''The Black Cauldron'' is an

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 ...

Al Lowe Albert William Lowe (born July 24, 1946) is an American video game designer, programmer, and musician who developed several adventure games, mostly for Sierra On-Line. He is best known for creating the ''Leisure Suit Larry'' series. He has also ...

Sierra On-Line Sierra Entertainment, Inc. (formerly On-Line Systems and Sierra On-Line, Inc.) was an American video game developer and publisher founded in 1979 by Ken and Roberta Williams. The company is known for pioneering the graphic adventure game genre, ...

and published in 1986. The game is based on the

Disney The Walt Disney Company, commonly known as Disney (), is an American multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate headquartered at the Walt Disney Studios complex in Burbank, California. Disney was originally founded on October ...

film '' The Black Cauldron'', which was itself based on the ''

Chronicles of Prydain ''The Chronicles of Prydain'' is a pentalogy of children's high fantasy Bildungsroman novels written by American author Lloyd Alexander and published by Henry Holt and Company. The series includes: ''The Book of Three'' (1964), ''The Black Cauld ...

'' novel of the same name by

Lloyd Alexander Lloyd Chudley Alexander (January 30, 1924 – May 17, 2007) was an American author of more than 40 books, primarily fantasy novels for children and young adults. Over his seven-decade career, Alexander wrote 48 books, and his work has been tran ...

. It was made shortly after the first ''

King's Quest ''King's Quest'' is a graphic adventure game series, released between 1980 and 2016 and created by the American software company Sierra Entertainment. It is widely considered a classic series from the golden era of adventure games. Following th ...

'' game, so it resembles that game in many ways. Along with ''

The Dark Crystal ''The Dark Crystal'' is a 1982 dark fantasy film directed by Jim Henson and Frank Oz. It stars the voices of Stephen Garlick, Lisa Maxwell, Billie Whitelaw, Percy Edwards, and Barry Dennen. The film was produced by ITC Entertainment and The J ...

'' it remains one of only a few adventure games by Sierra to be based on films.

Plot

The

player character A player character (also known as a playable character or PC) is a fictional character in a video game or tabletop role-playing game whose actions are controlled by a player rather than the rules of the game. The characters that are not control ...

is a young assistant pig-keeper named Taran, who undertakes a quest to stop the evil Horned King, who seeks for

Hen Wen ''The Chronicles of Prydain'' is a pentalogy of children's high fantasy Bildungsroman novels written by American author Lloyd Alexander and published by Henry Holt and Company. The series includes: ''The Book of Three'' (1964), ''The Black Caul ...

, the magical pig of the wizard

Dallben ''The Chronicles of Prydain'' is a pentalogy of Children's literature, children's high fantasy Bildungsroman novels written by American author Lloyd Alexander and published by Henry Holt and Company. The series includes: ''The Book of Three'' (19 ...

, for her

visionary A visionary, defined broadly, is one who can envision the future. For some groups, this can involve the supernatural. The visionary state is achieved via meditation, lucid dreams, daydreams, or art. One example is Hildegard of Bingen, a 12th-c ...

abilities. With these abilities, the Horned King would be able to discover the Black Cauldron and rule the land. Taran's first mission is to lead her to the

Fair Folk A fairy (also fay, fae, fey, fair folk, or faerie) is a type of mythical being or legendary creature found in the folklore of multiple European cultures (including Celtic, Slavic, Germanic, English, and French folklore), a form of spirit, o ...

while the Horned King's dragons are looking for them. Should the pig be captured (the game allows either possibility), Taran can go to the Horned King's castle and rescue her. As soon as he is inside, Taran will meet

Princess Eilonwy Princess Eilonwy ( ) is a fictional character in Lloyd Alexander's ''The Chronicles of Prydain''. She appears in four of the five novels in the series, as well as Disney's 1985 animated film adaptation '' The Black Cauldron''. Eilonwy is a membe ...

with her magic bauble and may rescue

Fflewddur Fflam ''The Chronicles of Prydain'' is a pentalogy of children's high fantasy Bildungsroman novels written by American author Lloyd Alexander and published by Henry Holt and Company. The series includes: ''The Book of Three'' (1964), ''The Black Caul ...

