I miss old SSI games and all the beauty and wonder they brought me as a child. Perhaps it’s more of the feeling of playing old MS-DOS games and that no worries feeling of playing games all summer long when your parents are out working; no cares in the world but that of the evil dragons and goblins of an RPG world. Secret of the Silver Blades arrived in May of 1990, developed and published by Strategic Simulations Inc (SSI), a company we covered in our gaming history back in TD Gaming Podcast Episode 9.
Secret of the Silver Blades is actually the third in a four-part game series which was eventually packaged in the Gold Box editing of the SSI games. It was a continuation of the game Curse of the Azure Bonds and the first in the series: Pool of Radiance. The cool part of the series was the leveling system where each would let you level to a certain limit just like most modules in D&D games, this game let you get to level seven which means a Mage could use the cool Delayed Blast Fireball spell which was one of my favorite magic spells in D&D (yeah, I’m a dork.)
The graphics were a whopping 16-colors, with slight graphical improvements over the other two prior games. This game didn’t have an overworld map like the others, going full first person for the length of the game. Another great enhancement was the ability to use the arrow keys to navigate menu’s without the need for “hot keys” like older SSI titles, given the game is very much menu-based for combat, equipment and inventory management it was very handy to have the use of those nice little arrow keys.
You create your party and start adventuring in a game engine very similar to all the games before it, so introduction to game mechanics was minimal, you could advance your characters further in level and, most importantly, import characters from previous games. The D&D world is really a character-driven game environment and you grow fond of your characters and understand the best ways to battle with them, importing is key and still, today, is a big part in well done RPG expansions (Guild Wars is a great example). Unfortunately, many games fall short of character import and it kind of blows away some of the magic of an RPG.
One of the frustrating issues with Secret of the Silver blade is the limitation on levels for the Cleric, because they can’t level up past 7 they can’t get the good ressurection spell, only allowed to use Raise Dead which lowers your characters constitution by 1 (much like the traditional D&D rules). However, given its a video game and not a paper-dice based game, the raise dead penalty is annoying, so it was easier to save often and re-load when you died to try again and avoid the penalty. I do recall their being some scrolls or something to get back your constitution penalty… but it’s been awhile I might be making that up.
Anyway, a well done series, classic RPG and helped build a foundation for games like Morrow Wind and Oblivion in my opinion.
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Nintendo Making Users Pay for
Black Wii? That’s been out in UK since November 2009!
Guess it took 6 months to change the power lead?
(It also came bundled with Wii Sports / Sports Resort and black Wii Motion Plus connector)
Had a bit of a thought on last week’s QotW – Tetris. The game that came with the original Game Boy, as well as various flash based websites these days. I certainly spent many an hour on that.
As for being a gamer parent, yes we will be different. I remember being 14 and getting my mum to buy me Doom 2 (18-rated due to the violence, which is nothing compared to these days), as she was clueless about gore and such. Mortal Kombat was also blood and guts galore, but it flew off shelves because of it.
Now as games have been graphically more intense and realistic, the obvious difference between real world and virtual is getting closer. Parents KNOW that we play GTA to pick up prostitutes, take them for a ride, then run them over to get our cash back.
We know that games like Left 4 Dead and Resident Evil will teach you its ok to chainsaw a zombie in half, or fire a sawn-off shot-gun at point blank range.
Yes, we have grown up with this games, and can make that distinction. It might not mean that we stop our kids playing these games, but we’re certainly AWARE OF THE CONTENT, which is what all the “video games cause violence” arguments stem from. Parents never used to take the time to assess what the kids were playing.
@Red Hot Chilli Peppers:
I think Jennifer is right, I think they use this kind of release schedule to keep interest.
COD and Halo are different stories. I mean they’re both shooters, but it’s also different universes.
And Derrick, they’re not going to eventually burn out. Try NOW instead of eventually.
@Next Call of Duty will be Black Ops:
It’ll be Vietnam, as far as I know. It’ll have plenty of shooting, so if you expect stealth, well, careful with your expectations.
@Bungie:
Bungie did Halo, but I don’t think they own the IP. As for their new franchise, we’ll see.
I personally didn’t like Halo, I found the enemies to be … dorky? I mean they didn’t inspire any fear.
So, dunno about the next Bungie game.
@black console:
“You know, I have one simple request, and that is to have a console with frickin’ laser beams attached to it”
Don, for a moment I heared the Dr. Evil inside you.
Now, why would anyone want the console market dead? I’m a PC gamer and I don’t get it.
@3.5″ floppy: I still have some of them. Used one to flash the bios of the motherboard.
I remember that in order to get various drivers from the school computer I had to copy them on several floppies, just to have some redundancy.
In 2003 I bought my first 64MB flash drive. Man, that was a giant leap forward, in terms of both size AND portability. That flash drive still works, by the way.
@Question of the week:
I’m pretty sure they’ll do fine. I already mentioned the dad and daughter that play the same computer game, and the fact that they seem to have a pretty strong connection.
I think that parents that played games will take better decisions when it comes to managing the impact games have on their kids. I mean this is something they know quite a lot about, so their decisions as parents will be good.
Microsoft owns the rights to Halo, and 343 Industries, which runs the brand, is headed by Frank O’Conner and other ex-Bungie developers. Bungie’s big IPs in the past include, aside from Marathon, the Myth series and Oni.
Activision better not be expecting another game on the level of Halo. It just isn’t happening. Halo was a shooter in the right place and the right time for the right console.
Hey Jenadonrick great cast ICC10 quote was lol.
@ GH – Sounds like if they made a game: Red Hot Chili Peppers vs Green Day, Listening to you guys (& girls) the game would be a hit!
@ Bungie – As everyone knows I’m a fan of the Bungie, so it’s really exciting to see if they have to skills to pull off a successful game other then HALO. My friends & I were joking about this. That maybe the next COD will have AC130’s shooting down needlers & a Gravity hammer in the game. Also Do you know why no other developers have mimicked halo’s forge & theatre features? because they are too features the extended the life of halo 3 so successfully.
In Regards to Don talking about Consoles being easier.
I agree with his opinion, Quite recently I decided I would take a trip to memory lane & download BF2 off steam; I had a lot of stuffing around to simply play that game. After every 30sec into a game I was getting kicked from Punk buster. I had to spend hours searching through forums, In the end it was my program MSI Afterburner which I use to monitor my FPS, Temps & alter my fan speeds/Overclocks. So after uninstalling MSI I was good to go but PC gaming can be annoying @ least I know that if I buy a game for the 360 all I have to worry about is getting up & inserting the disc. The PC gaming market is an expensive market to be in, if your want to be playing the top end graphics all the time for the newest games. You need the Bis graphics card/processor which can be anywhere around $300-1200ea Which in 6 months will be Out of date. The great thing about consoles is that you are almost guaranteed 3-4 years without upgrading.
As for the QOTW
I’m not planning on having ankle biters anytime soon but I believe in moderation games can be a good source of learning & a good bonding exercise. Parent have to take on the responsibility of regulating how much they play & monitor which games they are playing. If you have minors playing GTA it’s mainly the parents fault for rather not caring or monitoring what they are playing.
@ Chess
I have heaps of mates that I play chess with. If you don’t know how to play ur not a MAN. =p
BTW I had a spelling fail last episode. Remembering Hackers can’t spell 😉 proving I’m a hacker.
(I don’t believe this is true because isn’t it important to have correct syntax?)