Jump to content

The Bard's Tale (1985 video game)

From Alfawiki
The Bard's Tale
Company typeVideo game
IndustryVideo games
Founded1985
FounderMichael Cranford
ProductsThe Bard's Tale (video game)
ParentInterplay Productions

The Bard's Tale is a fantasy role-playing video game created and coded by Michael Cranford for the Apple II. Developed by Interplay Productions in 1985 and published by Electronic Arts, it was subsequently adapted for various systems, including the Commodore 64, Apple IIGS, ZX Spectrum, Amstrad CPC, Amiga, Atari ST, MS-DOS, Mac, and the NES. This title initiated The Bard's Tale franchise, encompassing multiple games and novels. Initial releases bore the series name Tales of the Unknown, a subtitle that was omitted in later ports and editions.

A remastered edition became available for Windows in August 2018, followed by a version for the Xbox One in 2019.

Plot

The narrative premise is outlined on the game’s packaging:

In ancient times, during an era dominated by magic, the malevolent sorcerer Mangar the Dark menaced the modest settlement of Skara Brae. Dark creatures invaded, and Mangar unleashed a curse of Eternal Winter, isolating the town. One fateful night, the town’s militia disappeared without a trace.

The fate of Skara Brae depended on a small band of inexperienced young Warriors, novice Magic Users, a few barely matured Bards, and some unemployed Rogues.

You command this disparate group of freedom fighters. Fortunately, a Bard accompanies you to chronicle your heroic deeds—if you survive. This is where legends are born. Thus begins the tale...

Players assemble a team of up to six adventurers, developing their skills to overcome progressively tougher enemies and complete the main quest by gathering essential items and information.

Skara Brae is represented as a 30x30 tile grid featuring streets, buildings, gates, and enchanted guardian statues that block certain routes. Two towers are situated at the northeastern and southwestern corners, each secured behind locked gates. The western city entrance remains snowbound and inaccessible throughout gameplay. Additionally, one street forms an endless loop via teleportation back near the city walls.

Important locations include the Adventurer's Guild, Garth's Equipment Shoppe, an unmarked Review Board (where characters gain experience levels), several taverns and temples, as well as various dungeons. These dungeons are labyrinthine complexes—such as cellars, sewers, catacombs, or fortresses—inhabited by monsters and puzzles; some are protected by magical statues that attack intruders.

  1. The initial dungeon encountered is the Wine Cellar (1 level), located beneath a tavern and connected to Skara Brae’s Sewers (3 levels). The Sewers provide access to the otherwise inaccessible southwestern sector of the city where Mangar's Tower stands; entry to this tower requires a key. Discovering the Wine Cellar involves ordering wine at a particular tavern to trigger access—though obtaining wine is not mandatory for progression.
  2. The Catacombs (3 levels) lie under the temple devoted to the Mad God and are inhabited by undead creatures. Entry demands knowledge of his name, which must be entered as a password. Defeating a Spectre on the deepest level rewards players with an eye.
  3. This eye enables interaction with a statue within Baron Harkyn's Castle (3 levels) that teleports players to Skara Brae’s northeastern district where Kylearan's Tower is located; however, immediate advancement is optional. If players become injured during combat, they can use one-way portals to return to the city or Adventurer's Guild.
  4. Access to Kylearan's Tower (1 level) is only possible via teleportation from Harkyn's Castle. At its conclusion, Kylearan the Archmage greets players and provides a key granting entry to Mangar's Tower; nevertheless, players must still navigate locked gates through the Sewers.
  5. The final dungeon is Mangar's Tower (5 levels), initially reachable only through the Sewers. To defeat Mangar, players need to collect several items found in other dungeons. Within this tower lies a key that later permits direct access from the city to both Mangar's Tower and Kylearan's Tower without passing through Sewers or Harkyn’s Castle.

Gameplay

The Bard's Tale represents a traditional dungeon crawl experience centered on accumulating experience and enhancing characters' abilities primarily through random battles with foes. Players navigate complex dungeon mazes, solve intricate puzzles, and upgrade their weaponry, armor, and other gear.

Up to six player characters can be created, selecting from classes such as bard, hunter, monk, paladin, rogue, warrior, magician, and conjurer. Experienced magic users gain access to advanced classes like sorcerer and wizard. On certain platforms, players could import characters from Wizardry or Ultima III, a pioneering feature at the time.

The bard class introduced distinctive mechanics by employing magical songs as persistent spells that boosted the party’s attributes, such as enhancing armor or attack speed. Some puzzles specifically required bard songs to progress. Each song played corresponding music, combining classical pieces with original compositions.

