Archon (computer game)

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Archon
Archon Box Cover
Developer(s) Free Fall Associates
Publisher(s) Electronic Arts & Ariolasoft (Europe)
Designer(s) Jon Freeman, Anne Westfall, Paul Reiche III
Engine Custom
Release date(s) 1983
Genre(s) Fighting, Strategy
Mode(s) Single player or Two player
Rating(s) N/A
Platform(s) Atari 8-bit, Apple II, Commodore 64, Amiga, IBM PC, Macintosh, NES, Amstrad CPC, ZX Spectrum
Media floppy disk, cartridge, cassette
Input Joystick

Archon is a computer game developed by Free Fall Associates and distributed by Electronic Arts. It was originally developed for Atari 8-bit computers in 1983, but was later ported to several other systems of the day, including the Apple II, Commodore 64, Amstrad CPC, ZX Spectrum, Amiga, IBM PC, Apple Macintosh, and NES. It was designed by Paul Reiche III and Jon Freeman and programmed by Freeman's wife, Anne Westfall. Reiche also produced the artwork for the game.

Contents

[edit] Description

Archon is visually very similar to chess, but with a number of significant changes.

While the board is similar to a chessboard and the various pieces are similarly designed to have various offsetting abilities, when one piece attempts to take another the removal of the targeted piece is not automatic. Instead, the two pieces are placed into a full-screen 'combat arena' and must battle (arcade-style, with the players running the pieces) to determine who takes the square.

[edit] Combat

Generally (but not always) in combat, a stronger piece will succeed over a weaker piece in either defending or capturing a square. It is also possible for the fight to result in a double-kill, in which both pieces are eliminated. This uncertainty adds a level of complexity into the game, since it is not always possible to predict if taking a square will be successful.

Screenshot of Archon on the Commodore 64
Screenshot of Archon on the Commodore 64

Different pieces have different abilities in the combat phase. These include movement, lifespan, and weapon damage & attributes. The weapons vary by range, speed, "reload time" and the amount of damage inflicted on an opponent. For example, the pawn (represented by knights on the 'light' side and goblins on the 'dark' side) moves quickly, but has very little strength; its weapon, a sword or club, has limited reach and power. A dragon is considerably faster and can fire a powerful projectile blast, while a golem moves slowly and fires a slow but powerful boulder.

Some pieces have special abilities. The Phoenix can turn into a ball of fire, both damaging the enemy and shielding itself from enemy attacks. The shapeshifter assumes the shape and abilities of whatever piece it is up against.

[edit] Power points and cycling

Each character's strength is also affected by the color of the square on which the combat occurs and by a light-and-dark cycle on the 'neutral' squares, indicated by the changing color of the board. The 'light' side is stronger on the white squares and during the light cycle, and the 'dark' side is stronger on the dark squares and during the dark cycle.

[edit] Spellcasting

Each side also has a spellcaster piece (the Sorceress for the dark side, the Wizard for the light side) which can cast seven different spells; each spell may be used only once per game by each spellcaster. The spells are:

  • Teleport - teleports one of your pieces to any square.
  • Heal - fully heals one piece.
  • Shift Time - reverses the light/dark cycle.
  • Exchange - swaps the board locations of any two pieces.
  • Summon Elemental - summons one of four elementals randomly to a chosen square to battle an enemy piece -- the elemental disappears after the battle.
  • Revive - returns one of your defeated pieces to the board.
  • Imprison - prevents the target piece from moving until the light/dark cycle returns to its color.

The spells may not be cast on pieces currently sitting on one of the five 'power points', which are located at the center of the board and the center of each of the four sides.

[edit] Endgame

The game is usually won when either one side destroys all the opposing pieces or one of the sides is able to occupy all of the five power points. More rarely, a side may also win by Imprisoning its opponent's last remaining piece. And if each side has but a single piece, and the two pieces destroy each other in a double-kill, then the game ends in a tie.

[edit] Layout and pieces

Each piece has movment restrictions. "Flying" pieces can "jump" other pieces on the board, including opposing pieces. "Ground" pieces cannot jump. The wizard and sorceress pieces have movement described as "teleport," but are unrestricted like a flying piece.

Archon layout
Valkyrie Archer     Power
Point		     Manticore Banshee
Golem Knight           Goblin Troll
Unicorn Knight           Goblin Basilisk
Djini Knight           Goblin Shapeshifter
Wizard
Power point		 Knight     Power
Point		     Goblin Sorceress
Power point
Phoenix Knight           Goblin Dragon
Unicorn Knight           Goblin Basilisk
Golem Knight           Goblin Troll
Valkyrie Archer     Power
Point		     Manticore Banshee

The purple squares fade from light to dark throughout the game. As they become light, the light side becomes more powerful and vice-versa. Pieces abilities are listed below.

