Lands of Lore - the Throne of Chaos

[Unkillable Cat]

I cannot give a completely honest comparison, since my memory of Dungeon Master 1&2 is hazy, and I haven't touched CSB yet.

For me, the baseline is Eye of the Beholder 1, as that was the first game of the type that I played. EOB2 came shortly afterwards and is generally an improvement, but not vastly better as some have claimed.

LoL comes somewhere just below EOB1. EOB1 was a better game than LoL, but the story was paper-thin, there are no characters to speak of (even though the characters were used in a different AD&D setting), the ending was missing (that's what the Stone Gem was for, which is why it was cut) and puzzles were mostly of the "try everything until you get it right" variety. At least LoL tried to give you pointers for many puzzles.

In short, it's above average, but its shining point is that it's a great game to get people into dungeon crawlers.

As for Scotia... her final form is called the Executioner, and it's unkillable. Some guy tried whacking at it for HOURS using the Westwood Stick, and couldn't kill her. Except for an interesting cheat that ends up spawning two or even THREE Scotias at the same time, there is no way to kill her without using the Whole Truth on her when she's about to transform for the first time.

I know now that I as wrong on one thing: Those items that I thought weren't in the game, like the Cloud and Zephyr rings... they are. They're just unreachable. The Zephyr ring is in Castle Cimmeria, so is the Cloud Ring. In Yvel there's an awesome Great Maul hidden out of reach unless you're wall-hacking.

And as for the hidden difficulty level? Monsters are stupidly fast. In the CD version, all attacks always hit... but that includes yours as well, which actually makes the game easier.

Sceptic: We've had this argument before. Just because YOU had an easy time with something, doesn't mean that everybody else did. You don't have to look for long online to find that there were A LOT of players that had trouble killing the Larkhon. The only other thing in LoL that gave people more trouble was the bug with Vaelan's Cube.

 

[Sceptic]

Sceptic: We've had this argument before. Just because YOU had an easy time with something, doesn't mean that everybody else did. You don't have to look for long online to find that there were A LOT of players that had trouble killing the Larkhon. The only other thing in LoL that gave people more trouble was the bug with Vaelan's Cube.

My issue was more with the dual-sided "it's too easy but GOOD GOD IS IT HARD" argument. I know, you said it's easy "with spikes", but I just don't agree that the Larkhon was a spike of any kind. ARgument works the other too by the way - just because you had trouble figuring out that the skull was useful against the Larkhon doesn't mean everybody else did. At the time NO ONE I knew, or that I knew of, or that I could read anywhere (magazines etc) mentioned the Larkhon as a trouble spot. It's why I tend to regard this with the same scepticism as say "QFG4 is awesome and QFG3 sucks, everyone always said so" - back then nobody really complained much about 3 and 4 was universally panned and hated because it was virtually unplayable. As for the Cube again it didn't give anyone I knew trouble - what did was the patch, wherein you couldn't duplicate the cube anymore and actually had to use the Emerald Swords. The ghosts in White Tower and Cimmeria were a joke pre-patch due to cube-spamming and inifite mana regeneration to heal everyone.

 

[Mother Russia]

If you want to bang Dawn, play Lands of Lore 2 as a good Luthor.

As for my opinion on LoL? It's one of the most beautiful dungeon crawlers ever made, I'll give it that, and most of its puzzles and level design are decent enough. Most... but not all. This game degenerates into sludge right about the time you meet the Dark Commander. There is clearly so much content cut from the game. Once the invasion of Yvel City begins, the game is on rails, and everything "conveniently works out". Plot points like how Scotia got her hands on Nathaniel's key are ignored, and the subplot of the blacksmith being a spy is almost completely overlooked. So much effort is put into creating backstory and atmosphere for the Lands, yet the story is rushed through at the end? 'Sloppy' doesn't begin to describe this.

LoL is the only dungeon crawler I know of where there are doors that are NOT MEANT TO BE OPENED. Ever. Westwood were too lazy to get them right, and again too lazy to remove them from the game. LoL is also the only dungeon crawler I know of where people generally don't have a clue what's going on under the engine. The guys over at Abandonia made great progress (like finding out that Michael is the best spellcaster in the game!) but overall it's all still a mystery, 20 years after the game's release. And this isn't some obscure fan-project from Eastern Europe (hello Cardhalia) but a Triple AAA product of its time. Lands of Lore 2 is even worse in this regard. Westwood Studios were, in general, sloppy in their work. This is even visible in EOB1&2, but in no way as badly as in LoL.

