Vengeance of Excalibur | |
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Developer(s) | Synergistic Software |
Publisher(s) | Virgin Games |
Designer(s) | Robert Clardy Alan Clark |
Platform(s) | MS-DOS, Macintosh, Amiga, Atari ST |
Release | 1991 |
Genre(s) | Role-playing |
Mode(s) | Single-player |
Vengeance of Excalibur is a 1991 role-playing video game developed by Synergistic Software and distributed by Virgin Games. It is a sequel for Synergistic's 1990 title Spirit of Excalibur , set in Spain around the turn of the 10th and 11th Centuries. Vengeance of Excalibur puts the player in control of a small team of Knights of the Round Table who will seek out in Spain for the stolen items of the treasure of Camelot (the series advances the timeline of Arthurian lore 500 years past period where it is usually established).
The game begins two years after Spirit of Excalibur left off: Britain has been reunited under King Constantine III, who succeeds King Arthur after the Battle of Camlann, and peacefully rules over the realm after killing Mordred's sons and their aunt, Morgan le Fay. During a stormy night a lone knight is admitted into Camelot; while Constantine converses with the stranger, the knight lets in a second figure, who subsequently transforms Constantine into a statue. They then proceed to the treasure room of the castle and steal its contents, including Arthur's mythical sword Excalibur and the recently recovered Holy Grail. The knight is also able to subdue and kidnap Nineve, the court's sorceress, second in magical power only to Merlin. With the treasures of Camelot stolen, plagues and demonic creatures roam the British country-side. Merlin is appointed acting regent of the realm while the Knights of the Round Table are dispatched in small groups to search the medieval western Europe and find a way to stop this mystic assault.
The player controls a group of knights bound for the Iberian Peninsula from Portsmouth: a witness to the assault on Camelot reveals that the knight is the rogue warrior Sir Bruce sans Pitie, and that there is evidence that indicates that he may have traveled to Spain, a country torn by the war between the Christian kingdoms of the north and the Muslim caliphates of the south, and plagued by groups of mercenary knights, violent bandits, and clannish Basques. If they manage to negotiate these hazards, the forces of the Round Table must still find and defeat Sir Bruce and his ally, the Shadow Master.
Gameplay in Vengeance of Excalibur is nearly identical to its predecessor Spirit of Excalibur: the game is made up of seven episodes, each with a specific goal, usually the retrieval of one of the stolen artifacts, and a number of lesser quests that may be undertaken to complete the episode, or to enhance the powers of the player's knights. Unlike Spirit where the player had many knights under his control, in Vengeance of Excalibur he or she only has a team of four knights which are later joined by the sorceress Nineve and by other characters who temporarily join the player's team – usually to provide troops for large-scale battles. Some of the knights the player can choose from at the beginning are either returning characters from Spirit, like Sir Lancelot or Sir Bors, while the others are new and not necessarily derived from Arthurian mythology. Every character has his strong point when the game begins; for example Lancelot is the most combat-capable starting out, while Bors is the most pious. The player is also presented with the chance to import four characters from Spirit of Excalibur, bringing the total number of knights that can be chosen up to sixteen. These imported characters (which can include Lancelot and Bors) are translated into the game with most of their statistics and items intact from Spirit, which can make the game easier if they were significantly developed in the previous game.
Vengeance of Excalibur has some important differences that set it apart from that of its predecessor. The first difference relates to individual combat, which now allows for 3-versus-3 fights, as opposed to the 1-vs.-1 battles of the original game. In addition, the player can no longer manually control his fighter: there are now however three different combat styles that the player can choose for every character who is fighting (reckless/full offense, normal, and cautious/full defense). The second difference is the size of the locations the player can travel to. In Spirit of Excalibur every location usually had a few scenes, like the outside and the inside of a castle, from which the characters could move to and from. In Vengeance locations often have more than two scenes, and the characters can be directed to more than one direction in each scene. This effectively creates a larger environment for the player to explore, and it makes in-game mazes and labyrinths possible.
Computer Gaming World stated that Vengeance's story was inferior to its predecessor and the final battle was disappointing, but liked the audio. [1]
Excalibur is the mythical sword of King Arthur that may possess magical powers or be associated with the rightful sovereignty of Britain. Traditionally, the sword in the stone that is the proof of Arthur's lineage and the sword given to him by a Lady of the Lake are not the same weapon, even as in some versions of the legend both of them share the name of Excalibur. Several similar swords and other weapons also appear within Arthurian texts, as well as in other legends.
Guinevere, also often written in Modern English as Guenevere or Guenever, was, according to Arthurian legend, an early-medieval queen of Great Britain and the wife of King Arthur. First mentioned in popular literature in the early 12th century, nearly 700 years after the purported times of Arthur, Guinevere has since been portrayed as everything from a fatally flawed, villainous and opportunistic traitor to a noble and virtuous lady. Many records of the legend also feature the variably recounted story of her abduction and rescue as a major part of the tale.
