[HN Gopher] The Betrayal at Krondor Help Web
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       The Betrayal at Krondor Help Web
        
       Author : ccanassa
       Score  : 88 points
       Date   : 2022-05-17 08:49 UTC (14 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (vga256.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (vga256.com)
        
       | PostOnce wrote:
       | Betrayal in Antara (the sequel to Krondor) was like Skyrim to me.
       | The reviews mostly focused on the outdated graphics, but we've
       | long since moved beyond "graphics keep getting better" and I
       | suspect it would be more happily reviewed in 2022 than it was
       | back then.
       | 
       | Also, I consistently think about art (music, games, movies,
       | books, etc), that while you may not have massive international
       | fame, your work might still be somebody's favorite.
        
       | bencollier49 wrote:
       | The book "Magician" by Raymond E. Feist, which this game came
       | from, is a great read and interesting in as much as the book came
       | after and grew out of a long-running RPG campaign, if I remember
       | correctly.
        
         | RektBoy wrote:
         | It is, would be interesting as a movie or game.
        
           | bencollier49 wrote:
           | That's a good shout actually. It would make a terrific film
           | in the right hands.
        
             | woolly wrote:
             | It's recently been re-optioned after the initial deal fell
             | through to a company called Six Studios:
             | https://www.tor.com/2022/02/03/riftwar-cycle-series-in-
             | devel...
        
         | mabster wrote:
         | There's also "Krondor, The Betrayal" where he turned the game
         | back into a book! Unfortunately not as good as his earlier
         | works.
        
           | xen0 wrote:
           | That trilogy (Betrayal, Assassins, Tear of the Gods) is
           | weird. 'Krondor: The Assassins' is 'readable' at least, but
           | is also the only one not based on a game; it can be a little
           | more focused, although it retains it's DnD campaign style
           | story.
        
           | 2muchcoffeeman wrote:
           | Yeah, the later works were very much fan service. Very easy
           | reads if you're on a holiday though.
        
         | luciusdomitius wrote:
         | It is a great book, somewhat better than the competition, but
         | being aware of Feist in the age of Tolkien, GRRM and even the
         | Harry Potter lady, simply means a lonely childhood hah.
        
         | kemayo wrote:
         | Magician was the start of a reasonably entertaining sword and
         | sorcery series. The RPG campaign roots are really visible once
         | you pay attention, but (as far as I can remember) in a better
         | way than, say, Dragonlance managed.
         | 
         | I always enjoyed the political fantasy spin-off series Daughter
         | of the Empire by Janny Wurts more, though. :D
        
           | xen0 wrote:
           | Both Silverthorn and A Darkness at Sethanon both feature a
           | very literal party, gathering at a very literal tavern.
        
           | TillE wrote:
           | Feist gets a lot of flak for being yet another Tolkien
           | ripoff, but I think he's by far the best of the ripoffs. The
           | first trilogy, anyway.
           | 
           | And yeah, the Empire trilogy is probably the best of his
           | (co-)work.
        
         | stevekemp wrote:
         | There's a good writeup here with some more background
         | 
         | https://www.filfre.net/2019/10/betrayal-at-krondor/
        
         | Andrew_nenakhov wrote:
         | It is not from the "Magician", it is set between 4th and 5th
         | books in the main series and later was made into a novel.
        
           | bencollier49 wrote:
           | I mean to say that Magician was the book which introduced the
           | world.
        
       | busterarm wrote:
       | This game and Might and Magic VI have always been my high water
       | marks for computer RPGs, despite their flaws.
       | 
       | This website is serious nostalgia for me.
       | 
       | The Mordhel wordlocks from this game are a mechanic I desperately
       | wish other games would pick up (who doesn't like riddles?).
        