Let's not forget that except for a few chokepoints of difficulty, LoL is one of the easier dungeon crawlers around. Cavemen in the Draracle caves can one-shot me? Better be careful of themOHFUCKTHEYRESPAWNLIKECRAZY. Killing the Larkhorn? You need to figure out ON YOUR OWN that the Green Skull actually casts a spell. Urbish Mines? Confusing as fuck for little or no reason. Top level of the White Tower? RAGE RAGE RAGE RAGE. Pointless battle crammed in near the end just to add filler material? Check. Oh look, you need to unlock a four-part lock to be able to complete the game (see... just about every RPG released ever, the examples are too many to count). LoL actually has THREE of these, BTW (Elixir, Keys, Figurines). By the time I reach Castle Cimmeria, I don't care if some monster eats my armor, I know there's gonna be another one coming up soon.

People were asking for pre-2000 proofs of decline? I give you... Lands of Lore: The Throne of Chaos.

Oh please. So what if there are doors that are not meant to be opened, or items never used?

I love red herrings. Realms of Arkania had many such items. Some were red herrings meant to tease pack rats...others were actually used in sequels.

Ofcourse the game was not perfect by any means. It was real time, (though well done I admit) all npcs could cast spells ( I would have preferred Baccata and Paulson to be be pure warriors while Timothy to be a pure ranger or magic less bard) and Dawn should have been playable and joinable.

Grimrock is the only game I have played that is similar to LoL after LoL's release so long ago (EoB series came before)

 

[Sceptic]

I love red herrings.

I like them too, in moderate doses, but it's obvious in LOL that they weren't intentionally there and the game was just unfinished. The entire dungeon is a good example of this, as are the many plot holes that start appearing once you reach Yvel.

Grimrock is the only game I have played that is similar to LoL after LoL's release so long ago (EoB series came before)

Aside from not having a party, Anvil of Dawn was very similar, and in some ways a much better game.

 

[Mother Russia]

I love red herrings.

I like them too, in moderate doses, but it's obvious in LOL that they weren't intentionally there and the game was just unfinished. The entire dungeon is a good example of this, as are the many plot holes that start appearing once you reach Yvel.

Grimrock is the only game I have played that is similar to LoL after LoL's release so long ago (EoB series came before)

Aside from not having a party, Anvil of Dawn was very similar, and in some ways a much better game.

How so? Explain.

Anvil of Dawn, while a revolutionary game at the time for it's massive leap in grafix, is similar to Arena and Ultima Underworld, not blobbers like grimrock or LoL. One of the main differences is that combat doesn't have cool downs/rounds, it's hack and slash. In LoL and Grimrock, after making an attack the PC has a short cool down period before attacking again, which represents a 'round' of combat as in pnp games.

Note, not to diss on Anvil at all, but just pointing something out.

 

[RK47]

Anvil of Dawn is Grimrock 0.5
Go front, Hit, Retreat. Go front , Hit. Retreat.

 

[Unkillable Cat]

Oh please. So what if there are doors that are not meant to be opened, or items never used?

Name one other game of the same ilk as Lands of Lore that had doors that were never meant to be opened.

Take your time, I can wait. I don't think you will, because as far as I can tell, no other grid-based dungeon crawler does this, and I've played through a bunch of them. Like Sceptic said, it is blatantly obvious that Lands of Lore was released in not only an unfinished condition, but an unpolished one as well. At least we didn't have to live with as many bugs as modern-day releases do.

Grimrock is the only game I have played that is similar to LoL after LoL's release so long ago (EoB series came before)

Then you missed out on Stonekeep and Anvil of Dawn, and yet... you harp on about Anvil of Dawn, but out of ignorance first and foremost.

Anvil of Dawn, while a revolutionary game at the time for it's massive leap in grafix, is similar to Arena and Ultima Underworld, not blobbers like grimrock or LoL.

Or maybe it's just plain stupidity. Anvil of Dawn is EXACTLY like LoL and Grimrock. Sure, it tries to introduce new things, and abandons what you claim to be ONE vital element of a blobber, but a spade is a spade. The basic gameplay mechanics are the same. LoL, DM, Grimrock and EOB are all grid-based, Underworld and Arena are not. Anvil of Dawn is grid-based, which group of games do you think it belongs to?

And while the graphics ARE an improvement over its predecessors, it's by no means "revolutionary". That title is better thrown at Stonekeep, which tried to use video captures for all the in-game critters.

 

[octavius]

Anvil of Dawn is both grid based and single character? Sounds like a decline compared to party based blobbers and Ultima Underworld...

BTW, I remember Thief (yeah, it's not same style as LoL) had a door you could never open. I think it was in the garden part of the Sword mission.

