tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6162314467762792782.post6501680414942381756..comments2024-03-29T02:34:55.592-04:00Comments on The CRPG Addict: Revisiting: Wizard's Crown (1985)CRPG Addicthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01238237377918550322noreply@blogger.comBlogger80125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6162314467762792782.post-44474528530452605442024-01-19T14:50:16.039-05:002024-01-19T14:50:16.039-05:00Rolemaster was unplayable only if you tried to use...Rolemaster was unplayable only if you tried to use ALL the rules. It wasn't meant to be used that way. One could just choose and use those rules that better suited your game group. Not that different from AD&D, really.Jorgemanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08540205396897103375noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6162314467762792782.post-89078546858235719202023-07-04T00:34:58.939-04:002023-07-04T00:34:58.939-04:00Thanks for sharing! I also didn't learn about ...Thanks for sharing! I also didn't learn about Eternal Dagger as an adult. I first played it about a year ago and sadly bounced off of it hard. I couldn't deal with the day/night cycle being like 4 moves long, especially given the new food requirement. I get what they were trying to do, adjusting moves per cycle to reflect that you were now on an Overworld map and before you were in the ruins, I just found it too tedious.<br /><br />Glad to hear you found the disk images with the numeric keypad patch helpful! U3_Guruhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12044735933085333528noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6162314467762792782.post-36281135017046271762023-07-03T21:49:11.071-04:002023-07-03T21:49:11.071-04:00You both very intuitively described my own time wi...You both very intuitively described my own time with the game. It was a different time - no burgeoning Steam library, packed with weird and potentially fun unplayed oddities. Both my budget and the limited number of game studios compared to today made it so that I tended to draw as much enjoyment as I could out of the games I had. There were often times when I simply had access to no new games, so I had to replay the ones I did have that still held interest, and those were invariably the ones with systems complex enough to command my attention throughout multiple passes through the game, like Civilization, Darklands (baffling though it was to me at the time), and Wizard's Crown.<br /><br />As a further illustration, I didn't learn about The Eternal Dagger until I was an adult. I just didn't really have a way to keep abreast of new releases and had to rely on whatever I could find at the 'computer store' (what a concept from today's vantage!), and I never spotted or never noticed the sequel.<br /><br />But reading through this thread has inspired me. I downloaded AppleWin and got the WC and TED disk images and am happily trundling through the first square of the ruins, fending off packs of goblins and orcs, and it's as much fun as I remembered. The loot upgrade treadmill is tuned well in this game and really seems to have been ahead of its time, although having just confessed that I missed a lot of games that were current at the time, maybe I'm not the most qualified person to say so :)<br /><br />Speaking of my new playthrough: U3_Guru, I'm using the disk images you tweaked to make the numpad array more intuitive. Thank you for doing that! It makes getting around the world map less of a learning chore. It's too bad that the combat maps still use the 1 = north, 8 = nw apple IIe mapping, but I'm glad for the improvement I have and appreciate that it probably wasn't straightforward to implement. Thanks again!Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6162314467762792782.post-73252376238908940582023-07-03T16:27:49.979-04:002023-07-03T16:27:49.979-04:00You nailed it Chet - when I first played Wizard...You nailed it Chet - when I first played Wizard's Crown as a kid, I did spent more or less an entire summer playing it. I had other games, but only a few and had played them a bazillion times so Wizard's Crown was fresh and challenging and I had nothing "better" to do :-)U3_Guruhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12044735933085333528noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6162314467762792782.post-57791470311389807622023-07-03T16:23:17.301-04:002023-07-03T16:23:17.301-04:00Very valuable and insightful comment, Mike. I part...Very valuable and insightful comment, Mike. I particularly appreciate your comments on quick combat, and I agree that the position of the scout does provide evidence for your theory. If I had time, I'd test it with some other variables; I'm still curious how it treats spells in those moments.<br /><br />This strikes me as a game that one would grow to love if he had, say, an entire summer, and no other games. There would be no reason not to spend hours mastering combat and squeezing every benefit out of it. I agree that after that point, other games would fall short. I imagine there must have been some <i>Wizard's Crown</i> fans who hated SSI for "dumbing down" combat in the Gold Box series, even though to most of us, Gold Box combat was as tactical as we'd ever seen.CRPG Addicthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01238237377918550322noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6162314467762792782.post-62539984613861892542023-07-03T13:54:28.136-04:002023-07-03T13:54:28.136-04:00I read this entry and the comments with interest. ...I read this entry and the comments with interest. I'm another who played