''Ankh'' is a 2005

graphic adventure game An adventure game is a video game genre in which the player assumes the role of a protagonist in an interactive story driven by exploration and/or Puzzle video game, puzzle-solving. The Video game genres, genre's focus on story allows it to draw ...

developed by the German company

Deck13 Deck13 Interactive GmbH (formerly TriggerLab GmbH) is a German video game developer and publisher based in Frankfurt. The company was founded in July 2001 by the team behind Artex Software, a studio that primarily developed video games for RISC ...

and published by bhv Software. It features a three-dimensional environment with cinematic camera movement. Humor is an important aspect of the game, and the influence of classic

LucasArts Lucasfilm Games (known as LucasArts between 1990 and 2021) is an American video game brand licensing, licensor that is part of Lucasfilm. It was founded in May 1982 by George Lucas as a video game development group alongside his film company; as ...

adventure games is noticeable. ''Ankh'' is a remake of ''Ankh: The Tales of Mystery'', a 1998 adventure game developed by Artex Software for the

Acorn Archimedes Acorn Archimedes is a family of personal computers designed by Acorn Computers of Cambridge, Cambridge, England. The systems are based on Acorn's own ARM architecture processors and the proprietary operating systems Arthur and RISC OS. The fi ...

. ''Ankh'' spawned two sequels: '' Ankh: Heart of Osiris'' and '' Ankh: Battle of the Gods''. In 2006, the original ''Ankh'' was ported to

Linux Linux ( or ) is a family of open-source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991, by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged as a Linux distribution, which ...

and

OS X macOS (; previously OS X and originally Mac OS X) is a Unix operating system developed and marketed by Apple Inc. since 2001. It is the primary operating system for Apple's Mac computers. Within the market of desktop and lapt ...

. A Special Edition of the game was released in the UK in February 2007. A

Nintendo DS The is a handheld game console produced by Nintendo, released globally across 2004 and 2005. The DS, an initialism for "Developers' System" or "Dual Screen", introduced distinctive new features to handheld games: two LCD screens working in tan ...

port was released in 2008 under the title ''Ankh: Curse of the Scarab King''.

Plot

The player takes the role of Assil, the son of a respected architect in Cairo. Assil is a party animal but at some point one of his party-nights turned out sour. When he tries to have some fun in the pyramids with two friends of his, he accidentally breaks some urns and thus disturbs the mummy resting in the pyramid. The mummy punishes Assil by placing a death curse on him, and now he has 24 hours to remove the curse and save himself. Later in the game Assil meets the Arabian ambassador's daughter Thara, who is also a playable character. Jan Klose, Creative Director at Deck13 Interactive, also cited ''Monkey Island'' to be an influence for the ''Ankh'' series.

Development

The soundtrack for the game was composed by Dynamedion and was rated as 1st place for “Best German Soundtrack 2005”. According to ''

GameStar ''GameStar'' is a monthly-released PC gaming magazine in Germany. It is the best-selling German-language magazine focused on PC gaming and it also hosts the largest video gaming-related portal in the German-speaking internet. Content The pri ...

'', ''Ankh'' was produced on a small budget "in the low six-digit range".

Reception

Domestic

''Ankh'' was a commercial hit in the German market, with sales of 100,000 units in that region alone. The ''

Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger The ''Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger'' (KStA) is a German daily newspaper published in Cologne, and has the largest circulation in the Cologne–Bonn Metropolitan Region. ''Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger'' has a base of over 100 contributing editors and a wide ...

'' reported that it also saw success worldwide. According to Deck13, the combined global sales of ''Ankh'' and its first two sequels—'' Heart of Osiris'' and '' Battle of the Gods''—surpassed 500,000 units by August 2009.

International

The PC and DS versions received "mixed or average reviews" according to the

review aggregation A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews of products and services (such as films, books, video games, software, hardware, and cars). This system stores the reviews and uses them for purposes such as supporting a website where users ...

website

Metacritic Metacritic is a website that review aggregator, aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted arithmetic mean, weighted average). M ...

References

External links

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Ankh (Video Game) 2005 video games Adventure games Deck13 games Linux games MacOS games Nintendo DS games Point-and-click adventure games RuneSoft games Video game remakes Video games based on Egyptian mythology Video games developed in Germany Video games set in Egypt Windows games