Game 546: Warriors of Legend (1993)

Fortunately, the Hyborian Age is too early for them to have been knights.

       

Warriors of Legend

United States

Synergistic Software (developer); Virgin Games (publisher)

Released 1993 for DOS

Date Started: 27 March 2025 

     

We reach the end of an era with Warriors of Legend. It isn't the last Synergistic game, nor the last game designed by Robert Clardy, but it is the last RPG using the "World Builder" engine, which debuted in 1988 with War in Middle Earth and featured in Spirit of Excalibur (1990), Vengeance of Excalibur (1991), and Conan: The Cimmerian (1991). I haven't always liked it, but it's offered something different than the typical Wizardry, Ultima, or Dungeon Master clone. 

    

It takes place in a kingdom called Lemuria, which enjoyed peace for centuries, until it was visited by sorcerers from across the desert in Lortai, "a fabled realm of sorcery and mystery." The visitors were at first welcomed for their exotic nature, strange tales, and "feats of magic," but it soon became clear that they were up to something insidious. Leaders of Lemuria disappeared mysteriously or changed their personalities overnight, "killing and pillaging in their own kingdoms." Before long, the Black Circle, Lortai's "coven of sorcerers," had completely seized power. King Osric the Great learned that the Circle planned to break an ancient artifact called the Chaos Key, opening a gateway between Lemuria and the Realm of Chaos.

    

The kingdom was later known as Madagascar.

    

Osric put out a call for heroes, but only four showed up. They were immediately ambushed by agents of Moc Madure, the Dragon Lord, and taken to Madure's fortress. They were about to be executed when one of them, Brand, broke his bonds, and freed the others. They escaped and returned to Osric's capital at Illandria. Here, the game begins.

       

They can head to New Verdigris once they're done here.

    

It's not a bad backstory, though somewhat derivative, and I'm not sure why the capture and escape part were necessary since, functionally, the heroes end up where they started. The proper names (if not their full bios) are mostly drawn from Robert Howard's Conan stories, suggesting that Warriors is meant to exist in the same sort of Hyborian-age setting as Conan. In fact, it wouldn't surprise me if Warriors had started as a sequel to Conan before Synergistic or Virgin lost the license.

 

The game begins with a character creation, or at least character editing, process. The default characters are named Brand, Ataris, Keena, and Astrovir, but the player can re-name them. Each has values from 0-20 in strength, wisdom, intelligence, agility, and stealth. Immediately, there are some issues. The manual says that the game offers five character classes: fighter, wizard, thief, archer, and cleric. Each of these classes has a prime attribute that determines the maximum level the character can achieve. Fighters are governed by strength, thieves by stealth, archers by agility, wizards by intelligence, and clerics by wisdom.

     

The four characters.

    

So far, so good. But the character sheet doesn't otherwise identify a specific class for each character. Instead, the words "Combat," "Clerical," "Sorcery," "Archery," and "Thieving" appear on the right-hand side of the sheet. These are similar but not identical to the supposed five classes. How am I supposed to tell what class each character is? None of the words are highlighted or marked. Clicking on them does nothing. I guess the character is whatever class has the highest attribute? The manual notes that none of the characters is a cleric, but clerical abilities "can be utilized by any of them with high wisdom." But Astrovir has equally high values in intelligence and wisdom. Is he a wizard or cleric? And none of the characters is highest in agility; does that mean I have no archer? What if I adjust the default values, which the game lets you do? Am I changing the character's class? The manual is obtuse about these things, so I just shrugged and went with the default party, figuring I'll at least explore a bit. 

  

The character creation screen.

     

Gameplay begins on an overworld map seen from a side view. The party can choose to go to the city of Illandria, some ruins, the palace, Mt. Gunderbad, and a pyramid. Clicking any of these icons transitions the interface to the classic "studio" perspective used by the World Builder engine, in which the characters seem to be on a stage with no fourth wall. The first time the player visits the map screen, the game automatically selects the city of Illandria and takes the party there, so I guess that's a bit of a hint.

    

The outdoor map.

    

In "studio" view, the exploration window occupies the top two-thirds of the screen. The bottom third has the party members' names, inventories, and character sheets. The selected party member automatically acts as the lead when you move, and the rest follow. You can move with arrow keys or the numberpad, but most interaction is done with the mouse, with only a few keyboard backups.

  

Before I turn it off, I should note that there's some semi-tonal "Arabian"-sounding music, more thematic than melodic, over both the main title and the exploration window. It's credited to Christopher Barker, who also did Conan and the two Excalibur games. It's appropriate to the setting. Sound effects are otherwise relatively sparse, mostly limited to clangs and screams during combat.

      

Entering the city through the southern gate.

    

As we begin to explore the city, we bump into NPCs, and they begin talking to us. Some of them offer some light dialogue options. A few examples:

   

• An NPC groans about how he has to carry a sack around all the time and can't stop or put it down. "It's like there's some strange force governing my every action." Funny, but it's a little too early in the genre to pretend that NPCs are self-aware. He suggests I talk to Ulg, the crippled sage, and gives me directions to his home.

