Game 279: Castle of Tharoggad (1988)

An unimpressive title screen sets the tone.

      

Castle of Tharoggad

United States

Computerware (developer); Tandy (publisher)

Released in 1988 for Tandy Color Computer 3

Date Started: 29 January 2018

Date Ended: 31 January 2018
Total hours: 8

Difficulty: 3/5 (Moderate)

Final Rating: 13

Ranking at Time of Posting: 17/282 (6%)

Castle of Tharoggad, if you can't figure it out by looking at the title for 10 seconds, is a color remake of Dungeons of Daggorath (1982; link to my coverage), and if it does one thing well, it's making its predecessor look even more impressive by comparison. It's a perfect example of an attempt to "update" the mechanics and appearance of a game while failing to understand subtle issues of atmosphere and balance that give the original its soul.

Usually I leave the critical reviews for the end, but in this case the most interesting thing about Tharoggad starts with review it received in the November 1988 Rainbow magazine, a periodical dedicated to the TRS-80/Tandy Color Computer line. (Models 1 and 2 were marked as "TRS-80," the "TRS" standing for "Tandy/Radio Shack," but Model 3 was just "Tandy.") Despite writing for a magazine dedicated to this specific platform, the reviewer is utterly unaware that Castle of Tharoggad is a sequel to one of the most popular game for that platform. He thus reviews it completely straight, complaining about sluggish performance during combat and, most importantly, the graphics: "It's hard to feel heroic when you're slaying a blue spider that wears a silly grin on its face."

       

The reviewer has a point.

     

The lukewarm review prompted a response from author Scott Cabit in the January 1989 issue. He complains that the reviewer didn't play far enough to enjoy some of the more advanced graphics later in the game, that he was clearly unfamiliar with Daggorath, and that he gave ho-hum treatment to the upgraded interface:

      

The icon and menu system used in Castle of Tharoggad provides convenient access to every command normally found in adventures and is probably one of the most striking things about the game. Yet this feature is dismissed as ordinary in the review. How often have you seen fully icon- and menu-driven games in a 16K program pack?

Although the review of my program was fair. I do not think that it provided an informed discussion. I suggest that the reviewer play Dungeons of Daggorath for a few hours and compare the two games. I think that he will better appreciate Castle of Tharoggad's features.

          

I can think of no greater testament to the delirium of all involved with this title than to think in side-by-side play, Tharoggad would come out favorably to Daggorath. Certainly, the universal opinion seems to be the opposite--so much that Cabit himself eventually ceded the issue. Several years ago, he commented on a YouTube video of gameplay and seems to have reversed himself on the desirability of the new interface. He blames Tandy:

        

Yes, it was the game I was told to write by Tandy. They wanted a point & click interface, because they said everyone hated the keyboard input method used by Daggorath, and they wanted "cheerful colorful" graphics. Bah! I originally wrote it dark and foreboding and they kept making me make the game more cheerful, lighter and easier to play. Wish I still had a copy of the original version I wrote. 

           

Tharoggad is hardly the only game to fall prey to this belief. Something was in the water in the late 1980s and early 1990s, and it gave developers the impression that players vastly preferred mice and joysticks to good old-fashioned keyboard play. I can't believe that this was ever true, and it certainly isn't true now. I played this game a week ago, and my right hand still hurts from all the mouse work. Playing a game--including movement--by clicking on icons, with no keyboard backup, is about as infuriating as an all-mouse version of Microsoft Word or Excel.

But yes, the color graphics were the second mistake. Tandy's reasoning seems to have been, "We're marketing this game for the Color Computer! It must have lots of colors!" The result is that the entire game is garishly ridiculous, particularly when coupled with the graphical quality of the monsters, which is so bad that making fun of it seems almost cruel, like verbally abusing a four-year-old for an unrealistic drawing of a dog.

          

Something you'd expect hanging on the fridge of a toddler's parents.

        

Daggorath wasn't a perfect game, but it worked within its limitations to provide an experience that was challenging, and above all, atmospheric. Its limited graphics were part of that atmosphere, and the game achieved some notable effects when torchlight grew dim or the character passed out. Equally important was its effective use of sound. Every monster had its own noise, which got louder as it approached the character, whose own heartbeat was used as both a health meter and fatigue meter. There was a remarkably sense of foreboding and tension as you explored the game and tried to prevent tachycardia.

Tharoggad ruins almost all of this. The heartbeat is still there, but the monsters make no noise. Torches don't dim; they just suddenly die. Unconsciousness is accompanied by flashing of bright colors, not the slow fading of the limited graphics around you. There are a dozen other ways that small issues of mechanics upset the exquisite balance that the first game managed to achieve.