this game avidly when it came out. I was in sixth grade and had only token wargaming experience but a lot of tabletop D&D experience. The depth of the combat system disclosed itself to me over many hours, as I slowly noticed and then experimented with options that were then very new to me, like "Fall Prone," (which, I must say, was rarely actually practical, but was fun to use on occasion). I enjoyed this game so much, and replayed it so much, that I was somewhat disappointed by the gold box games when they were released. I enjoyed the complexity and the unique multi-classing system. About ten years ago I got an emulator for another playthrough, challenging myself to play a party that was totally multiclassed, which of course requires such a high intelligence score that other scores are rather feeble. Everybody had to have a rapier. It didn't get more playable until I could dump some experience into stats, but it was a fun challenge. I found that I still appreciate the elaborate wound system, the resource management, and the unique take on magic, including the numinous but powerful luck score.<br /><br />Most of my potential responses to what I saw were already covered by more timely commenters, but I do have two thoughts that might add to the discussion. The first is on the question of whether Quick Combat actually plays through using the tactical context. My answer is: very clearly yes, or at least it does so using some of the tactical context. This is most noticeable when you have a scout, whether on the overland map or in a dungeon. On the overland map, if you put your scout out at a range beyond their skills' abilities to support, then will will see that scout get surrounded in quick combats and you will notice that you're spending most of your mana healing up the scout even in easy quick combats. In dungeons, if you run ahead with one character and trigger a combat (the final palace with all the rooms full of demons is where I remember doing this most), that one character will get smashed very quickly. From these observations I always inferred that the game was in fact playing through combats using the same context and constraints as the tactical combats.<br /><br />My second thought is in response to the limitations of 8-bit programming and the decisions that confronted the people who made these games. I work at a place that still uses an old Cobol database, and the workplace wrinkle of having to work around the parsimonious decisions made decades ago still inflects our work today. It's very common currency where I work (and understandable) to complain about these constraints. On the other hand, I doubt that any software I have made or will make will still be in use or worth using in forty years. I do think that the stingy constraints of this old computing environment forced decisions to be more deliberate and probably helped the designers and analysts of the time to avoid some of the design traps that I see myself falling into today. We're lucky, in a way, to live and work in a world of abundant storage and generous limits on data transmission, but I think there's a discipline that comes from the more limited context. In any case, I think it's a tribute to the folks who built these old systems and games that we can still use and enjoy (some of) them today.<br /><br />Mikenoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6162314467762792782.post-8786037168301826082023-06-30T14:42:27.813-04:002023-06-30T14:42:27.813-04:00They did implement dual-classing, but not right at...They did implement dual-classing, but not right at the beginning. I can't remember in what game the option first appeared.CRPG Addicthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01238237377918550322noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6162314467762792782.post-29445628675326473902023-06-27T13:57:12.932-04:002023-06-27T13:57:12.932-04:00Catsmoke, thanks for the compliment and sharing yo...Catsmoke, thanks for the compliment and sharing your Wizard's Crown story! And sorry I'm a year late in saying so - Google is inconsistent about sending me notifications. <br /><br />I am with you that Wizard's Crown was a memorable experience! It was a grind, but to me it was a fun grind. I thought the character development path was interesting and there was just an enough story to set the atmosphere. U3_Guruhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12044735933085333528noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6162314467762792782.post-508058561364739092023-06-26T20:55:00.178-04:002023-06-26T20:55:00.178-04:00Radiant, this sounds like exactly the kind of dumb...Radiant, this sounds like exactly the kind of dumb over-optimization I would have done when I was coding for 8-bit machines. It's not necessarily that you *needed* those extra few bytes; it's that we learned to save space anywhere we could, necessary or not.<br /><br />It's *also* true that there were no interface standards beyond "makes sense to me" and many coders rarely considered whether their "intuitive" solution would make sense to anyone else. Both answers can be true at the same time. We don't know the original story, but "dev created it as an optimization and kept it because he didn't think any further than that" is perfectly plausible. There's no reason the be so smug.Phasma Felishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07040805980444135697noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6162314467762792782.post-14136832202099608252023-06-26T20:47:01.958-04:002023-06-26T20:47:01.958-04:00I believe the Gold Box games just used the AD&...I believe the Gold Box games just used the AD&D multi-classing rules. Only non-humans can do it, they've got arbitrary level limits for each class/race combination (regardless of multi-classing), and they can't switch after chargen.