, the mighty magician Daelon. Explore the fantasy lands of the Far Reaches and retrieve three of the five pieces of the ancient relic called The Hand of Mobus. Talk to a variety of characters, collect objects and solve adventure type problems and puzzles. Kingdom: Far Reaches features mouse control, video animations, cartoon-like graphics, an in-game travel map and original music which can be turned off if desired.

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31.10.1997

Join forces with Dungeon Master Dalboz and travel throughout the Underground Empire's many locations, such as Hades, Flood Control Dam #3 and The Dungeon Master's Lair.

31.12.1994

Death Gate is a classic adventure game from the much revered Legend Entertainment. The studio is known for developing games that include exceptionally well crafted puzzles and a wacky sense of humor which frequently breaks the fourth wall and plays to a wide assortment of offbeat puns. Moreover, the company has emerged with a winning streak of fantasy and sci-fi games based on popular literature adaptations. The most famous of these are Frederick Pohl's Gateway and Terry Brooks' Shannara. In 1994, Legend Entertainment has chosen to adapt not 1 book but the whole series of 7 books by Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman known as The Death Gate Cycle. The original release of the game even includes a special gift for fans of the book series, namely an exclusive short story written by the same authors that tells some of the history of the mysterious Assassin's Guild from the series. In Death Gate, the player is cast in the role of a freshly freed Patryn—a young, brave wizard named Haplo. By his deeds in the Labyrinth, he has gained Xar's trust to be sent as a scout to the other 4 realms. The way between them leads through a mystical portal known as the Death Gate. For his journey, Haplo is handed not a single but several quests to complete. He must first explore the realms, learn about the new lands, and find the pieces of the World Seal that will allow the reformation of the world to its original whole. He must also retrieve as much of forgotten magical lore as he can, and find runes that will allow him to enter all the other realms. Finally, and most importantly, he must find out what has happened to the Sartan who seem to have vanished somewhere long ago, so that Xar will be able to bring them to the proper Patryn justice. The game, by taking inspiration from the first 4 books, creates a certain unique experience for the player that stands out among other fantasy adventures. There is an unusually layered structure based on the initial premise of the 5 separate realms, since the consequences of the sundering run much deeper than mere differences in landscapes. From realm to realm life conditions vary enormously, including geography, history, fauna, flora and astronomical bodies. For each realm, the population is divided into very specific societies, although many attributes of each race remain common. Several royal families, powerful guilds, and wealthy, independent merchants all have their own specific goals and ambitions that are not at all connected to the grand schemes of the Patryn and the Sartan, which they mostly are unaware of at this time after centuries of their absence. The distinctiveness of each culture's circumstances and the individual diversity of the larger and smaller schemers within the cast of characters give a special magic and wonder to the proceedings in the game, especially when the player visits a new realm for the first time and starts exploring it. The worlds possess a mysterious, intriguing flavor, but with a touch of whimsical surprises from nearly everywhere. Each encounter with Xar between travels reveals more information concerning the whole mechanics that connect these realms. Death Gate contains some exceptionally good voice acting. This is especially true for Henry Strozier who plays the role of Xar. He carries a low, charismatic, and authoritative voice that perfectly befits a character with a brave heart, long experience, deep wisdom, but a good share of arrogance. He shines for good measure too, since the player will spend more time conversing with his character than any other in the game. Haplo, who is only heard in conversations, voiced by David DeBoy, does not have a plain, uninteresting voice either. He sounds slightly arrogant and lordly like his master, but also rather youthful, yet manly enough to give an air of independency. The MIDI music in Death Gate is very well done. The compositions are perfect for an epic fantasy setting. The tunes are often light and comforting, but they can change dramatically to a more majestic tone when visiting the king's palace and to a darker motif when exploring the undergrounds of Abarrach, the vicious Labyrinth, or the deadly Assassin's Guild. Aside from Haplo and Xar, several other characters from the books also make an appearance in the game. Many of them, however, have been greatly simplified and reduced to only episodic roles with little development. Many major characters from the books are missing altogether, most notably Alfred, whose role is crucial in bringing out Haplo's characterization in the literary originals. On the other hand, some of the memorable archetypes from the books are used in new, interesting ways. For example, a boy named Bane has been recast into a different child with a different life and social standing, though both share a very similar personality. The character that stays most true to the canon is the whimsical, crazy wizard Zifnab, who appears in all his pun infested glory. In general, the plotlines are less violent and happier than those in the books, and the characters show less moral ambiguity. Death Gate plays like a traditional point-and-click adventure game, but like a role-playing game it is as much about being free to explore the fictional world as about following a foreordained storyline thread. There is quite a bit of narrative text, diaries, historical documents, and dialogs to sieve through. They are all well written and are rather fascinating, since everything is directly connected to the quests the player needs to complete or the puzzles the player needs to solve. There is a fine dose of humor in the game too, but nothing so unsubtle that may distract from taking the main conflicts of the story seriously. From this stance, Death Gate is actually quite a departure from the largely comical gallery of previous game titles from Legend Entertainment. The puzzles in Death Gate are a bit on the easy side, but the enjoyment they give is very well balanced by their ingenuity. The wealth of subplots, quests, plot twists, and deceptions add a lot of tension to the player's own proceedings. There is a certain logic and buttons based puzzle that is rather hard to beat. However, the player can ask for help from the game to solve it (or even skip over it). In general, the difficulty level of the game lies somewhere between easy and medium. The player can die in the game, but there is an option available to undo the player's last fatal action. Comparison with the books quickly reveals some of the obvious budgetary or time constraints the developer must have faced during Death Gate's development. Pryan, the realm of fire, is build of elements taken not only of this realm in its original form but also of Chelestra, the realm of water. Consequently, the latter realm has shrunken to a very limited scope in the game. The smallness of Chelestra comes in the game as a particular disappointing revelation, since it is the last of the elemental realms that the player visits. The interface used in Death Gate has evolved from the original Legend Entertainment's interactive fiction interface. There is an always available standard list of commands (such as Take, Look at, or Use) for the player to choose from, reminiscent of Lucasarts' SCUMM interface. In addition, extra action commands specific to an object appear when it is clicked. For example, when clicking on a door, apart from the standard list of verbs, there are added options to unlock, knock, or eavesdrop on the door. There are many actions which are not necessary to complete the game but which trigger funny responses specific to the situation. Altogether, the interface is a clever compromise between the sense of freedom achieved through a text parser and the simplicity of contemporary point-and-click style. Gameplay in Death Gate draws on a few gimmicks that are typical of role-playing games. For some parts of the game, the player is able to have a party of several characters. There is also a process of collecting magical spells, even though they have been tweaked for solving puzzles instead of combat. A spell is constructed by connecting runes in a combination. After that, it is traced in the air by Haplo with his hands to bring the spell into motion. The player will be able to learn many spells in the game, mostly from the mensch. This is an important diversion from the canon, as the mensch from the books possess a different kind of magic altogether. The high resolution graphics of the game will remind fans strongly of fantasy literature illustrated covers. The characters are beautifully detailed in high resolution, but rarely fully animated. However, their faces are always incredibly alive, especially in conversational close-ups. When exploring the game world, the player will notice many intricate but small animations in otherwise generally static sceneries. Major events occurring in the game are partially described in narrative text and partially presented as cut scenes. Sadly, the number of background illustrations in the game is a bit limited. All locations are shown from only a single point of view. Sometimes, the player is drawn to something interesting drawn at the edge of an illustration but is unable to look closely to find out more about it.

