Dark Sun: Shattered Lands

The Dark Sun series is developed by SSI, three-part role-playing series, which was published between 1993 and 1996 for DOS. It is based on the campaign Dark Sun world of role-playing rules Advanced Dungeons & Dragons and consists of two single-player titles and an MMORPG. All titles use the so-called Dark Sun engine, which was developed by SSI as a successor to its Gold Box engine and between 1988 and 1993 for the published SSI AD & D title was used.

• 3.1 action
• 3.2 gameplay
• 3.3 reception

• 4.1 gameplay
• 4.2 Development
• 4.3 reception
• 4.4 successor

Game world

Dark Sun (English: Under the Hidden Sun ) plays in the world Athas. The scenario is, among others, as "post - apocalypse magic " circumscribed, since the use of magic has turned the country into a hostile wilderness ( cf. Post Apocalypse ). The world is ruled by sorcerer kings and is characterized by great brutality. Dark Sun differs in design from the usual fantasy worlds.

Shattered Lands

• OS: DOS 5.0
• CPU: 386/DX 25 MHz
• RAM: 2 MB
• Graphics Card: VGA card with 256 colors
• 17 MB free hard disk space

Dark Sun: Shattered Lands is a system developed by SSI computer role-playing game for DOS from the year 1993.

Action

Scene of the action is the city-state Draj, ruled by the sorcerer king Tectukitlay. This wants a full blood sacrifice to celebrate the completion of his pyramids to organize. Its objectives is therefore the extinction of the few free desert villages in the surrounding countryside Drajs. The player controls a four-member gladiator troupe that is doomed in the battle arenas Drajs to the amusement of the people and the sorcerer king to fight. The objective is to escape from captivity and the union of the free cities to Tectukitlay united against to contact and destroy them.

Gameplay

The game begins with character creation of the four-man group of heroes. You can choose from seven races ( human, elf, half - elf, halfling, half - giant, Mul, Thri - Kreen ) and seven classes (Fighter, Gladiator, Ranger, Thief, Priest, Preserver, Psionic ). The game world consists of contiguous, two-dimensional maps. The game is in this case - as in the contemporary Ultima titles and unlike previous SSI Gold Box Series - consistently presented in a bird's eye view. While exploring the game world, the group is usually symbolized by a Sammelicon. Only when it comes to the turn-based battles, the individual figures are fanned. Unlike in the previous AD & D games, the player can rest only at predetermined locations to regenerate magic and life. For the rapid progress in the game world travel portals exist.

Development

Once introduced in 1988 with Pool of Radiance Gold Box engine had peaked in the early 1990s and declined the sales figures of the younger AD & D role-playing games, SSI hoped this trend with the VGA graphics of the new Dark Sun engine and a new, confront unused Hintergrundszeanrio and to build on the success of previous AD & D title. Originally Shattered Lands was announced for autumn 1992, but the development was delayed by one year, so the title came after multiple displacement only in October 1993 on the market. Originally, the game should come up with a real-time battle system, which was, however, again changed the course of development as in the previous titles on turn-based.

Reception

The announcement in 1992 still outstanding graphics of the game was time for publication in October 1993 already only mediocre. In addition there are criticisms of the gameplay, which was to be called too thin and too too much support on vorgeskriptete events. In the gaming magazine Power Play the plot and the scenario were described as a mix of Mad Max and Spartacus and praised as " full-bodied newcomer to the fantasy genre ." However, have been criticized program error that led to the freezing of the game, as well as the small number of fixed rest areas, forcing the players to long journeys within the game world. Other criticisms were, firstly, the mouse control because the cursor is not automated by Iconveränderung, but only after manual click demonstrated the interaction; secondly, the Automap was criticized, the moment you enter the area all the details on level design and whereabouts of all game characters divulge why the element of surprise fall by the wayside.

