''Kingdom O' Magic'' is a

video game Video games, also known as computer games, are electronic games that involves interaction with a user interface or input device such as a joystick, controller, keyboard, or motion sensing device to generate visual feedback. This fee ...

released by Sales Curve Interactive in 1996. It is a comedic point and click

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 ...

parodying

fantasy fiction Fantasy is a genre of speculative fiction involving magical elements, typically set in a fictional universe and sometimes inspired by mythology and folklore. Its roots are in oral traditions, which then became fantasy literature and drama. ...

. It can be played with either of two available protagonists, Thidney or Sha-ron. ''Kingdom O' Magic'' was planned for release on four different systems:

MS-DOS MS-DOS ( ; acronym for Microsoft Disk Operating System, also known as Microsoft DOS) is an operating system for x86-based personal computers mostly developed by Microsoft. Collectively, MS-DOS, its rebranding as IBM PC DOS, and a few ope ...

PlayStation is a video gaming brand that consists of five home video game consoles, two handhelds, a media center, and a smartphone, as well as an online service and multiple magazines. The brand is produced by Sony Interactive Entertainment, a divisi ...

Macintosh The Mac (known as Macintosh until 1999) is a family of personal computers designed and marketed by Apple Inc., Apple Inc. Macs are known for their ease of use and minimalist designs, and are popular among students, creative professionals, and ...

, and

Sega Saturn The is a home video game console developed by Sega and released on November 22, 1994, in Japan, May 11, 1995, in North America, and July 8, 1995, in Europe. Part of the fifth generation of video game consoles, it was the successor to the succ ...

. However, only the MS-DOS version was ever released.

Themes

The game, penned by television writer Alan Silberberg, is filled with

surreal Surreal may refer to: *Anything related to or characteristic of Surrealism, a movement in philosophy and art * "Surreal" (song), a 2000 song by Ayumi Hamasaki * ''Surreal'' (album), an album by Man Raze *Surreal humour, a common aspect of humor ...

humor. For instance, the instruction manual claims that the game was "First published in 1876 under the title '101 fun things To Do with Trolls'. However the version on

CD-ROM A CD-ROM (, compact disc read-only memory) is a type of read-only memory consisting of a pre-pressed optical compact disc that contains data. Computers can read—but not write or erase—CD-ROMs. Some CDs, called enhanced CDs, hold both comput ...

is specially calibrated for short people with red hair." It was designed by

Fergus McNeill Fergus McNeill is a Scottish author and award-winning interactive entertainment developer. He has designed and created games since the early 1980s, working with companies such as CRL, Silversoft, Macmillan Group, Activision, SCi Eidos and EA. H ...

. As in his previous games, '' Bored of the Rings'' and ''

The Boggit ''The Boggit: Bored Too'' is a text adventure game by Delta 4 released in 1986 for the Commodore 64, Amstrad CPC, and ZX Spectrum home computers. The game is a parody of the J. R. R. Tolkien novel ''The Hobbit'' and of the earlier game based upon ...

'', the game parodies

J. R. R. Tolkien John Ronald Reuel Tolkien (, ; 3 January 1892 – 2 September 1973) was an English writer and philology, philologist. He was the author of the high fantasy works ''The Hobbit'' and ''The Lord of the Rings''. From 1925 to 1945, Tolkien was ...

's Middle-earth. Various elements in the games are parodies of Middle-earth characters and locations, such as " The High Steward of Minar Tragedy, Don Elrondo of Rivendull and Queen Galadrag of De-Lorean. The game's closing credits sequence plays the theme to the 1970s British cartoon ''

Roobarb ''Roobarb'' (also known as ''Roobarb and Custard'') is a British animated children's television series, created by Grange Calveley and originally shown on BBC1 just before the evening news. Each cartoon, written by Calveley and directed by Bob ...

'', but there appears to be no other relationship between the works.

Plot

Beginning the game, the player can select between two protagonists: Thidney the Lizard Bloke (voiced by

John Sessions John Marshall (11 January 1953 – 2 November 2020), better known by the stage name John Sessions, was a British actor and comedian. He was known for comedy improvisation in television shows such as ''Whose Line Is It Anyway?'', as a panellist o ...

) or Shah-Ron the Girlie (voiced by Lani Minella) from planet Comely. According to the on-screen descriptions, Thidney is skilled at combat whereas Shah-Ron is skilled at magic. There are three quests: *The Good, Old Fashioned, Traditional Quest: The player wanders around the Kingdom fighting and completing various side-quests, until finally "rescue the dragon, steal the princess and kill the treasure". *The Magnificent 7-11 Quest: The player has to find and recruit 7 to 11 characters from the Kingdom in order to protect Flake town from an upcoming invasion. *The Bizarre & Slightly Twisted Quest: The player must find the Lost Lava Lamp Of The Ancient and defeat the Dark Lord, in order to save civilization.

Gameplay

The player is surrounded by many

NPCs A non-player character (NPC), or non-playable character, is any character in a game that is not controlled by a player. The term originated in traditional tabletop role-playing games where it applies to characters controlled by the gamemaster o ...

moving around, such as karate elves fighting against and ringwraiths. The player can interact with non-hostile characters, triggering a dialogue tree: conversation is handled choosing from multiple responses, leading to different directions of conversation. Combat occurs when approaching a NPC with a weapon selected. Then all violence is covered by a cloud as seen in many cartoons, and then the two combatants walk away as if nothing had happened. There are also magic spells to supplement the combat system, but their effects, while humorous, are largely unhelpful.

Remake

A team had begun making an unofficial remake of ''Kingdom O' Magic'' using the Adventure Game Studio engine.

References

External links

* *{{Metacritic video game
''A cache of SCi's Kingdom O' Magic website''
1996 video games Adventure games Cancelled classic Mac OS games Cancelled PlayStation (console) games Cancelled Sega Saturn games DOS games DOS-only games Middle-earth parodies Parody video games Video games about reptiles Video games developed in the United Kingdom Video games featuring female protagonists