10.04.1998

The Prince and the Coward is a 1998 video game created by fantasy writer Jacek Piekara and video game designer Adrian Chmielarz. It was produced by Polish company Metropolis Software in cooperation with the British Revolution Software. GOG.com re-released it in 2021.

18.12.2006

The game revolves around navigating a main character named Dude from the third-person perspective about a secret landscape under his bed in search of a lost slipper. The game is in 2D and consists of a number of puzzles centered on using items collected and interacting with other NPCs. There is no dialogue in the game and the difficulty often derives from trying to determine why a character behaves in the way it does. Solutions to the puzzles are often illogical, in keeping with the atmosphere of the game which has been described as psychedelic.

21.07.2002

AdventureQuest is a fully animated RPG that you can play when you are on your lunchbreak, when the big game servers go down, or even for hours every day! You fight against hordes of monsters and enemies so that you can grow stronger and obtain ancient weapons of unimaginable power. Explore an entire world, filled with over 700 monsters, hundreds of items, magical powers to gain, and many classes to master! Become a Fighter, Wizard, Ninja, Vampire Slayer, Rogue, Knight, Mage, Paladin, Dragonslayer, and more.

10.07.2009

Katrina is an apprentice sorcerer at the Magic School. One day, she receives a letter from her brother and fellow student Roger, describing his search for the missing Professor Frobos. Troubled by recurring nightmares, Katrina decides to follow her brother to aid the investigation and help elucidate the mysterious disappearance. Magic Encyclopedia: Moon Light follows the same basic design of its predecessor, mixing hidden object and adventure gameplay mechanics. As the heroine, the player has to visit locations around the world, presented as a series of mostly static screens. The objective is to find and click on the scattered pieces of objects, to assemble and store them inside the inventory for later use. The bottom interface shows several segmented pictures of the broken objects, with each collected piece adding a new part and gradually reassembling them. The complete objects are stored in the inventory at the right side of the screen, from where they can be dragged and dropped on logical places on the scenery to solve puzzles. Some sections of the location have glimmering lights to indicate a zoomed view available, usually containing one of the missing pieces. The hint button shows the position of one of the hidden pieces, but takes some time to recharge after use. Some of the pieces can only be obtained after using an inventory tool or solving one of the puzzles. The puzzles take place on a separate screen, where some sort of mechanism has to be manipulated directly to solve it. These mini-games are varied, with logic puzzles about ordering cards, concentration, and other more original challenges. They can be skipped after a few minutes with the arrow button at the bottom.

20.04.2020

Deathtrap Dungeon is an interactive video realisation of Ian Livingstone's multi-million selling classic gamebook starring Eddie Marsan (Fast & Furious presents Hobbes & Shaw, Deadpool 2, Atomic Blonde) as narrator.

12.10.2020

Take to the skies on a magical broom in the VR racing game based on the Little Witch Academia anime! Join the ranks of students at prestigious Luna Nova Witchcraft Academy to race through the skies and purify ghosts on a custom broom in more than a dozen missions, and experience original story sequences featuring voice actors from the hit anime series! Collect items, points, and tickets, and customize your broomstick to your heart’s content. Can you take first place in the ultimate challenge of the Stella Cup? Join together with friends in online multiplayer and take in the sights of the world of Little Witch Academia in Free Flight Mode! “Together, we can fly!"

22.08.2023

From the creative director of Dead Space and multiple Call of Duty campaigns comes Immortals of Aveum, a single-player first-person magic shooter set in an original fantasy universe engulfed in magic, rife with conflict, and on the verge of oblivion.