Magic users had the option to permanently switch classes. Achieving mastery over all spells across four classes granted the prestigious "Archmage" title—the most potent status in the game—though it provided no gameplay advantages aside from spell access.

Casting any of the 85 spells required entering a four-letter code found in the printed manual; however, mouse support on DOS, Amiga, and Macintosh versions allowed players to select spells from a list.

Combat was conducted in a turn-based manner with textual descriptions rather than graphical animations. After battles, rewards such as gold and experience points were distributed evenly among surviving party members.

Cluebook

In 1986, Electronic Arts released an official cluebook (ISBN 1-55543-064-3) that expanded upon the game's narrative. Authored by T.L. Thompson, it is presented as an in-world journal written by Lord Garrick, viscount of Hamelon—Skara Brae’s sister city—who is trapped under Mangar’s curse.

Garrick leads a group including Corfid op Orfin the Bard, Ghaklah the Magician, Isli the Paladin, Soriac the Archmage, and an unnamed sage-sorcerer in an effort to liberate Skara Brae from Mangar’s grasp. The journal chronicles their dungeon exploration and puzzle-solving until their Rogue betrays them by stealing crucial artifacts before facing Mangar. Soriac prepares a spell enabling Isli to escape with the journal to Pellis, a powerful figure opposing Mangar; however, this spell erases their deeds and consumes Isli as it fades.

Development

The Bard's Tale and its sequel The Bard's Tale II: The Destiny Knight were conceptualized, designed, and programmed under the leadership of Michael Cranford, with additional design contributions from Interplay founder Brian Fargo and Roe Adams III. Graphics were created by David Lowery, music composed by Lawrence Holland, and production overseen by Joe Ybarra. Cranford drew heavily on his and Fargo’s experiences with Dungeons & Dragons, aiming to surpass genre benchmarks such as the Apple version of Wizardry.

As a committed Christian, Cranford incorporated subtle references to Jesus within the game, with many city names in The Bard's Tale II inspired by the New Testament. Following a disagreement with Fargo, Cranford departed prior to The Bard's Tale III to pursue academic studies in philosophy and theology.

A consultant contributed ideas including the city name "Skara Brae," which also appeared in Ultima IV. To prevent conflicts, other suggestions from this consultant were not utilized.

At Interplay, Rebecca Heineman (then credited as Bill "Burger" Heineman) developed essential data compression algorithms and tools for graphics creation and porting across platforms. She later criticized Cranford for withholding the final game version to negotiate a publishing deal that granted him exclusive rights to the sequel. Brian Fargo acknowledged this situation but defended Cranford’s actions. Cranford refuted these claims as "fiction," explaining that Heineman was largely removed from business dealings and minimally involved in development. According to Cranford, Fargo delayed providing a written contract until Cranford withheld the final product; ultimately, contract terms differed from their verbal agreement. A resolution was reached; however, Fargo requested Cranford’s departure after completing The Destiny Knight, leading Cranford to exit game development.

All parties have since reconciled amicably. Cranford and Fargo maintain a friendship, with Cranford contributing to The Bard's Tale IV: Barrows Deep, developed by Fargo’s company inXile Entertainment for the original title’s 30th anniversary. Heineman has expressed interest in remastering the original trilogy for contemporary platforms.

Critical reception

In 1985, Computer Gaming World’s Scorpia enthusiastically recommended Bard's Tale, describing it as essential playing. Although she later noted in 1993 that the game’s initial challenge and limited save options were drawbacks, she still praised its captivating puzzles and endorsed it. Hartley and Pattie Lesser from Dragon magazine also gave the game a top rating, calling it "a high adventure game" and awarding it a perfect 5-star score in their follow-up evaluations.

The Commodore 64 edition received commendations from Compute!'s Gazette in 1986 for its intricate magic mechanics and overall depth. The Apple IIGS port was celebrated by Compute! in 1987 as "the most visually impressive product" available on Apple computers at the time. When released on the ZX Spectrum in 1988, it garnered positive feedback; CRASH assigned an 86% rating while Sinclair User gave it an 89%, emphasizing its appeal primarily to devoted RPG enthusiasts. Your Sinclair rated it 9 out of 10.

