The Black Cauldron (film)#Video game
The Black Cauldron, an adventure game computer game manufacturer Sierra On -Line is the the same cartoon was used as a template, which came out in Germany under the title Taran and the Magic Cauldron.
Plot and background
1984 Al Lowe was given the opportunity to create his first computer game. He programmed the Graphic Adventure Game " The Black Cauldron ", which is based, like the eponymous film of the Walt Disney Studios on the first two books of the Chronicles of Prydain by Lloyd Alexander. It came in 1986 in a simple EGA graphics and a text parser for Amiga, Apple II and Atari ST to the market.
The history
The main character in this story is Taran, a young " Assistant Pig -Keeper " ( auxiliary swineherd ), who works for the magician Dallben on the small farm of Caer dolphins. Taran's task is the magical pig " Hen Wen ," which has clairvoyant abilities to protect " the Horned King " from the evil. This seeks to steal the pig to use his skills as he would find the magic "Black Cauldron" ( Black Cauldron ), which can bring the dead back to life. The player's task is to Hen Wen to lead to a safe place, so that the Horned King gets neither the pig nor the kettle in her hands. It is up to Taran to save the mystical land Prydain from destruction.
Template for this black boiler is a magic cauldron of Celtic mythology. In this game, the power of the boiler be broken, that a survivor voluntarily jumps into him. In contrast to the original novel, it is not Prince Gwydion, because this character has not been incorporated, but Gurgi, Taran's the little companion.
Graphics and Sound
The Black Cauldron has a game for the typical computer games of that era graphics developed by Sierra On-Line Adventure Interpreter (AGI ), which supports a resolution of 160 × 200 pixels × 16 colors. Despite this, obvious by today's standards limits, gives the game by his spectral some very dark colors feel of an animated film. However, a shortcoming of the interpreter was the limited detail, the pixels were still clearly visible and the facial expressions of the people could not be shown. Eyes, nose or mouth consisted only of a few pixels. For large parts of the environment are presented from quite simple forms. The game is created in the so-called third-person perspective, that means the player sees his own character on the screen.
Sounds are played directly through the PC speakers, there is no support for sound cards. Therefore, playing music, in contrast to contemporary games, here only a subordinate role. It could only be monotonous or shrill squeaking sounds are played.
Game development and control
According to the game designer Al Lowe Disney asked the company Sierra On-Line in order to develop the game because the Dieney Studios at that time did not yet have its own software manufacturer. Nevertheless, the game was personal computer software is marketed under a Walt Disney label. During the development phase of Disney Al Lowe granted full access to the original hand-painted backgrounds and animations from the film.
The control of the character using either the cursor keys, a little more comfortable on the numeric keypad or a joystick. In addition, there is a menu for adjusting the speed or the different courses of action such as " look at something ", " do something" to save or load game. Usually there are at least two possible solutions to complete the game. You can read the progress or the effectiveness of its actions over a score.