Rating levels:

• Power Play: 73 % / 72% ( CD -ROM version )

The one-year delay had serious financial implications for developers SSI. The estimated revenue for 1992, still remained and could not be adequately compensated. In early 1993, therefore, had 20 % of the workforce will be dismissed. Finally, lay the actual revenue below expectations. In summer 1994, the faltering company was eventually taken over by Mindscape. The delay of Dark Sun: Shattered Lands is seen as a cause of the financial demise of the company, which is why the online games Gamespot the title in 1999 recorded 10 vaporware into its Hall of Shame of the top.

Wake of the Ravager

• OS: DOS 5.0
• CPU: 386/DX 33 MHz
• RAM: 4 MB
• Graphics Card: VGA card with 256 colors
• 30 MB free hard disk space
• 2 X CD -ROM drive,

Dark Sun: Wake of the Ravager is the sequel to the 1994 released computer role-playing game Dark Sun: Shattered Lands. Like its predecessor, the title of SSI was developed and released for DOS.

Action

The game continues the story of its predecessor, but this time the venue is the city of Tyr. The player's group of adventurers gets there at the beginning of the game in a raid, he witnessed the murder of a woman who as a member of a secret society (English: Veiled Alliance) turns out. The group is a plot of the so-called Draxianer on the track that are responsible, among others, for the death of the god-king of the city and the government want to tear through the city itself. However, on behalf of the Dragon King seconded by Ur - Draxa commander of Draxianer pursued with the revival of a long dormant monster also own plans that threaten the entire world Athas. It is the task of the group of adventurers to end the siege Tyr and hold the Draxianer of the realization of their plans.

Gameplay

Dark Sun: Wake of the Ravager takes over unchanged the gameplay of its predecessor. The player controls a four-man group of adventurers, he can either re-create or import from the predecessor. The game offers a mix of turn-based battles and puzzles. The character creation in addition to the options of the first track includes the ability to create dwarves and Druid. The main plot is supplemented by a number of optional side quests. In some cases, alternative solutions are available to work around some extended fights by sneaking. Although the technical basis remained the same, the perspective has changed slightly compared to its predecessor.

Reception

Volker Weitz of the gaming magazine Power Play the program designated as a " dahingeschludertes Program" and " rapid fire ", the content did not include a new leg and keep the same mistakes as its predecessor. Also Michael Fast PC Joker criticized the technical quality, but praised compared to its predecessor, the less combat -heavy gameplay, which have more puzzles and small orders to offer. In addition, Wake of the Ravager contained numerous bugs that users were holding, inter alia, by the end of the game. Testerin Scorpia the American game magazine Computer Gaming World called the game due to the numerous bugs and a little original main plot as a disappointment, the one anmerke the premature publication. However, they praised the interesting design of some side quests and the ability to avoid fights by alternative solutions.

Rating levels:

• PC Joker: 73 %
• Power Play: 49%

Crimson Sands

• OS: Windows 95
• CPU: 486 MHz with 66
• RAM: 8 MB
• 2 X CD -ROM drive,
• Modem: 14.4 kbit / s transmission rate

Dark Sun Online: Crimson Sands in 1996 published MMORPG from SSI. It uses the same technical basis as the title previously released Dark Sun: Shattered Lands and Dark Sun: Wake of the Ravager. It ranks next to Neverwinter Nights to the earliest graphical MMORPGs before the genre was permanently established with the success of Ultima Online and Everquest.

Gameplay

Scene of the game action is again the countryside and the city of Tyr. The player character can unlike Dark Sun: Wake of the Ravager not be imported from the single player title. Instead it is recreated from eight available races and classes, the selection corresponds to the circumference of Wake of the Ravager. Overall, the player could with an account create up to four characters, however, was only one character in the game can be used. The game already included numerous MMO standard game functions such as guilds, chat window, group formation and penalties for the death of a character. The game allowed to play in most areas PvP battles that were still turn-based. The death of a character was punished with the loss of a character level and some equipment. Was the level cap for player characters, depending on the requirements of the AD & D rules for the respective classes, at level 15, the game generated by a random regular new quests to provide the player with content. A key feature was the chat option that is similar to the case of purely text-based online role-playing games of the type Multi User Dungeon, a strong social component represented, were performed on the text-based role-play and live events.