        

I ran a little too fast down this hallway.

          

The plot of Tharoggad is that an Evil Wizard has invaded a Good Wizard's castle, imprisoned him, and populated the castle with monsters. The nameless adventurer's goal is to defeat the Evil Wizard and free the Good Wizard. To do so, he has to ascend through 8 levels of the castle, slaying monsters and collecting treasures along the way.

All game actions are accomplished via the icons on the screen, which can be manipulated by mouse or joystick. Most commands require you to specify a hand first, then an action, such as pick up, drop, "incant" (basically just "use'), and store in backpack or remove from backpack. You click on a compass to move and turn, and you double-click on the hands to attack with whatever is in that hand.

The interface is probably complicated by emulator issues, but I found the process of clicking around the icons maddening. The cursor seems to be constantly agitating in the emulator. Even worse, the entire interface frequently locks up in combat, while the enemy is taking his turn, and when it unlocks, the cursor usually jumps to some random place rather than where you last had it positioned. This makes it functionally impossible to do complicated things during combat, such as drop a shield to pull a potion out of the backpack and drink it.

         

A snake gets the best of me.

          

Each level has a fixed configuration from game to game, and each has the same selection of items and monsters. Even the item locations are fixed, I think. But the monster locations are random, and monsters pick up items they encounter, so shortly after you start the level, item locations are effectively randomized.

The game's full monster list is spiders, bats, ghosts, snakes, blobs, skeletons, huge ogres, zombies, and demons. Unlike Daggorath, individual enemies pose little danger in combat. From the first level to the last, no matter what weapon you have equipped, rapid double-clicking on the hand will kill just about anyone in between two and six hits. The problem comes when multiple enemies line up in a hallway to attack you. I found that I could kill two without much trouble. By then, your heartbeat is racing from the effort (and the damage you've taken), so you often die on the third. Four is definitely too many. But movement also increases your heartbeat, so you can't take too long to decide to flee, or you might simply die of a heart attack while running down a corridor.

      

The game's hardest foe.

      

Enemies often swarm you when you enter a new level, or a new area of an existing level. Fortunately, their pathfinding is abysmal, so if you can find a corridor with a bend or two, you can get into a position where you can force them to come to you one at a time.

Weapon progression goes: stone dagger, wooden sword, spear, mace, steel dagger, iron sword, and steel sword. There are three types of shields: leather, metal, and magic. Perhaps the most important items are torches, the limited availability of which place an effective time limit on the game. Torch types are taken from the first game: wooden, lunar, solar, and magic. Unlike Daggorath, however, I don't think different types of torches illuminate different things. The higher ones simply last longer. It took me a while to remember that you can stow torches after lighting them (somehow, they don't set your backpack on fire), allowing you to carry other objects (e.g., sword and shield) in your hands.

        

A pile of goods dropped after several combats.

      

Item progression is the only way to advance in the game. There's technically a "strength" meter, but it simply increases as you go up the levels and never makes battle harder or easier. Unlike Daggorath, you don't get experience or strength from killing monsters. But you still have to kill them to make sure they haven't picked up items that you need.

          

My backpack after a couple of levels.

          

The level design is interesting and at times maddening. Levels 1 through 4 are 12 x 8. Levels 5 through 7 mash two 12 x 8 sections together, connected by a secret door. Level 8 goes back to the smaller configuration. Among the levels, there are only four basic configurations, used repeatedly, although the positions of secret doors change between uses.

If there's a way to detect secret doors without simply bashing into every wall, I never found it. The interface is already clumsy enough without having to turn and hit dozens of walls per level, but that's basically what you have to do to find your way forward. Even worse, many secret doors are one-way, and many of those lead to dead ends. You definitely want to take saves at the beginning of each level, before you enter an area you can't get out of.

         

The penultimate dungeon level. Note all the ways to get trapped.

        

Ah, speaking of saves: there is no real "save" feature in the game (it came on cartridge). Instead, when you hit the "save" code, it provides four nine-digit alphanumeric strings, enough to record your position, status, inventory, and dead/alive status of the monsters on your level. It is not enough to record the health or position of the monsters on your level, so these are all re-seeded when you enter the codes to "reload." I didn't spend a lot of time trying to interpret or edit the codes, but I did study them long enough to figure out which spaces held the character's position, for reasons I will describe anon.

         

Part of the game "saving" feature.

