"Medieval gore-fest"

This was one of my favorite games on the good old Amiga, which is why I've chosen this as my first review submission. It had very decent graphics for its time, and supported up to four players, while still being a great one-player game. Please keep in mind that this game is more than ten years old, and that this review is rated accordingly.

Story: 7

The druids of Stonehenge have sensed that dark times are coming, and have called forth for a champion who can retrieve the moonstone from the Lost Valley of the Gods. In doing so the hero will not only have saved the land, but also be in favor with the gods who may reward him with a place among themselves should he succeed. Four knights answer the druids call, and embark on the quest for the Moonstone.

A very vague story, but the game doesn't provide much more background info than that. Though it is another take on the let's-save-the-world-again concept, it is an original one. Or at least, it was original 10 years ago. Anyway, the game isn't story driven, the story is merely an excuse to let you take control of a knight and hack your way through a land full of monsters and black knights. And boy, what fun that is!

Graphics: 8

Very grainy by todays standards, and even back then they were not among the finest available. But they were better than average and never confusing. It was never difficult to see what was going on. The graphics are 2D sprites on static backgrounds, all hand-drawn. The backgrounds, while not being overly detailed, are very nice and suits the region they display, be it a dark, gloomy swamp or bright grasslands. The sprites are fairly large and as detailed as the graphics would allow back then. One enemy actually take up 1/4 of the screen! They are animated quite well in any situation, from swinging swords to meeting gruesome deaths. And they do that a lot. The game is very gory, each hit will result in a bloodstain on the ground, characters gets decapitated, eaten, cut in half, and even splattered by giant clubs all with blood and gore flying everywhere. Some battles will have you facing many enemies, and since dead characters doesn't magically disappear as was usual back then, the screen soon turns into a bloodied slaughterhouse. There is an option in the main menu to turn the gore off though, in case mommy is watching.

Sound: 9

There is no music while you actually play the game, only while loading, visiting certain places and during cut scenes which there are very few of. And even then the music is only short themes being looped. But they do convey the medieval atmosphere pretty well, especially while loading a battle. A very dark, gothic theme is played then setting the atmosphere just right. Very good. The sound effects are also top notch. All the clangs, thuds, grunts, splats and screams belonging in a sword fight is there, and executed very well. I'm giving the sound a 9 only because of the music, because after hearing those short themes being looped over and over again they do feel rather cheaply done. Thankfully you never have to listen to them for very long, so you won't grow tired of them immediately.

Gameplay: 9

The game consists of two different parts, an overhead world map and the battles. The game starts out on the world map, split in four regions with one knight starting out in each region. There will always be four knights, no matter how many players there are. The missing players will be substituted with AI-controlled black knights. I will get back to these. You have been told by the druids that in order to access the lost valley and get the moonstone you must collect a set of four keys, one in each of the regions. The game progresses in days, each knight getting a turn before the next day begins. Also each knight have abilities which can be raised by gaining experience, for example raising endurance will let you travel longer in one day.

There are several locations a knight can travel to. Most of them are shrines where battles are fought. Winning one of these battles will give that knight experience and the treasure found there. There are also other locations such as healers and magicians who may aid you on the quest. You can find equipment and accessories to improve your knight's abilities and also magic scrolls allowing you to cast spells, but alas, there are no battle spells in the game. All this makes the world-map part of the game seem much like an RPG.

While the world-map RPG style part of the game is very well executed, Moonstone's strength is in the battles, where you fight monsters or one of the other knights in real-time. No more taking turns, this is all about fast reflexes. The battle-area's size is only one screen, but big enough to allow you the space you need. Instead of the top-down view of the map, the battles are viewed from the side, with enemies appearing from both sides of the screen. You can move in eight directions, and perform eight actions by pressing the fire-button while pushing the joystick in one direction. These actions may also vary depending on your opponents. The battles are usually very fast and frantic, having you blocking and cutting this way and that at an incredible rate. Fortunately the controls are very easy to get into, and though many battles are hard, they are not impossible, and usually quite a blast as the fast paced battle with its exaggerated violence and gore inspires a sadistic humor. The learning curve is very high though, and you'll probably be dying a lot. But getting extra lives is also fairly easy, so you won't see the game over screen early in the game, even if you're a beginner.

While this game is a great single-player game, the real fun is in the multi-player games. I've rarely had as much fun competing with my friends as I have in this game! To begin with, each player starts out just trying to find keys and complete the quest, but as soon as a few keys have been found you'll soon be chasing each other across the lands, battling frequently for ownership of the keys, cursing at each other for dying at the hands of a friend. Or simply laughing sadistically as a friend fails miserably against a monster and is deprived of a life in a very foul manner, usually involving spray-painting the scenery with himself.

Faults:

I very much wanted to give this game a 10 out of 10, but it is lacking in certain areas that deprives it of this score. First of all, it's short. This isn't exactly a bad thing though, since it makes it very easy to pick up and have a go. A session rarely takes more than an hour and a half, two hours at most. It's probably because of this that the creators didn't include an option to save the game. Combine that with the fact that the game has a bad tendency of crashing, and you have a serious problem. Yes, the game does hang very often, and this is a sad thing as many gamers will be put off by this, because it always means having to start over from scratch.

Secondly, the AI of the black knights. On the world map they seem just to wander around doing nothing constructive at all. Sometimes they will head for a location or a nearby knight with an obvious goal in their minds, but this is rare. In battles however, they are a different story. They are very skilled combatants and difficult to defeat. But, they give you no real challenge in the main quest when you play the game alone. Finding the keys and defeating the monsters guarding them is challenging enough by itself though, so you shouldn't be put off by this.

Lastly, the balancing between good players and bad players. In a multi-player game, the person who has played the game the most will most probably wipe the floor with the others, since the game is so unforgiving. Unless you know how to fight monsters and other knights, you really don't stand a chance. And it takes a certain while to learn how to win the battles, due to a steep learning-curve. The game is satisfying to master though as it has a very nicely done ending, along with the equally nicely done intro, something that also was rare back then.

I should also mention the load-times since it is a popular gripe these days, though I have not deducted any points because of it. This is after all an old game on an old system. The game takes a very long time to boot up, and though most in-game loads are short, the battles do take a while to load. And you will be loading a lot of those. Still, as I mentioned, load-times should be expected on the Amiga so I will not let it influence my score.

Conclusion: 8

Combine these faults with the only nearly-great graphics and cheaply done but good music and you have the reason why I rated it 8 out of 10. It is still a very great game in my opinion, and if you have an old Amiga system you should try to track the game down and give it a go, especially with a couple of friends. You won't regret it, I promise you.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 08/25/02, Updated 08/25/02