• An old man says, "Greetings, kindred spirit." This annoys the party for some reason.

     

Why are all the responses so rude?

      

• A woman carrying buckets compliments our appearance and suggests we visit her in the Orc's Nest some night.

• A woman asks for "alms for the poor." We give her a gold piece, and she recommends we visit Sahhar the Seer near King Osric's Palace. 

• An old man named Crazy Eddy plays a variety of word games with us. First, he asks us a question with all the words in reverse order. We have to respond the same way. Then he puts all his words in alphabetical order, then anagrams them. At the end, he says that if we ever defeat a dragon, we should be careful to search the area before leaving.

    

He spoke to us backwards, so our answer has to be backwards.

   

• A crotchety old woman says that the passage to Moc Madure's lair is through the great mountain to the north.

      

I don't know if any of the dialogue options are different with different characters selected as the leader. They don't seem to vary.

We also start wandering into buildings, eager for a place that might sell supplies. We started the game with 1000 gold pieces but no weapons or armor. Key buildings aren't marked, so we have to try all of them. We find:

    

• A temple with a priestess who performs "mana restoration." We don't need it yet.

• A residence with a woman who's plainly terrified of us.

     

I guess that's a sensible reaction to four warriors bursting through your door.

    

• An inn where we can sleep for 10 gold.

• A residence where a man praises us for going after Moc Madure. He tells us that Moc is "more lizard than man" and recommends that we don't try to reason with him.

• A merchant! He sells steel helms for 20 gold, steel mail for 50 gold, steel shields for 30 gold, and leather versions of those things for 10, 30, and 20. I do some experimenting, and it doesn't seem that the non-warrior characters have any trouble equipping an all-steel kit, so I just buy that for all of them. The interface for buying and selling is a little cumbersome.

    

Keena's kit when we're done. There are spaces for a helm, shield, weapon, armor, boots, necklace, four rings, and whatever the thing in the lower right is.

    

In the next house that I wander into, some guy starts attacking me with a sword. The game switches to its combat interface, which I don't have time to figure out before he kills Keena, and wow do the party members howl when they die.

    

The party members apparently don't know how to fight with their fists.

     

The manual doesn't have a lot to offer on combat, just that you should be able to left-click for a single attack and right-click for continuous attacks. Since no clicking works, I decide that the game won't let us attack without weapons, which turns out to be true. I abandon my previous exploration pattern and start hunting for some place that will sell us weapons.

   

Around this time, I start experiencing another problem: the game won't save. The way it's supposed to work is that you click the "Save" icon, then click one of three save slots, then type a name, then hit ENTER. This works maybe once or twice with every new game, but inevitably I click in the box and it won't let me type anything but spaces, ENTER doesn't work, and there's no way to escape or get out of the box. I'm forced to quit the emulator and reload, losing whatever progress I made in the meantime. It happens so often that I can barely make any progress in the game. I try several DOSBox configurations and several versions of the game with no effect. (No one online seems to have mentioned the problem, but there is very little about the game online at all.) Finally, I re-install a DOSBox version that allows save states, and the rest of this session is dependent on those. I know from experience that they will eventually fail, so I don't know how far I'll be able to get. Suggestions are welcome.

     

There is no way off this screen.

     

I find a general goods store (Timur's Fine Junk), where I buy a lockpick set, some boots, and a couple of empty potion bottles. The merchant also sells knives, but that's not a solution to my weapon problem, as the game regards them as throwing weapons. 

     

The store interface.

     

I'm unable to find a weapons shop, but after a while, I realize that from the southern gate where you enter the city, you can run around the perimeter of the city's walls to three other entrances. 

    

An alternate way into the city.

    

It still takes me a while. The city is chaotic and hard to navigate, and I find myself wishing the game had come with a city map, like Conan did. I pop into places long enough to confirm they're not stores and then leave, ignoring NPCs and fleeing combats. I do find a pawn shop selling Thor's Hammer, but it costs more gold than I have for even one of them. The merchant in Tughril's Armory is maddeningly labeled "weaponer" but only has armor to sell. I ignore numerous shops of other types: potions, scrolls, amulets, inns, pubs. This city is big. I like that, but it shouldn't be this hard to find starting weapons.

      

It's not always easy to tell where you can walk.

    

Finally, I wander into a place called Momo's Weapons. His inventory is a bit unbalanced: he has maces for 30 gold, +3 swords for 725 gold, +4 swords for 850 gold, and +4 bows for 250 gold. No matter—at least he has the maces. I buy four of them, taking us down to 200 gold pieces, and finally settle in for exploring the rest of the city, starting with a return to the south entrance and that first battle.

     

Three very expensive items and a common one.

