The Black Cauldron
Walt Disney's - The Black Cauldron, developed and published by Sierra Online in 1987.
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Player's Review
"FROM SIERRA, MAKERS OF THE BESTSELLING KING'S QUEST ADVENTURE SERIES, AND THE WALT DISNEY PERSONAL COMPUTER SOFTWARE STAFF FEATURING:
Over 1,020 cells of animation, including 30 animated characters that walk, talk, run, climb, even swim!
Seventy three-dimensional screens more detailed than any seen before, in up to 16 colours -- watch as animated characters pass in front of trees, behind rocks, and around other characters!
Six built-in arcade sequences and mazes, including a moat teeming with hungry alligators, a slippery castle wall with guards tossing boulders down, and teetery rocks that form a path across a treacherous swamp.
Over 30 different items to obtain and use, including a "truthful" harp, a handful of fairy dust, and a magic sword.
Eight different musical tunes, in different areas of the game, all from the musical score of The Black Cauldron movie. Plus up to 17 additional sound effects.
Multiple solutions and variable scoring -- follow the movie's storyline, or use your imagination to maximize your score; play again and again, each time discovering new twists!"
From Wiki:-
"The Black Cauldron is an adventure game designed by Al Lowe of Sierra On-Line and published in 1985. The game is based on the Disney film The Black Cauldron, which was itself based on the Chronicles of Prydain novel of the same name by Lloyd Alexander. It was made shortly after the first King's Quest game, so it resembles that game in many ways. Along with The Dark Crystal it remained one of only a few adventure games by Sierra to be based on films.
The player character is a young assistant pig-keeper named Taran, who undertakes a quest to stop the evil Horned King. The Horned King seeks Hen Wen, the magical pig of the wizard Dallben, for her oracular ability. Using Hen Wen, the Horned King can discover the location of the Black Cauldron and use its power to rule the land. Taran's first mission is to lead Hen Wen to the Fair Folk while the Horned King's dragons are looking for them. Should the pig be captured (the game allows either possibility), Taran can go to the Horned King's castle and rescue her. As soon as he is inside, Taran will meet Princess Eilonwy with her magic bauble and may rescue Fflewddur Fflam, as well as discover a Magic Sword. The Cauldron is in the possession of three witches of Morva who will trade it for the Sword. A dragon grasps the cauldron and Taran goes back to encounter the evil man himself. There are plot branches and multiple endings depending on many variables, such as whether Hen Wen the pig was saved, how the cauldron was destroyed, and what reward was chosen afterward."
A point and click adventure from Sierra on the classic AGI engine. There is no text parser in this game and all can be controlled with the mouse. The numeric pad is used for eight directional movement or the curser keys (that I use) for four directional movement. You can of course just point where you want to go with the mouse. There are four function keys used for selection look, select (from inventory), Use and Do. The whole adventure is fairly short but there are multiple solutions to a problem and different endings for some replay ability. You can change the game speed but I have left it at normal. There are multiple ways to die but it is usually from falling off or into something.
The game is designed for a 512 Amiga 500 and plays from a single floppy disk. Load times can be long as extra memory is not utilised to cache visited screens. I wanted to play from HD but it appears some on disk protection prevents that. Overall, it's not bad for one of Sierra earliest adventures but it's input system can take some grappling with. Climbing up to the castle, only to climb down again and back up again can be a bit of a slog and a low point for me.
00:00:00 Credits
00:00:35 Game
01:15:11 Alternate ending (Gurgi jumps in Cauldron)
01:19:25 Not so good ending (Jump in Cauldron)
Over 1,020 cells of animation, including 30 animated characters that walk, talk, run, climb, even swim!
Seventy three-dimensional screens more detailed than any seen before, in up to 16 colours -- watch as animated characters pass in front of trees, behind rocks, and around other characters!
Six built-in arcade sequences and mazes, including a moat teeming with hungry alligators, a slippery castle wall with guards tossing boulders down, and teetery rocks that form a path across a treacherous swamp.
Over 30 different items to obtain and use, including a "truthful" harp, a handful of fairy dust, and a magic sword.
Eight different musical tunes, in different areas of the game, all from the musical score of The Black Cauldron movie. Plus up to 17 additional sound effects.
Multiple solutions and variable scoring -- follow the movie's storyline, or use your imagination to maximize your score; play again and again, each time discovering new twists!"
From Wiki:-
"The Black Cauldron is an adventure game designed by Al Lowe of Sierra On-Line and published in 1985. The game is based on the Disney film The Black Cauldron, which was itself based on the Chronicles of Prydain novel of the same name by Lloyd Alexander. It was made shortly after the first King's Quest game, so it resembles that game in many ways. Along with The Dark Crystal it remained one of only a few adventure games by Sierra to be based on films.
The player character is a young assistant pig-keeper named Taran, who undertakes a quest to stop the evil Horned King. The Horned King seeks Hen Wen, the magical pig of the wizard Dallben, for her oracular ability. Using Hen Wen, the Horned King can discover the location of the Black Cauldron and use its power to rule the land. Taran's first mission is to lead Hen Wen to the Fair Folk while the Horned King's dragons are looking for them. Should the pig be captured (the game allows either possibility), Taran can go to the Horned King's castle and rescue her. As soon as he is inside, Taran will meet Princess Eilonwy with her magic bauble and may rescue Fflewddur Fflam, as well as discover a Magic Sword. The Cauldron is in the possession of three witches of Morva who will trade it for the Sword. A dragon grasps the cauldron and Taran goes back to encounter the evil man himself. There are plot branches and multiple endings depending on many variables, such as whether Hen Wen the pig was saved, how the cauldron was destroyed, and what reward was chosen afterward."
A point and click adventure from Sierra on the classic AGI engine. There is no text parser in this game and all can be controlled with the mouse. The numeric pad is used for eight directional movement or the curser keys (that I use) for four directional movement. You can of course just point where you want to go with the mouse. There are four function keys used for selection look, select (from inventory), Use and Do. The whole adventure is fairly short but there are multiple solutions to a problem and different endings for some replay ability. You can change the game speed but I have left it at normal. There are multiple ways to die but it is usually from falling off or into something.
The game is designed for a 512 Amiga 500 and plays from a single floppy disk. Load times can be long as extra memory is not utilised to cache visited screens. I wanted to play from HD but it appears some on disk protection prevents that. Overall, it's not bad for one of Sierra earliest adventures but it's input system can take some grappling with. Climbing up to the castle, only to climb down again and back up again can be a bit of a slog and a low point for me.
00:00:00 Credits
00:00:35 Game
01:15:11 Alternate ending (Gurgi jumps in Cauldron)
01:19:25 Not so good ending (Jump in Cauldron)
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