While the Macintosh version earned praise from Macworld for its soundtrack and gameplay elements, it faced criticism for its monochrome visuals and repetitive battle sequences. The Commodore 64 version was honored with a 'Sizzler' award and scored 94% from Zzap!64, with reviewer Sean Masterson declaring it "the finest RPG on the Commodore." By 1993, Commodore Force ranked the game as the 13th best title on the Commodore 64 platform.

In reviewing the sequel in 1988, Ahoy!’s AmigaUser described The Bard's Tale as an all-time classic. That same year, the title was inducted into the Computer Gaming World Hall of Fame with a score of 7.49 out of 10. It placed seventh in a 1990 readers' poll for favorite games of all time and was listed as the 89th greatest game ever by the magazine in 1996.

Commercial performance

Achieving significant commercial success, The Bard's Tale became the top-selling computer RPG of the 1980s, moving 407,000 units. It notably became the first RPG outside of the Wizardry franchise to rival sales of the Ultima series, especially among Commodore 64 users who did not have access to Wizardry until 1987. By 1993, combined sales of the series surpassed one million copies.

Sequels

Following its critical and commercial triumph, The Bard's Tale led to two official follow-ups along with a "Construction Set":

In 1990, Electronic Arts compiled the original trilogy into The Bard's Tale Trilogy, releasing it for DOS systems.

Initially planned under the umbrella title Tales of the Unknown, with individual games named The Bard's Tale, The Archmage's Tale, and The Thief's Tale, the series was rebranded by EA to capitalize on the first game's popularity using the more recognizable Bard's Tale name. The city name Skara Brae was coined by an EA representative, and some intended titles were modified before launch.

What was originally envisioned as The Bard's Tale IV evolved into a distinct project titled Dragon Wars (1989), following Interplay’s separation from EA over rights disputes, which resulted in changes to both title and narrative.

In 2003, Brian Fargo—an influential figure behind the original series—established InXile Entertainment and released an unrelated action RPG named The Bard's Tale in 2004. This iteration satirized conventional fantasy RPG conventions and took place near the actual location of Skara Brae. Although InXile secured legal rights to use the Bard's Tale name through a loophole, EA maintained trademarks over the original series’ storylines, characters, and settings, restricting their use.

In May 2015, Fargo revealed plans for a crowdfunded continuation titled The Bard's Tale IV, which debuted in 2018 as a direct sequel to the original trilogy featuring modernized gameplay.

Additionally, InXile released a virtual reality spin-off called The Mage's Tale in 2017, developed concurrently with The Bard's Tale IV.

Remastered Edition

During crowdfunding efforts for the fourth installment, inXile partnered with Rebecca Heineman’s Olde Sküül studio to create remastered versions of the original trilogy optimized for contemporary macOS and Windows platforms, aiming to replace earlier emulated editions. After development delays, responsibility shifted to Krome Studios, who collaborated with inXile to launch the remastered collection titled The Bard's Trilogy on August 14, 2018.

This Remastered Edition rebuilt all three games from their foundations while preserving original plots and gameplay but enhanced graphics, audio quality, and user interface to meet modern expectations. It standardized gameplay elements across all titles by resolving inconsistencies related to party composition, spell systems, and other features present in initial releases and ports. New additions included female character portraits along with subtle nods to The Bard's Tale IV.

Following inXile’s acquisition by Microsoft, this remastered trilogy became available on Xbox One on August 13, 2019, supporting Xbox Play Anywhere functionality.

Novels

Throughout the 1990s, Baen Books published several novels under The Bard's Tale brand name, demonstrating its cultural impact despite limited direct connections to game narratives. Key works include:

  1. Castle of Deception, authored by Mercedes Lackey and Josepha Sherman (1992)
  2. Fortress of Frost and Fire, by Mercedes Lackey and Ru Emerson (1993)
  3. Prison of Souls, penned by Mercedes Lackey and Mark Shepherd (1994)
  4. The Chaos Gate, written by Josepha Sherman (1994)
  5. Thunder of the Captains, co-authored by Holly Lisle and Aaron Allston (1996)
  6. Wrath of the Princes, also by Holly Lisle and Aaron Allston (1997)
  7. Escape from Roksamur, authored by Mark Shepherd (1997)
  8. Curse of the Black Heron, written solely by Holly Lisle (1998)

Certain novels share closer narrative ties within this collection—for instance, Castle of Deception connects with The Chaos Gate, while Prison of Souls links to Escape from Roksamur, and similarly, Thunder of the Captains relates to Wrath of the Princes.

External links

Retrieved from "https://www.alfawiki.org/index.php?title=The_Bard%27s_Tale_(1985_video_game)&oldid=26522"