Lancelot du Lac, alternatively written as Launcelot and other variants, is a popular character in Arthurian legend's chivalric romance tradition. He is typically depicted as King Arthur's close companion and one of the greatest Knights of the Round Table, as well as a secret lover of Arthur's wife, Guinevere.
Mordred or Modred is a major figure in the legend of King Arthur. The earliest known mention of a possibly historical Medraut is in the Welsh chronicle Annales Cambriae, wherein he and Arthur are ambiguously associated with the Battle of Camlann in a brief entry for the year 537. Medraut's figure seemed to have been regarded positively in the early Welsh tradition and may have been related to that of Arthur's son. As Modredus, Mordred was depicted as Arthur's traitorous nephew and a legitimate son of King Lot in the pseudo-historical work Historia Regum Britanniae, which then served as the basis for the following evolution of the legend from the 12th century. Later variants most often characterised Mordred as Arthur's villainous bastard son, born of an incestuous relationship with his half-sister, the queen of Lothian or Orkney named either Anna, Orcades, or Morgause. The accounts presented in the Historia and most other versions include Mordred's death at Camlann, typically in a final duel, during which he manages to mortally wound his own slayer, Arthur. Mordred is usually a brother or half-brother to Gawain; however, his other family relations, as well as his relationships with Arthur's wife Guinevere, vary greatly.
Galahad, sometimes referred to as Galeas or Galath, among other versions of his name, is a knight of King Arthur's Round Table and one of the three achievers of the Holy Grail in Arthurian legend. He is the illegitimate son of Sir Lancelot du Lac and Lady Elaine of Corbenic and is renowned for his gallantry and purity as the most perfect of all knights. Emerging quite late in the medieval Arthurian tradition, Sir Galahad first appears in the Lancelot–Grail cycle, and his story is taken up in later works, such as the Post-Vulgate Cycle, and Sir Thomas Malory's Le Morte d'Arthur. In Arthurian literature, he replaced Percival as the hero in the quest for the Holy Grail.
The Lady of the Lake is a name or a title used by several either fairy or fairy-like but human enchantresses in the Matter of Britain, the body of medieval literature and mythology associated with the legend of King Arthur. She plays several important roles in many stories, including providing Arthur with the sword Excalibur, eliminating Merlin, raising Lancelot after the death of his father, and helping to take the dying Arthur to Avalon. Different sorceresses known as the Lady of the Lake appear concurrently as separate characters in some versions of the legend since at least the Post-Vulgate Cycle and consequently the seminal Le Morte d'Arthur, with the latter describing them as a hierarchical group, while some texts also give this title to either Morgan or her sister.
Excalibur is a 1981 epic medieval fantasy film directed, cowritten and produced by John Boorman, that retells the legend of King Arthur and the knights of the Round Table, based loosely on the 15th-century Arthurian romance Le Morte d'Arthur by Thomas Malory. It stars Nigel Terry as Arthur, Nicol Williamson as Merlin, Nicholas Clay as Lancelot, Cherie Lunghi as Guenevere, Helen Mirren as Morgana, Liam Neeson as Gawain, Gabriel Byrne as Uther and Patrick Stewart as Leondegrance. The film is named after the legendary sword of King Arthur that features prominently in Arthurian literature. The film's soundtrack features the music of Richard Wagner and Carl Orff, along with an original score by Trevor Jones.
The Knights of the Round Table are the legendary knights of the fellowship of King Arthur that first appeared in the Matter of Britain literature in the mid-12th century. The Knights are an order dedicated to ensuring the peace of Arthur's kingdom following an early warring period, entrusted in later years to undergo a mystical quest for the Holy Grail. The Round Table at which they meet is a symbol of the equality of its members, who range from sovereign royals to minor nobles.
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Accolon is a character in Arthurian legends where he is a lover of Morgan le Fay who is killed by King Arthur in a duel during the plot involving the sword Excalibur. He appears in Arthurian prose romances since the Post-Vulgate Cycle, including as Accalon in the French original Huth Merlin and Acalón in the Spanish adaptation El Baladro del Sabe Merlin.
Spirit of Excalibur is a 1990 role-playing game developed by Synergistic Software and published by Virgin Mastertronic for MS-DOS, Amiga, Atari ST, Commodore CDTV, Apple IIGS and Macintosh. The player controls a host of characters with the goal of uniting Sub-Roman Britain under a single king and defending the kingdom. The game was followed by the sequel Vengeance of Excalibur in 1991.
King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table is a Japanese anime series based on Arthurian legend. Produced by Toei Animation, the series consists of 30 half-hour episodes released between 9 September 1979 and 3 March 1980. The series achieved great popularity in its non-English translations.
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Adventures of Sir Galahad is the 41st serial released in 1949 by Columbia Pictures. Directed by Spencer Gordon Bennet, it stars George Reeves, Nelson Leigh, William Fawcett, Hugh Prosser, and Lois Hall. It was based on Arthurian legend, one of the very few serials of the time with a period setting that was not a western.
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