Light

  • Valkyrie -- flying, projectile weapon
  • Golem -- slow, ground, projectile weapon
  • Unicorn -- ground, projectile weapon
  • Djini -- flying, projectile weapon
  • Wizard -- teleport, spell caster, projectile weapon
  • Phoenix -- flying, radial weapon that also allows projectile weapons to pass though harmlessly, but stops the phoenix's movement
  • Archer -- ground, projectile weapon
  • Knight -- ground, melee weapon

Dark

  • Banshee -- flying, radial weapon of similar range of the pheonix's, but allows the banshee to move, and can not be used in defense. The area immediately surrounding the banshee is not effected by the weapon.
  • Troll -- slow, ground, projectile weapon
  • Basilisk -- ground, projectile weapon
  • Shapeshifter -- flying, takes the form and abilities of whatever piece it is in combat with
  • Sorceress -- teleport, spell caster
  • Dragon -- flying, projectile weapon
  • Manticore -- ground, projectile weapon
  • Goblin -- ground, melee weapon

[edit] Sequels

FreeFall Associates developed a sequel to the game called Archon II: Adept in 1984 (it appeared on different systems on different dates). Not very similar to the original, it had improved graphics, different creatures and required different strategy to win. The players in this version represented either Order or Chaos and possessed 4 adepts that could cast powerful spells. The game also featured an end-game option called the "Armageddon spell" where one player or the other could call for a final battle to determine the outcome of the game. The Amiga version featured full stereo sound, unusual for games of the day.

Toys for Bob developed a game in 1994 called Archon Ultra. It was a full remake of the original game with updated graphics and sound. It also featured a multiplayer mode via modem. However, it performed very poorly in the marketplace. The Unholy War is a PlayStation game also developed by Toys For Bob for Crystal Dynamics and published by Eidos Interactive in 1998. It was designed by Paul Reiche III and featured a similar style of strategy and combat as Archon.

An unofficial sequel, Archon III: Exciter was produced by unknown Archon fans for the Commodore 64 in 1985.

The game was rewritten for Palm OS in 2000 and was close to the original. The creator, Carsten Magerkurth, of EmperoR Studios contacted the members of former FreeFall Associates and, with their input, developed a new version in 2003 (v1.21) with colors and sounds even closer to the original.

Another rewrite of the game, entitled Archon: Evolution, was developed by Curve Software. The game reached public beta status before disappearing from the Internet without a trace. The game used code from the original 8-bit version and supposedly had the support of John Freeman.[citation needed]

In February 2007, it was announced that Myriad Interactive had purchased the licensing rights from Free Fall Games with an intent to bring the spirit of the original back with the the technology of today.

[edit] Trivia

When using the spell "Summon Elemental", if the player does not like the elemental summoned, he can advance it onto a power point and then recast the spell until he receives an elemental that he likes. This trick does not work on the C64 version, however, instead the game simply asks the player to choose a different target.

[edit] Legacy

Paul Reiche and Fred Ford went on to create the Star Control series of computer games. The melee component of the first Star Control game is very similar in that each player has a group of spaceships with different abilities which they send into 1-on-1 combat. Paul and Fred went on to found Toys for Bob, and create many other games together.

Silicon Knights's game Dark Legions (1994) is basically an updated version of Archon with some additions like allowing the player to purchase their army before committing to the game. Archon may have served as the inspiration for Battle Chess, a computer game of chess where the pieces battle for their spaces. It also inspired some more recent games, including The Unholy War for the PlayStation and Wrath Unleashed for the PlayStation 2 and Xbox.

The game Mortal Kombat: Deception includes a Chess Kombat mode which is very similar to Archon, including most or all of the wizard spells.

Inside Electronic Arts, Archon is used as the internal name for the Quality Assurance team.

Archon in turn may have been inspired by the holographic chess-like game played by Chewbacca and C3P0 in the 1977 movie Star Wars. That game was played on a rounded table (the Archon playfield is square) but the main idea from the game featured in the movie is represented in the computer game.

Science-fiction author Orson Scott Card reviewed Archon for COMPUTE! Magazine in November 1983. Card gave Archon (as well as two other EA games, M.U.L.E. and Worms) a complimentary review, writing: "They are original; they do what they set out to do very, very well; they allow the player to take part in the creativity; they do things that only computers can do." [1]

[edit] References

  1. ^ "Home Computer Games Grow Up" by Orson Scott Card from Classic Computer Magazine Archive

[edit] External links

[edit] Fan made games

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