          

The one-way secret doors start to get pretty crazy on Levels 6 and 7, and there are many places where you can trap yourself and have to reload. Level 7 also holds the only "magic shield" and "steel sword," both of which are in areas that you can't get out of, unless you modify the codes to keep your inventory but change your coordinates.

Nothing plotworthy happens until most of the way through Level 7, when you encounter a wall of fire. Once you walk into it, you can't back out, go forward, or do anything without incinerating yourself, with the sole exception of casting "Aquaflash" from a spellbook that you find on Level 4. I didn't find the spellbook the first time I tried, so I was stumped at this location.

            

Dispelling the wall of fire.

        

Eager not to count this one as a loss despite my hatred for the interface, I started completely over and made meticulous maps on the way up--complete enough that I offer them to anyone who might inexplicably want to play the game. This time, I found the spellbook. When "invoked," it offers 10 spells, each of which can be cast only once. There are two instances of "Aquaflash," for walls of fire on Levels 7 and 8. "Pyromite" and "Disolve" [sic] kill monsters in one hit. "Invisibility" allows you to walk past them. You need "Teleport" to get out of the area where you find the spellbook in the first place, since it's a dead-end. "Vivify" heals you.

"Disrupt" is an odd one that seems to pull monsters out of their current positions and move them a square to the west. It's the only way I was able to get the magic shield or steel sword on Level 7 legitimately, by waiting for an enemy to pick it up and then "disrupting" him to an accessible area. I never figured out what "Dispersion" does, and there's two instances of that.

         

What passes for a "zombie."

         

Level 8 starts you in a long corridor with about a million zombies. "Invisibility" is a good option here, until you can get to a safer place and lead them to you in smaller groups. You find a magic torch on this level, which can only be lit with a "magic match" found on Level 2. I'm not sure what it does that other torches don't. Maybe you can only see the wizard with it. I haven't tried approaching the wizard without it.

After defeating all the zombies, I soon encountered a wizard on Level 8. He was labeled "wicked wizard" and attacked hard, but not anything like the wizard in Daggorath. The first time, I killed him immediately with "Pyromite," but later I was able to defeat him with the regular iron sword.

      

Successful use of "Pyromite."

      

Beyond him is a second wall of fire and then another wizard, also labeled "wicked wizard." He dies with about the same difficulty as the first. And that, unfortunately, is where my adventure ends. It's infuriating to carry this as a loss, but all I can do is defeat both wizards, which provides no endgame screen or other indication that you've won.

I suspect that one of these two wizards is actually the "good" wizard, and you have to save him somehow, but I can't figure it out. I've tried casting every possible spell. I've tried running past the first wizard and killing the second. I've tried dropping my weapons and armor. I've tested every wall for secret doors. Nothing works. Also a mystery is the key that I found on Level 4 but doesn't seem to open anything or do anything when "invoked."

         

The wizard clobbers me while I try to make friends with him.

      

If anyone wants to try it yourself, these codes will get you to the end of Level 4 with all of the major items:

OGG0440GI

C0SGCG0VV

VVUT80000

00007BFTN

And these codes will get you to Level 8, with both wizards still alive. The fire wall is one step to your east, and the spellbook has all of the spells that it wasn't mandatory to cast before getting to this point:

0MC0440T7

D0936G8VV

VVVVVV019

G00055K1J

Naturally, I'll take any hints that will allow me to add an epilogue to this entry and convert the game to a win. I've tried to communicate with Scott Cabit, but no luck so far.

            

         

Despite my praise of Daggorath, I didn't rate it very high in a classic RPG sense, and I didn't end the game liking it so much as admiring it. This one, offering the same limited game world, NPCs, and economy, and offering (unlike Daggorath) no character development, and presenting a horrid interface, does even worse, coming to a final score of 13. The highest score (3) is in "gameplay," with some credit to its moderate difficulty and pacing. I think it was a sincere effort to replicate Daggorath, created by people who honestly felt that an icon-driven interface and color graphics were better, but entirely missing the point of the original.

Scott Cabit wrote a number of other games for the Color Computer line in the 1980s, including Syzygy (1984), Martian Crypt (1985), and Adventure in Mythology (1986), none of them RPGs. He now works for a company that makes aviation software. Computerware was a minor developer that specialized in the platform and also never offered another RPG. I wish I could say that my experience with the entire platform ends here, but unfortunately, we'll have The Seventh Link and Paladin's Legacy in 1989, both miserable looking Ultima clones.

Next up on the 1988 list: the sample game that accompanied an obscure RPG construction kit.