<br /><br />Don't recall if they implemented dual-classing, which was an entirely different mechanic only available to *humans,* where you *couldn't* start with more than one class but *could* add another one later, except that you would forget all of your original class abilities until you got your second class up to the same level, at which point they returned, and *God* Gygaxian D&D was weird.Phasma Felishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07040805980444135697noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6162314467762792782.post-14679303462919076552022-09-09T16:10:35.433-04:002022-09-09T16:10:35.433-04:00Thank you for the suggestions. I downloaded and s...Thank you for the suggestions. I downloaded and started a new game on Helherron, but I have to say, it's very much akin to Ultima IV. What I'm really looking for is something more modern with a GUI and mouse support rather than having to remember all the various keyboard commands for every action or constantly having to reference the help screens.Eriknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6162314467762792782.post-13994518835584572052022-09-08T03:33:25.038-04:002022-09-08T03:33:25.038-04:00Great games! Better than most professional CRPGs. ...Great games! Better than most professional CRPGs. I look forward to the Addict playing them. He can't use his favourite strategy with Nahlakh.POnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6162314467762792782.post-55552264021400644502022-09-08T02:20:11.780-04:002022-09-08T02:20:11.780-04:00For anyone playing Nahlakh, the game has an undocu...For anyone playing Nahlakh, the game has an undocumented automap that you can view by pressing C.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6162314467762792782.post-79079744302962236502022-09-07T18:08:25.229-04:002022-09-07T18:08:25.229-04:00I'm currently having a grand ol' time with...I'm currently having a grand ol' time with Nahlakh, which is even earlier (1994), having never quite finished it back when it was released. It cites Wizard's Crown as a direct influence, and Helherron, in turn, cites Nahlakh and its sort-of-a-sequel Natuk. The graphics are better than WC, but not by a lot, and the UI's only adequate. It's still a better CRPG than any others I've played in the last few years, though.Korathnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6162314467762792782.post-87042972527407473732022-09-07T16:03:24.829-04:002022-09-07T16:03:24.829-04:00Helherron, maybe. Haven't played it, but it...Helherron, maybe. Haven't played it, but it's from 2004.POnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6162314467762792782.post-78527983734788320292022-09-07T10:19:28.409-04:002022-09-07T10:19:28.409-04:00I played the original Wizard's Crown when it w...I played the original Wizard's Crown when it was first published for the C64 and very much enjoyed it back then. Now however, I find myself looking for similar games that have been released more recently that provide mouse support, have better graphics and vastly improved UI. Is anyone aware of such games that exist? I found one I'd played for a while called Low Magic Age, but am looking for something new. I really enjoy the 2D, top down, turn based games, but I find it really difficult to find anything similar to Wizard's Crown and the like. I once found a website that listed many hundreds of games that permitted advanced filters for selecting multiple tags, but can't find it again. Unfortunately, Steam is horrible for such searches, as you can only search on 1 or 2 tags. Any help would be greatly appreciated.Eriknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6162314467762792782.post-62713130008076957482022-07-26T15:13:37.279-04:002022-07-26T15:13:37.279-04:00I love these era-specific recollections. Thanks fo...I love these era-specific recollections. Thanks for commenting.CRPG Addicthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01238237377918550322noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6162314467762792782.post-3286760137957320572022-07-24T23:42:19.480-04:002022-07-24T23:42:19.480-04:00Guru, I am impressed by your programming knowledge...Guru, I am impressed by your programming knowledge and your placid demeanor.<br /><br />My freshman year in college at the University of Texas, I sat up late at night in my tiny two-person room on the 12th floor of my dorm, playing Wizard’s Crown. <br /><br />I’m in the camp of those who enjoyed the options-heavy tactical combat. That was the most fun part of the game, and those experiences were great opportunities to develop my characters’ backgrounds and personalities.<br /><br />The game’s voice, the written dialogue of the automated computer Dungeon Master or Game Master, was very appealing. Very sparse, but well-written, with a tone that has both a human warmth and the perspective of an objective arbiter. The screenshots in the article provide many good examples of this.<br /><br />This is a game whose whole is greater than the sum of its parts. It has atmosphere, it has drama, I was emotionally invested in the story. Although the game’s text is not much more than a framework, it compliments the other parts of the game, they are all of a piece.