      

Combat works as advertised: you left-click for one attack and right-click for continuous attacks. Spells will come later, when I find scrolls and ingredients. It takes me a couple of "reloads" (restoring save states) to defeat this guy. On his body, I find a healing potion, a magic potion, and a four-leaf clover.

   

Indoor areas often reward you for clicking on pieces of furniture, tapestries, or other objects. Here, I get 9 carrots (I guess these are also spell reagents) by clicking on a tapestry and 5 bones for clicking on a bookcase. 

   

There are things hidden in the plants to the left.

      

So I guess it goes without saying that this is the sort of game where if you get attacked while burglarizing a private home, you retaliate with deadly force, and you loot anything that you can loot. Conan was like that, anyway. I don't know enough yet to determine whether it's possible to play this game virtuously.

     

A lot of doors have to be picked.

     

I finish this session by exploring the rest of the district accessible from the southern gate. In addition to what I've already described:

   

• An old man on the street says that he once had a sword made by Momo, and he gives us directions to Momo's Weapons. Goddamn it.

     

Where were you an hour ago?

     

• Keena picks the lock of a residence where we find a healing potion and a suit of leather armor.

• A guardroom where a guard, while relating a story about a thief they recently caught with a bunch of keys, instills in us the importance of finding keys to unlock some doors.

• A residence where a guy named Zamander claims to know our father. "We fought together in the Baythan Wars." He says this to all of us, so I guess we're siblings. He tells us that the sections of town have names, though he only tells us three: the Thieves' Quarter on the west, the Residential Section in the middle, and the Merchants' Quarter to the east. "Unless you're a good fighter, the easiest way to get from one to the other is to leave the city [and] go around." I'm not sure what being a good fighter has to do with it. He also tells us what to expect out in the world: The Black Witch is in the ruins by the lake; Khalimad is in the White Palace; and Moc Madure lives in the volcano.

      

Zamander reminds us about the main quest.

    

• In a residence, a man named Yuga tells us that there's a band of barbarians in town fighting the Black Circle. "They'd make pudding out of the likes of you."

• In a residence, a woman named Abaton offers harp lessons and offers to sell us a harp for 100 gold, although I can't find any mechanism to take her up on it. (The dialogue only says, "Maybe I'll pay.") We find 8 serpent eye potions (reagents) on her bookshelf, plus one of those Thor Hammers. It does 30 damage against the 6 done by the mace, so I guess that's better.

     

She also appears to be dancing.

   

• In a vacant house, we have another fight with a swordsman. He leaves a serpent's eye potion and a rat tail.

• And another battle in the next residence. He leaves a +1 mace, a knife, and some berries, and his house has some more reagents. 

      

Post-combat looting.

    

• Haroun's Lotions and Potions offers healing, mana, cure poison, and resurrection potions.

• In a residence, what appears to be a nude woman lying on a bed complains that she asked "Meethed" to procure 10 men for her and they're supposed to be clean, "and NOT dressed like clowns." 

• A man named Yarra complains about his lack of fortune lately. He has a potted plant that yields a Mana Ring.

    

To be fair, I did rob him.

     

The dialogue options in these encounters are a little unsatisfying, allowing neither any role-playing nor the ability to have the character speak in a consistent voice. For instance, there's a guard who warns us not to speak to the guy in shackles (actually, a pillory) nearby. "He's a thief." The responses are:

   

• "Really, that guy's a thief?" This elicits an amusing story about how the guards caught him poking around the king's harem "with a big, stupid grin on his face." The concubines were "all passed out, mumbling 'no more . . . no more . . .'"

• "He looks like my old alchemy teacher." The guard warns us: "This guy could charm you into thinkin' he was your long lost brother."

    

Not the most interesting dialogue options.

    

Nothing terribly important happens in either case, and nothing stops us from re-engaging the dialogue and selecting the other option. So few games are offering full-sentence dialogues during this era that it's disappointing when one does and then trivializes it.

   

Other than saving, my biggest problem is identifying equipment. Sometimes, when you first pick up an item, it tells you what it is and gives you a little description. I can't figure out for the life of me how to get that same screen to come up once you already have an item in your inventory. Maybe you can't. Maybe if you miss it the first time, you're screwed.

 

Combat is unsatisfying, and if the creators were going to make it this unsatisfying, the least they could have done is give an "everybody attack" button so you don't have to click on the characters individually and then try to get them to click on a moving target who is often hidden behind another character. It also would have been nice to pause.

     

Brand started with only 20 strength.

     

Finally, I don't have a great sense of how character development works. The manual talks about experience and levels, but neither is made explicit on the character sheet. It does seem like strength has increased for a few characters, so perhaps attributes go up directly from exercising the appropriate skills.

     

In short, it's the typical Synergistic combination of interesting ideas with somewhat janky execution. The setting is intriguing, and I enjoy exploring the city, but we'll see if I can even restore the session next time.

   

Time so far: 2 hours