, as well as discover a Magic Sword. The Cauldron is in the possession of three

witches Witchcraft traditionally means the use of magic or supernatural powers to harm others. A practitioner is a witch. In medieval and early modern Europe, where the term originated, accused witches were usually women who were believed to have use ...

of Morva who will trade it for the Sword. A dragon grasps the cauldron and Taran goes back to encounter the evil man himself. There are plot branches and multiple endings depending on many variables, such as whether Hen Wen the pig was saved, how the cauldron was destroyed, and what reward was chosen afterward.

Gameplay

In order to make the game more accessible to

child A child ( : children) is a human being between the stages of birth and puberty, or between the developmental period of infancy and puberty. The legal definition of ''child'' generally refers to a minor, otherwise known as a person younger ...

ren, Sierra used an innovative idea that would not reappear in the genre for the next 10 years: the

text parser {{Refimprove, date=August 2007 In adventure games, a text parser takes typed input (a command) from the player and simplifies it to something the game can understand. Usually, words with the same meaning are turned into the same word (e.g. "take" a ...

was removed in favor of the

function key A function key is a key on a computer or terminal keyboard that can be programmed so as to cause an operating system command interpreter or application program to perform certain actions, a form of soft key. On some keyboards/computers, function ...

s that performed various actions: F3 would choose an inventory item, F4 would use it, F6 would perform "Use" near the character's location, and F8 would "look". The simplification of the two actions "Look" and "Use" was not reused in Sierra's later games. However, it somewhat resembles the control system of other later simpler

point-and-click Point and click are the actions of a computer user moving a pointer to a certain location on a screen (''pointing'') and then pressing a button on a mouse, usually the left button (''click''), or other pointing device. An example of point and cli ...

adventure games, such as the ''

King's Quest VII ''King's Quest VII: The Princeless Bride'' is a graphic adventure game developed and published by Sierra On-Line for the MS-DOS, Microsoft Windows and Macintosh computers in 1994. It features high-resolution graphics in a style reminiscent of Disne ...

'' or '' The Dig'' whose interfaces only consisted of "Look" and "Use". Being based on a Disney film, the graphics present some relative 'flexibility', compared to the monolithic and straight sceneries of previous and later games.

Reception

Antic Alphanumeric Television Interface Controller (ANTIC) is an LSI ASIC dedicated to generating 2D computer graphics to be shown on a television screen or computer display. Under the direction of Jay Miner, the chip was designed in 1977-1978 by ...

'' in 1987 criticized the Atari ST version of ''The Black Cauldron'' as "typical of early software for newer computers. It doesn't fully utilize the ST's capabilities", citing the "chunky low-resolution" graphics "obviously ported from another make of computer". However, the magazine concluded that fans of other Sierra adventures would enjoy the game.

Reviews

* ''

ASM (Aktueller Software Markt) ''Aktueller Software Markt'' (literally ''Current Software Market''), commonly known by its acronym, ''ASM'', was a German multi-platform video game magazine that was published by Tronic-Verlag from 1986 until 1995. It was one of the first magazine ...

'' - Aug, 1986 * ''

Computer and Video Games ''Computer and Video Games'' (also known as ''CVG'', ''Computer & Video Games'', ''C&VG'', ''Computer + Video Games'', or ''C+VG'') was a UK-based video game magazine, published in its original form between 1981 and 2004. Its offshoot website ...

'' - Aug, 1986

References

External links

''The Black Cauldron''
at Lemon Amiga
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in

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Review
in

Page 6 ''Page 6'' (subtitled ''Atari Users Magazine'' and later known as ''Page 6 Atari User'', then ''New Atari User'') was an independent British publication aimed at users of Atari home computers. It was published between 1982 and 1998. The magazi ...