<br /><br />My measure of anything is: Was it memorable? And I fondly remember those nights spent in the ruins south of the city, 34 years ago. catsmokenoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6162314467762792782.post-3275756735948116042022-06-05T09:41:21.150-04:002022-06-05T09:41:21.150-04:00As with most of the games you've been reviewin...As with most of the games you've been reviewing, I played this when it first came out. I loved it then; I loved it on the couple replays over the years; I'm sure I'll love it at least one more time now that you've reminded me of it. I do agree that combat and dungeon movement gets TEDIOUS (yay quick combat). I enjoyed the skill-based training, the weapon improvement system, and even going square to square in the wilderness looking for hidden dungeons/treasures. Even with the sharp difficulty increase, it fits well in line with the types of games I enjoy - i.e., most of the CRPGs that came in out in this era. Scotthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11343502750714905156noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6162314467762792782.post-87848260369262032912022-01-06T15:54:03.881-05:002022-01-06T15:54:03.881-05:00Radiant,
I don't meant to split hairs over th...Radiant,<br /><br />I don't meant to split hairs over the term "assume" vs. "guess", after giving it more thought, it probably isn't relevant.<br /><br /><br />So, to answer your questions:<br /><br /><br />"Why would you assume that this one, and only this one, is instead a smart optimization trick? <br />This blog has myriad examples of interface, or battle systems, or character systems, that were designed by someone inexperienced in that area, and that in retrospect don't make a lot of sense." <br /><br />This may be the only example of a game with movement keys with adjacent ASCII values, but generally speaking, memory limits and thus optimizations influence 8-bit RPG game alot. <br /><br />It works out something like this - you've got 48k or memory to work with, and you have a grand vision for what you want to do in your game and you have to par it down to work within 48k, and then at some point you're almost out of memory, the game isn't done, and that's where all sorts of compromises get made in design in order to squeeze in just a bit more. <br /><br />Again, I'm talking here about optimizations influencing 8-bit RPG game design in general, not necessarily specific to the uniqueness of the movement key case, because your question references a broad set of scenarios (battle systems, character systems etc). <br /> <br /><br />"Given that pretty much no other game or other programmer has used this trick since, Occam's Razor suggests, that it's really NOT a smart trick."<br /><br />8-bit developers came up with new tricks all the time as the 1980s unfolded. Look at games in the early 1980s versus mid 1980s. Pretty much the same hardware but the developers got better at it. Sometimes new things would be tried, only to not be repeated because in hindsight maybe it didn't work out so well. Now, if something hadn't been done before that's a good reason to stop and think, hmmmm, what is the reason it hasn't been done, but it's not an absolute reason not to try something new. <br /> <br /><br />As mentioned in an earlier post, I agree that the adjacent ASCII value movement keys is a unique case as Wizard's Crown is the only game I've seen use ASCII adjacent movement keys.<br /><br />The reason I thought they might have done it for the optimization benefit, when other games didn't is because Wizard's Crown supports movement on the diagonals (8 keys) whereas all other 8-bit RPGs I've played only support movement in the cardinal directions (4 keys).<br /><br />Thus, the memory savings from using ASCII adjacent keys in an 8 key game is double what it would be if only 4 keys were used. I thought maybe the the magnification of the memory savings was enough that it influence the UI decision with Wizard's Crown even though it didn't in other games.<br /><br /><br /><br />All of my comments above are to answer your questions about why I came up with the original theory that I did.<br /><br />As mentioned in my earlier post, my thinking has changed and I suspect the military "clock" movement theory is more likely to be correct.<br />U3_Guruhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12044735933085333528noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6162314467762792782.post-54318416611436706352022-01-06T11:05:09.404-05:002022-01-06T11:05:09.404-05:00Radiant,
I agree that some programmers just make ...Radiant,<br /><br />I agree that some programmers just make up something that makes sense to them, and that is certainly possible here, though I suspect Chet's theory of the "clock" method is more likely to be the case. A compelling player-oriented reason for a UI decision is usually going to outweigh optimization considerations. While I didn't find the original "clock" method to be intuitive, and other players I've talked to didn't either, I can see how it may have been intuitive to SSI's core audience of military strategy gamers. <br /><br /><br />To be clear, in my original assessment I wasn't assuming anything. I made my best guess based on the information I had and the experience I have. I believe I described it as a best educated guess. <br /><br />I know a lot about how optimization influences 8-bit RPG game design decisions. However, my lack of experience with military strategy games specifically was clearly a blind spot here, and when presented with a compelling alternative theory I've revised my perspective. U3_Guruhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12044735933085333528noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6162314467762792782.post-78498393004413917812022-01-06T10:53:03.030-05:002022-01-06T10:53:03.030-05:00Chet, thanks for the perspective!
