Darklands

aka: Darklands: Heldenhafte Abenteuer im mittelalterlichen Deutschland, Darklands: Heroic Role-Playing Adventures In Medieval Germany
Moby ID: 258
DOS Specs
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Description official descriptions

Darklands is a role-playing game set in 15th century Holy Roman Empire, which at that time encompassed today's Germany and several surrounding countries. Unlike most other role-playing games, it is set in a concrete historical environment that is accurately depicted, including geographical outlines, social and cultural backgrounds, authentic establishments and items, and so on. The game's supernatural elements are strictly based on the popular beliefs of that time and region and include fantastic creatures such as kobolds or dragons, curses, witchcraft, alchemy that actually works, etc.

The player controls a party of four active characters, though any amount of them can be created and swapped in the town inns. The player can begin by either selecting a pre-made party (quickstart) or by creating their own characters. In the beginning the player selects the character's social background. Afterwards, when they are ten years old, the player can choose an initial career path for them. Careers may include diverse occupations such as soldier, peasant, bandit, etc., which may eventually become more specialized (e.g. a student turning into an alchemist).

The more time the player invests in a certain career path (in five year periods), the more experience points the character receives, which can be manually allocated to improve their skills. Career choices affect main attributes such as strength or charisma, as well as skills, which involve weapon proficiencies, stealth, virtue, speaking Latin, healing, riding, and many others. Though there are no class definitions and each character can theoretically achieve excellence in any skill, character builds in the game can be seen as warriors, clerics, and alchemists. Religion-oriented characters may learn about various saints during the course of the game and pray to them for different benefits. Alchemists gain access to formulae and have to procure ingredients to mix potions with various effects. Skills in the game increase through repeated use: using swords in combat may increase the edged weapon skill, successfully conducted conversation may increase the character's common speech skill, etc.

The party chosen by the player begins the adventure in the inn of a randomly chosen town. The main plot eventually involves confronting a powerful demon and its cult, but it is unraveled only under specific circumstances achieved in the game. The game has a vast scope and can go on indefinitely. However, characters would age, grow weaker, and eventually die, requiring the player to create new ones. The main goal is to collect as much fame for the party as possible to obtain higher-ranked quests with better rewards, which also includes the quest that leads to the completion of the main plot. The player is completely free to roam the vast map of the Empire, accessing towns, castles, villages, and other places of interest. Towns and castles are navigated via text menus, with background images representing various locations. The travel screen is a map of the Empire with a lone figure representing the player-controlled party.

Most settlements of the same type have nearly identical options, though actual results may vary depending on the characters' skills, their local reputation, as well as unique traits found in different locations. For example, different towns may have wares of vastly different quality for sale; villages may engage in devil worship, and the player may attempt to prove that, etc. It is possible to increase local reputation (for example, by taking on cutthroats bothering the citizens) and overall fame by making virtue-increasing choices and vanquishing foes. It is, however, also possible to become outlaws by attacking guards, killing priests on the roads, and so on.

The game has several large isometric dungeon-type areas, most notably mines of different types, which contain generic quests as well as puzzles to solve. Areas unique to the main plot are also built like dungeons with particularly dangerous enemies and treasure to loot. However, much of the activity in the game takes place either in towns or in the wilderness, through various types of random encounters. The player is always given the option to avoid combat either through diplomacy or other means, the success depending on the character's corresponding attributes.

Combat takes place on separate isometric screens and proceeds in real time, but the player can pause the action to give orders to the characters at any time, giving it a pseudo-turn-based flavor. Characters can be ordered to attack, search for the enemies' vulnerable spots, use items, etc. Different types of weapons may have different effects depending on the enemies' armor: for example, blunt weapons are more effective against plate armor than swords. Depending on the enemies' intentions, player-controlled characters may only be knocked down or wounded mortally in case of defeat. Dead characters can not be brought back to life and must be replaced with new ones.

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Credits (DOS version)

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Reviews

Critics

Average score: 78% (based on 16 ratings)

Players

Average score: 3.8 out of 5 (based on 62 ratings with 8 reviews)

Fantastically atmospheric

The Good
The game just oozes atmosphere, I love the whole medieval setting and the fact most of the graphics are stills means the age of the game doesnt show too much. The character creation system is great and you can really get quite attached to the little blighters as they develop in stature and fame. This open ended premise basically means you can create your own story rather than be lead along like in the Final Fantasy series.

The Bad
The graphics are dated as are the sounds, but as I said they really dont detract from the whole experience. The open ended nature can get a bit tiresome without enough focus as generally repeating the same actions will reap the most benefits.

The Bottom Line
A classic RPG worth checking out if your a casual player ESSENTIAL if you are an RPG fan.

DOS · by Hugh McKenna (4) · 2001

I haven't found its equal in the 9 years since I started playing it.

The Good
It was soooo fantastically imersive. I created these characters, I designed them & specialised them. And after playing the game, I regenerated my party, creating a group of ULTIMATE warriors! I called them by name & armed them with a vast array of high quality weapons, armour, alchemical potions & heavenly saints.