Development

The considerations for the game began the summer of 1994, originally commissioned by the telecommunications company AT & T, which was looking for a competitor to Neverwinter Nights for his own closed online network Interchange. Development work finally began in October 1994, but in November 1995, AT & T decided to close its network, and was therefore the development of Dark Sun Online on. The rights to the game reverted to SSI. Since a large part of the development was already funded at this time, the company decided to continue the game at a low level and to seek a new partner for the publication. With the Total Entertainment Network ( TEN) finally could be gained a new partner and the development work has been resumed in full measure in January.

The development team was given the task to develop a MMO for thousands of games and with a Server-/Client-Struktur based on the existing code of Dark Sun: Wake of the Ravager to develop. As a result of aggressive cost planning, the project suffered but under constant cost pressure. So the team was merely a graphic with 50 % of his time available to generate much needed graphic content. The rest of the graphics had to be recycled from the previous parts, or other SSI developments such as Al- Qadim either: The Genie's Curse be taken. The same was true for the audio range, where sounds of the title World of Aden: Thunder Cape were recycles. With the restriction to the already technologically obsolete program code base and the few new graphics contents of the focus was therefore on the gameplay and the non-graphical content. Complication was the multiple taxation of the graphic artist, who was also involved in other projects and was involved at crucial moments in the completion of other titles. Therefore had to resort to the assistance of external service providers both in terms of graphics and the programming of the online functions. One consequence of this was the removal of all movies with the exception of the intro videos.

Cooperation with external service providers proved to be problematic. Firstly, the external graphic services not available in all cases, the desired performance. On the other hand, there were problems with interaction with the external programmers. Since the code base was not designed for an online game, had during the development and over again large parts of the code to be rewritten. Previously created content often functioned thus no longer in the desired way and had to be modified or rewritten. By switching from AT & T to TEN also the Server-/Client-Struktur had to be revised. As the costs should be kept low, the service here was able to prevail with his demand for a changeover to a peer-to - peer model. Thus the basis for the subsequent susceptibility of the game was placed against hackers. Another problem was in trying to keep the program as its predecessors title as a native DOS program and establish communication with the Windows 3.1 -based provider network. After several failed attempts, the game was finally converted into a native Windows program.

In order to eliminate bugs as possible, SSI led to the completion of the work by a closed beta test with volunteers and came across a great response. In addition to 500 copies on physical volumes, the quota was therefore supplemented by download versions. The finished game was both offered in a variant on physical disks including an intro movie, play music in CD -quality audio and a printed manual in the retail purchase, as offered in a reduced to the necessary game files version free to download. To access the game additional charges were levied.

Reception

Although Dark Sun Online already included some game features that have been popularized with the Ultima Online published a year later, the title were unsuccessful largely. First, the restriction prevented the closed Total Entertainment Network more widely, on the other hand the title because of the short development time and a consequent recourse to already existing content was not technically on the amount of time. To complicate matters further the vulnerability of the game against hackers, which led to character manipulation. Since the game was running on the user's computer rather than on a central server, developers and operators were able to counteract the manipulation inadequate. There were bugs. The business model of TEN finally shifted in favor of proprietary, browser-based gaming platform Pogo.com, in the TEN finally came up. 1999 Dark Sun Online was set. In a retrospective of the Game Magazine, Joystiq designated author Justin Olivetti Dark Sun Online as "a [ s ] triumph of ingenuity over limited resources and a lack of experience on MMO developments ".

Successor

On 19 December 1997 TEN announced under the title Dark Sun Online: The Age of Heroes a successor to Crimson Sands, which is, however, never appeared. Objectives were, among others, a modernized, better secured against manipulation platform and detailgetreuere implementation of the AD & D rules. The game was unlike Crimson Sands primarily responsible developed by TEN.