While I've ...Chet, thanks for the perspective!<br /><br />While I've developed a commercial 8-bit RPG, I have very little experience with military strategy games specifically. <br /><br /><br />I had not considered the military clock method as I'm only vaguely aware of it from when India Jones schooled his father on it in the plane "11'oclock Dad! 11, 10, 9" :-)<br /><br /><br />I think that your theory is most likely the correct one. A compelling player-oriented reason for a UI decision is usually going to outweigh optimization considerations. While I didn't find the original "clock" method to be intuitive, and other players I've talked to didn't either, I can see how it may have been intuitive to SSI's core audience of military strategy gamers. <br /><br /><br />If only there were 12 number keys on early keyboards, SSI could have matched it up perfectly!U3_Guruhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12044735933085333528noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6162314467762792782.post-66039810769365918952022-01-06T04:30:49.336-05:002022-01-06T04:30:49.336-05:00A very easy explanation, especially for old games ...A very easy explanation, especially for old games and small teams, is that the programmer didn't have any experience UI/UX design and just made something up that made sense to him.<br /><br />Think about it. This blog has myriad examples of interface, or battle systems, or character systems, that were designed by someone inexperienced in that area, and that in retrospect don't make a lot of sense. Why would you assume that this one, and only this one, is instead a smart optimization trick? Given that pretty much no other game or other pgorammer has used this trick since, Occam's Razor suggests, that it's really NOT a smart trick.Radianthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03866535042372152723noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6162314467762792782.post-51976036143324017672022-01-06T02:03:23.104-05:002022-01-06T02:03:23.104-05:00Mark, your explanation made sense to me, but I don...Mark, your explanation made sense to me, but I don't have the background to argue this intelligently. I would point out, though, that WC isn't the first SSI game to use that system of movement. We saw it back in <i>Galactic Adventures</i> (1983), and I suspect if we hunt through SSI's early wargames, we'd find it there, too. My suspicion is that it goes back to the military "clock" method of describing an enemy's position.CRPG Addicthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01238237377918550322noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6162314467762792782.post-23895892639665106462022-01-04T22:12:38.167-05:002022-01-04T22:12:38.167-05:00Thanks for the reply.
I agree with you that the...Thanks for the reply. <br /><br />I agree with you that there certainly there were small 8-bit games and in those game optimizations were not so important. <br /><br />RPGs tended to be larger games that often used every byte available in memory. It's not uncommon for 8-bit RPG developers to do things like shorten the names of monsters, items etc. just to free up a few more bytes of memory. <br /><br />Additionally, not all memory is of equal importance on an 8-bit system or within the context of a game engine. For example, even if an important feature takes a lot of bytes, it might reside in an auxiliary memory bank the developer might need to trigger the feature from the main game loop, in a different memory bank. If the memory bank the main game loop resides in is full, freeing up a few bytes by optimizing the movement key parser could be decisive. <br /><br />To your point, an 8-bit RPG is incredibly complex. It's just when you're running out of memory try to cram everything in you wanted to do for your vision of the game that the bytes really matter. <br /><br />That said, you make an interesting point that you've seen games written in less then 1k which don't use ASCII value adjacent keys. For that matter, I've never seen ANY other 8-bit game use value adjacent movement keys, including RPGs. <br /><br />The question is - why did Wizard's Crown's devs choose those keys. From having my nose in Wizard's Crown's code, I could clearly see that they took advantage of the adjacent ASCII values in the way they wrote the code. This optimization may have been a coincidence and had nothing to do with the developers reason for choosing the movement keys that they did. <br /><br />But, I found no evidence for any other explanation, especially considering that more player intuitive key sequences were available.<br /><br /> <br /><br /> <br /><br /><br />U3_Guruhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12044735933085333528noreply@blogger.com