The real-time strategy thing was just starting at that stage & Darklands clearly lead the pack. In many games since then, I've wished for a darklands style combat interface. The ability to freeze the action & issue new orders is awesome. Newer RTS's can be soo frustrating where combat happens sooo fast that it's all over before you can issue intelligent orders. Are there any other RTS's where you can arm units with ranged weapons as well as melee weapons? Darklands again lead the pack with its realism - how many archers would realistically have gone into battle armed only with their bow & quiver? Surely they would have carried a sword of sorts. Darklands reflects this sentiment, allowing units(characters) to carry several types of weapons at once, changing weapons when melee combat was joined.

The Bad
The limits of the Darklands world. Oh how I dreamt of crossing the Alps into Italy, traveling west into France, and across the Channel to England. And travelling East to Russia, and south-east to the Holy Land. The world was my oyster. The hints of expansion packs... Of gaining world wide fame... Oh well.

As others have already mentioned, the repetitiveness of skirmishes was another feature I occasionally tired of. Every thief & thug is identical... Every dwarf, every bear, every wolf, every... always the same image. Ten years ago it didn't make much difference - gameplay (incredible gameplay!) distracted from any disappointments with the graphics. These days, it's almost expected that games use different sprites or bitmaps to provide a mediocum of variety to normally mundane interactions.

Since Warcraft2, AOE & Starcraft (to name a few) have been around, fights with less than 10 units have become mere skirmishes. In a way, I wish that Darklands would have allowed you to control vast numbers of units, or at least become involved in major battles - (possibly allied with a Lord or King?)

The Bottom Line
Overall, I spent the 2 most important years of my educational life wasting(!?) my time playing this awesome simulation. In a way Darklands not only lead the way for real-time-strategy games, but it also paved the way for the currently new-generation of Role-playing Strategy games. Just check out World of warcraft, Warcraft 3 or Planetside. Every one of these has great similarities to Microprose's greatest title of all time. DARKLANDS.

DOS · by Gordon Menck (2) · 2001

One of, if not the only the greatest CRPGs made

The Good
This game is nearly perfect, it never gets old. After you beat the game, you can still wander around in the world (hundreds of subquests, you'll probably miss a few along the way). I bought the game back in 1995 and am still playing it today. The historical background is excellent, instead of magic there is alchemy which eliminates the "prevent the evil wizard from taking over the world" plotline most RPGs have. The character creation screen is the neatest I have seen in any RPG, you choose what kind of family they had, some professions your character could have had, and then add your skills points. The characters age realisticly, there are day/night cycles, shops close at certain times... This game will always stand out from any other RPG I've played in terms of gameplay.

The Bad
A few minor bugs, such as getting trapped in some dungeons interfered with my games a few times. The save/load functions needed work, I had to date and timestamp my save games to easily understand which one was the last. It dates them for you, but sometimes it's easier to read yesterday's date instead of the date a couple centuries ago. I've always hoped that MicroProse would make a special edition version with more enhanced graphics, and a map/scenario editor... still haven't gotten it though.

The Bottom Line
If you prefer gameplay over OpenGL 3D graphics, Darklands is for you. If you're looking for a game you'll enjoy for 5+ years, Darklands is for you. If you like RPGs I highly recommend you try Darklands.

DOS · by ZombieDepot (40) · 2001

[ View all 8 player reviews ]

Discussion

Subject By Date
Uh-oh... Unicorn Lynx (181788) Sep 9, 2013
Wrong Platforms? Señorita Kathryn (615) Mar 5, 2012

Trivia

Cancelled Amiga version

An Amiga version of Darklands was considered, but the game was judged as too large to be played from floppy, and the potential market of hard-disk equipped Amigas was apparently deemed not large enough, going by a chat log with Arnold Hendrick.

Influence

Darklands is based on history (whether true or not) of the influence of the Templar Knights, a powerful monastic order during the crusades which were eventually crushed by the Church (Pope Clement V) and the King of France (King Philip IV) based on their allegations with Satan, specifically Baphomet.

Intended Sequels

From the Designer's Notes in the Game Manual: "Darklands was designed to permit sequels. It is possible to have some additional adventures in Germany. More importantly, it is possible to create entirely new games elsewhere in Europe. The system not only allows moving "saved game" files back and forth, but also allows you to load multiple games onto your hard disk and move back and forth between the nations, in a sort of giant adventure. Let us know what you enjoyed in Darklands, what you would like to see in a sequel, and what setting you prefer. There are plenty of possibilities: the Emperor in Germany has many political problems and intrigues, England and France are busy finishing the last half of the Hundred Years War, after which England falls into civil war (the War of the Roses). Meanwhile, Italy is at the peak of its warring city-states era, Vlad the Impaler appears in the Balkans (the historical figure who ultimately became Dracula), Tamerlane is conquering Central Asia, and much more.What's your preference?" ~ Arnold Hendrick, 1992.

Sadly, they must not have received enough feedback to pursue this any further.

Memory

The game needs over 600K of free DOS memory to avoid crashes. In fact, the MORE lower memory you can free up, the better the game runs, something that is barely addressed by all the later patches.

Awards

  • Computer Gaming World
    • November 1996 (15th anniversary issue) – #10 Least Rewarding Ending of All Time

Information also contributed by Игги Друге and Indra was here

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Contributors to this Entry

Game added by Brian Rubin.

Windows added by Picard. Linux, Macintosh added by Sciere.

Additional contributors: Trixter, Kasey Chang, Indra was here, Jeanne, Glen Henderson, formercontrib, Patrick Bregger.

Game added August 30, 1999. Last modified March 6, 2024.