The Dark Heart of Uukrul

The Dark Heart of Uukrul
DOS cover art
Developer(s)	Digital Studios Limited
Publisher(s)	Brøderbund
Designer(s)	Ian Boswell, Martin Buis
Platform(s)	Apple II, MS-DOS
Release	Apple II NA: 1989 MS-DOS NA: 1990
Genre(s)	Role-playing
Mode(s)	Single-player

The Dark Heart of Uukrul is a first-person perspective, turn-based fantasy computer role-playing game written by Ian Boswell and Martin Buis of Digital Studios Limited, and published by Brøderbund. The game was released in 1989 on the Apple II and in 1990 on the IBM PC.

The game comprises a classic party of four heroes trying to defeat the evil magician Uukrul and reconquer the city of Eriosthé, going through many puzzles and riddles. It has a classic top-view turn-based combat system and a pseudo-3D first-person perspective for exploration. The party can also throw magic spells or pray to whimsical gods, and despite its basic, primitive graphics, there are plenty of variety among enemies. However, it's noted that the strength point of the game are the puzzless, secrets, level design and riddles around them, beyond the hack-and-slash and vast mazes.^[1][2]

Plot

Four adventurers are sent to the abandoned remnants of the once-great underground city of Eriosthé. Their mission, as stated by the Western Council, is to defeat the evil Uukrul, a dark magician of incredible power, who ages ago overthrowed the Ancients from the city, and claimed all of its passages and caverns as his dominion. Now Eriosthé is mostly plagued my monsters and minions of Uukrul. Fearing Uukrul will attack the western lands, the Council sent 18 months ago a party lead by Mara, but without news a new party must be assempled.

However, there's a way to achieve this seemingly impossible task. To reach the greatest possible powers, he detached his soul from his body, and kept his heart of dark stone somewhere within the furthest reaches of the maze-like passages of Eriosthé. The access to the heart is in turn opened by several keys shaped also as hearts of stones, which must be found behind battles with fierce enemies, hidden at secret places, or guarded by unscrutable riddles.

Gameplay

The four adventurers are each of a different class: a fighter, a magician, a priest and a paladin. Each one has unique characteristics. The fighter and paladin are capable of wearing and using the heaviest gear and weapons, and dealing the highest physical damage. The paladin can also lay hands over a foe to do damage, or over a friend or the whole party to heal. The magician uses wits to deliver spellsfrom five disciplines for different effects: damaging, healing, discovering secret doors, translating unknown texts, etc. Finally, the priest send prays to four different gods, and each pray should have a certain effect, some similar to the magician's spells, and others unique to the priest. But the gods are whimsical or can be angered, so sometimes prays aren't heard, and sometimes the god smites back the priest for disturbing the godly rest.

At game start, certain characteristics of each party member are decided through a series of questions which can e.g. create an agile warrior capable of dodging enemy's attacks at the cost of lesser damage dealt, or a bulky warrior not so able to evade or parry attacks but dealing much more damage in each successful hit.

The exploration system is in first-person perspective, with a simple 3D effect. One important feature of the game is its auto-map: when viewing the map, squares already explored are marked as such. No need to use paper and pencil to draw the map, although in certain areas there's a fog preventing to view the map at all. The city itself is divided in zones, and to move from one zone to the other, the party can only access through sanctuaries. The sanctuaries are the only place where the game can be saved, and has also a cache to save items, the party can rest and recover health points, etc. The first time the party enters a certain sanctuary, all wounds and illnesses are cured. Visiting a sanctuary when a character has enough experience points also makes that character advance a level up to the maximum level of 15.

Entering the sanctuary requires using one of four soul amulets which came printed with the game, to decode the secret word to open the door to the sanctuary. This was the copy protection system used in the game, and in fact many runes and scriptures found in the walls of the city are also written with the same glyphs. Entering a sanctuary only requires the secret word the first time, afterwards it can be entered freely. Sanctuaries also have teleports to other sanctuaries and special places.

The zone past the sanctuary Urlasar has most of the remaining inhabited Eriosthé, such as shops, the temple, the mausoleum, the guild, the shrines and somewhat deeper the circle of magicians. One thing to take care is that the party needs supplies to keep exploring, if food depletes, the party will start to lose health points and even die eventually. At the shrines and the circle of magicians, the priest and magician can acquire new rings if their level is high enough, in the case of the priest to have more chances to pray successfully, and in the case of the magician to access higher level spells. In case a party member dies, the body can be brought to the temple and resurrection can be attempted. In case it fails, a new member for the party can be found and chosen between several candidates at the guild.

During the exploration, packs of monsters can attack randomly, mostly in open areas. Certain places trigger the attack of specific foes too, and the deeper in Eriosthé the party goes, the harder the monsters are. The battles themselves are played turn based, first with a movement phase and then with an attack phase. Everything is done on an overhead view, where small square icons represent the party members and the foes. Besides moving and attacking, the priest can pray, the magician can launch spells, and other actions like retreat can be triggered.

Exploring the caverns and mazes requires more than just good gear. There are clues about where to find hidden doors, key to advancing the story, but some doors are impenetrable to magic or prays, and riddles and puzzles must be solved to open them - mechanically or through a secret word.

Production

The game was created by Ian Boswell and Martin Buis while they were studying as a pet project over the course of several years. Once Broderbund agreed to publish the game, they needed another year to complete it, all on a very limited budget.

The game was noted for its primitive graphics even for 1989 . On DOS, it supported CGA, EGA and VGA graphics.

The game has neither music nor sound in both Apple II and DOS platforms.

Reception

Despite good reviews, specially after years passed, at release time the game didn't sell well. According to Boswell, Broderbund didn't market the game, it was launched at the end of Apple II's life, and it passed unadvertised among other computer RPGs of the era, partly because Broderbund wasn't known for that type of games. It sold less than 5,000 units.^[2]

Computer Gaming World in 1993 called Uukrul "a standard dungeon-delving expedition with some interesting points, not least of which is the best auto-mapping in any game to date". The magazine approved of the balanced combat and "unusual ending", but warned that the puzzles made the game "not for those seeking only hack-and-slash entertainment".^[3]

Crooked Bee from RPG Codex praised Uukrul for the different challenges the player faces while progressing through the game, and for "some of the best dungeon, puzzle and character development design in the history of the genre". He also remarked the balance between elements, and its clever design.^[2]

References

External links

• The Dark Heart of Uukrul at MobyGames
• Retrospective Interview: Ian Boswell and Martin Buis on The Dark Heart of Uukrul at RPG Codex