 

[Unkillable Cat]

They were three doors, actually. They were there for three reasons:

# To give players a hint that there was more to Constantine's mansion than we were being allowed to see.

# To connect the basement of Constantine's Mansion (which you visited in the mission "Escape!") to the rest of the mansion, which was divided into two parts across two missions because...

# ... the engine would have a tough time processing the "complete" Constantine's Mansion. (Though NewDark could do it with ease.)

For Looking Glass to do this showed an attention to detail that is not found in dungeon blobbers. Those only had the "essentials", places that you were supposed to go, or had to find hidden switches or solve complex puzzles to access.

 

[Murk]

Anvil of Dawn has a ton of hacking/slashing with constant mouse clicks and the strangest gameplay theme -- rocks, always rocks. big heavy rocks.

 

[abnaxus]

Is LoL 3 worth checking out?

 

[Jaesun]

I loaded up LoL 2 and after I could start playing I said WHAT IN THE FUCK and turned it off.

 

[Gozma]

I thought a big tip to a crappy last minute change in LoL was the minimap revealing all the hidden switches and secret doors and shit, which invalidates half the game

 

[Jaesun]

Then don't use the map.

 

[Gozma]

Yeah but they clearly made a knee-jerk decision at some point to make consulting the map ruin the game, probably because they had some playtesters getting frustrated and they were like fuck it fuck the basis of the game we made getitoutthedoor

 

[Unkillable Cat]

Anvil of Dawn has a ton of hacking/slashing with constant mouse clicks and the strangest gameplay theme -- rocks, always rocks. big heavy rocks.

You had to remind me about the rocks? I had to lug around a bag full of them because there was ALWAYS a pressure plate puzzle around the corner which needed them.

I thought a big tip to a crappy last minute change in LoL was the minimap revealing all the hidden switches and secret doors and shit, which invalidates half the game

IIRC, LoL was the first dungeon blobber to feature an automap as "standard issue". Captive had a rudimentary map that was optional, and Dungeon Master 2 had some kind of map, and that one even updated in real time.

But before that there was nothing, and this infuriated and alienated a lot of players. I can understand why Westwood would want to cram an all-seeing automap into the game. I don't agree with it, but I understand it.

 

[DraQ]

Anvil of Dawn is both grid based and single character? Sounds like a decline compared to party based blobbers and Ultima Underworld...

RT and single character mesh far better than RT and party blob.

 

[Murk]

Is LoL 3 worth checking out?

If you're bored, it's worth killing 20 minutes on. It's not a very good game -- I'd not really bother with it. It's basically a first person action game set in a kind of persistent world. Might be a decent game if remade now but... not really.

 

[groke]

Then don't use the map.

This. You can just walk out of Gladstone without getting the atlas, so It is Possible to Totally Avoid Automap in LoL™.

 

[Aurelius]

Is LoL 3 worth checking out?

It's horribly buggy, has an annoying protagonist (16-year-old half-dracoid from the royal family ), the plot is boring and somewhat generic (you lost your soul!) and it's terribly imbalanced (melee does like 50-100 times the damage of ranged or most magic attacks) and easy as shit. That said, I like it for the nostalgia factor. It also has some features I liked, for example when finding a weapon you learn about its special properties by using it, which are then recorded in your journal. Wouldn't recommend it, though.

 

[Mother Russia]

I thought a big tip to a crappy last minute change in LoL was the minimap revealing all the hidden switches and secret doors and shit, which invalidates half the game

No it doesn't. Only a retard constantly looks at the map. I found most of the switches and walls by noticing them on screen, not on the map.

 

[Horus]

I downloaded the cd version of this game but i can't install it with dosbox or any other way. What should i do?

 

[duchU]

If we are talking about Lands of Lore 1 then I just want to say: it's a great shame that Westwood did not make Eye of the Beholder 3 - this game is fucking disaster because of it and ruins the trilogy as a whole.

I downloaded the cd version of this game but i can't install it with dosbox or any other way. What should i do?

You need to add cd drive into dosbox config file (dosbox-0.74.conf).
I have something like this:

...
[autoexec]
# Lines in this section will be run at startup.
# You can put your MOUNT lines here.

mount c c:\gry # Adds Windows directory c:\gry as hard drive c: in dosbox
mount d d:\ -t cdrom # Adds Windows cd drive ( D: ) as cdrom in dosbox under d:\ path
c:\ # Goes to c:\ in dosbox

 

[A user named cat]

Use D-Fend Reloaded. It makes setting up configs, mounting and everything so god damn easy instead of having to type out anything. Plus it's a pretty decent frontend. I use it along with Hyperspin and ScummVM for all my old gaming bliss.

 

[Absalom]

mount -t cdrom d X:\blank.iso
where x is whatever drive your mounting the iso as a virtual disc