       | xen0 wrote:
       | I have very fond memories of this game; I played it a lot as a
       | child and can still probably recite a great number of the word-
       | locks. I'm pretty sure my parents would still recognise the
       | riddle music too, even after 20+ years.
       | 
       | I remember this site too and am saddened to learn of the author's
       | passing.
       | 
       | It's heartwarming to see a relic such as this preserved, when so
       | many similar things are left to disappear with the communities
       | that made them.
        
         | busterarm wrote:
         | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XgRBXulWKXE Yep.
        
       | skocznymroczny wrote:
       | Wish the game was remade, it has many interesting concepts,
       | especially for its time, but the visual presentation and some
       | gameplay elements hadn't aged well.
       | 
       | It was an example of an early open world game. The most
       | interesting part of the game is the first chapter. The game very
       | directly makes you go south towards Krondor, and the path north
       | contains some large enemy packs. But if you manage to defeat the
       | two large enemy packs, it gets much easier later on and you can
       | take a very long detour around the entire map. This means you can
       | access some high level equipment and spells early on in the game.
       | The game designers actually planned for this possibility, because
       | there are some quests in those areas that can only be completed
       | in the first chapter (normally you'd explore these areas around
       | the third chapter at least).
        
         | Delk wrote:
         | On the other hand, I think one of the unique(?) elements of the
         | game was perhaps _because_ of the rather limited visual
         | presentation.
         | 
         | Betrayal at Krondor uses written descriptions of events and
         | environments a lot. It felt natural, at least to me, perhaps
         | partially because the graphics didn't really allow for showing
         | a lot of detail visually. Extensive voice acting wasn't really
         | a thing in the floppy era either.
         | 
         | Nowadays, with the incredibly detailed graphics and
         | professionally voice-acted spoken dialogue of AAA games, it
         | might seem a lot more weird if what the characters saw were
         | described in writing.
        
           | HideousKojima wrote:
           | I've been playing through the remaster of Nier recently and
           | there's one segment of the game where it transitions from 3d
           | action RPG to text adventure. It's very bizarre, but you
           | should go into any Yoko Taro game expecting bizarreness so it
           | actually works out pretty well.
        
         | 2muchcoffeeman wrote:
         | I played BaK several times and never knew that.
        
         | brolumir wrote:
         | While the game itself is not getting remade, there is an
         | "inspired by" game in the works:
         | https://www.callofsaregnar.com/
        
           | ccanassa wrote:
           | Damn! They managed to update the graphics while keeping the
           | "feel" of the original game, that's quite an impresive feat.
        
             | feanaro wrote:
             | Indeed. I'm a fan of both Daggerfall and Might and Magic,
             | so this looks seriously good.
        
         | bstar77 wrote:
         | This is a pretty rare game for that time that didn't have much
         | of any pixel art... it was either scanned images or rudimentary
         | 3d. I had no idea what it was when I downloaded it off a BBS
         | and was pleasantly surprised by the visuals. It's funny how our
         | perspectives change over time.
        
         | aidenn0 wrote:
         | What I don't understand is why I loved _Krondor_ but couldn 't
         | stand _Daggerfall_ (or any of the later _Elder Scrolls_ games).
         | Maybe it 's just that _Krondor_ was more focused? The chapter
         | system certainly made it easier to know what the next  "primary
         | goal" was without restricting you too from exploring the world
         | (at least in most of the early chapters; the last 3ish chapters
         | were certainly more railroaded).
        
         | YeGoblynQueenne wrote:
         | The original is on GOG, though I haven't played it and I don't
         | know how well it is emulated.
        
         | ccanassa wrote:
         | Yes, I also think that the art didn't age very well, the 3D
         | world being quite confusing to navigate IMO.
         | 
         | I forked an open source reversed engineered implementation of
         | that game some time ago, you can see it in here:
         | https://github.com/canassa/betrayal-at-krondor
         | 
         | My hope was to get it working and eventualy update some of its
         | graphics but I never had the time to properly work on it.
        
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       (page generated 2022-05-17 23:02 UTC)