King of Dragon Pass
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''King of Dragon Pass'' is a 1999 strategy
simulation A simulation is the imitation of the operation of a real-world process or system over time. Simulations require the use of models; the model represents the key characteristics or behaviors of the selected system or process, whereas the s ...
fantasy 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 d ...
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 ...
published by A Sharp. Set in the fictional world of
Glorantha Glorantha is a fantasy world created by Greg Stafford. It was first introduced in the board game ''White Bear and Red Moon'' (1975) by Chaosium and then in a number of other board, roleplaying and computer games, including ''RuneQuest'' and ''Her ...
, the player controls the fate of a barbarian clan settling in the dangerous frontier region of Dragon Pass. Originally released for PC, the game was a commercial failure but became a
cult classic A cult following refers to a group of fans who are highly dedicated to some person, idea, object, movement, or work, often an artist, in particular a performing artist, or an artwork in some medium. The lattermost is often called a cult classic. ...
. It was ported for
iOS iOS (formerly iPhone OS) is a mobile operating system created and developed by Apple Inc. exclusively for its hardware. It is the operating system that powers many of the company's mobile devices, including the iPhone; the term also include ...
in 2011, and was later released for Android and re-released for PCs. The iOS versions were much more commercially successful than the original PC release, leading to a spiritual successor, ''Six Ages: Ride Like The Wind'', being released in 2018.


Plot

The player controls a clan of Orlanthi (worshipers of the Storm God Orlanth) across several generations. Orlanthi clans bear some similarities to the
Iron Age The Iron Age is the final epoch of the three-age division of the prehistory and protohistory of humanity. It was preceded by the Stone Age ( Paleolithic, Mesolithic, Neolithic) and the Bronze Age ( Chalcolithic). The concept has been mostl ...
Nordic peoples, such as
lawspeaker A lawspeaker or lawman ( Swedish: ''lagman'', Old Swedish: ''laghmaþer'' or ''laghman'', Danish: ''lovsigemand'', Norwegian: ''lagmann'', Icelandic: , Faroese: '' løgmaður'', Finnish: ''laamanni'', kl, inatsitinuk) is a unique Scandina ...
s,
fyrd A fyrd () was a type of early Anglo-Saxon army that was mobilised from freemen or paid men to defend their Shire's lords estate, or from selected representatives to join a royal expedition. Service in the fyrd was usually of short duration and ...
s, the worship of a thunder god and a reliance on raiding, as well as Bronze Age Celtic and Italic peoples aesthetically, with the appearance of many of the tribesmen reflecting these origins. At the beginning of the game the clan has fled its home of Heortland after a foreign magician known as Belintar or 'the Pharaoh' usurps the throne. Along with dozens of other Orlanthi clans, the clan seeks to build a new home in Dragon Pass, a previously populated area left deserted after the Dragonkill War hundreds of years ago. With the Orlanthi clans variously feuding, allying, trading with and raiding each other, and a host of inhuman presences such as
elves An elf () is a type of humanoid supernatural being in Germanic mythology and folklore. Elves appear especially in North Germanic mythology. They are subsequently mentioned in Snorri Sturluson's Icelandic Prose Edda. He distinguishes " ...
, dwarves and
trolls A troll is a being in Nordic folklore, including Norse mythology. In Old Norse sources, beings described as trolls dwell in isolated areas of rocks, mountains, or caves, live together in small family units, and are rarely helpful to human bei ...
, Dragon Pass is a free but dangerous frontier society compared to the tyrannical rule of the Pharaoh in Heortland. To the west, a persistent danger is the 'Horse-Spawn,' a society of nomadic mounted warriors. As time passes by the clans form into 'tribes,' loose confederations of half a dozen clans. A prophet visits the player's clan to inform them of a great destiny. The player must guide the clan through seven heroquests (ritual re-enactments of feats of the gods) and successfully manage a number of events, including co-operating with other clans to build a town and making peace with the Horse-Spawn by marrying their queen (or, if the player's chieftain is female, their king). If the player is successful, the clan's chieftain unites the Orlanthi tribes and the Horse-Spawn into a kingdom, becoming King of Dragon Pass.


Gameplay

The player controls the seven-member clan ring leading the clan, providing leadership to the clan in all aspects of its life, such as trading, warfare, agriculture and diplomacy. The player can make two macro-level decisions per each of the five seasons in the Gloranthan year. Random events are drawn from a pool of hundreds, ranging from mundane law disputes to spiritual or demonic incursions. They are often influenced by previous decisions and outcomes. In battle, the player determines the goals and preparations, and possibly chooses the actions of his nobles at pivotal moments. To succeed, a player must balance the various needs of survival and prospering, as well as manage the problems presented by the setting or the clan individuals - a lack of food might be solvable by clearing more farmland, but when the forest responds by sending a talking fox to urge leaving the trees alone, a wrong choice could bring the clan hunters to war with their environment. Likewise, should a member of the clan act in a selfish and foolish manner, action needs to be taken to stabilize and defuse the situation, if necessary. ''King of Dragon Pass'' contains no animation, instead depicting people and events with hand-drawn artwork. The game has elements of strategy,
construction and management simulation Construction and management simulation (CMS), sometimes also called management sim or building sim, is a subgenre of simulation game in which players build, expand or manage fictional communities or projects with limited resources. Strategy vid ...
, and role-playing video games.


Production and release

''King of Dragon Pass'' was conceived and developed by David Dunham, using his friend
Greg Stafford Francis Gregory Stafford (February 9, 1948 – October 10, 2018), usually known as Greg Stafford, was an American game designer, publisher, and practitioner of shamanism. Stafford is most famous as the creator of the fantasy world of Gloranth ...
's setting of Glorantha. At peak development, the A Sharp production team consisted of only 12 people. The game cost $500,000 to make but only sold 8,000 boxed copies, rendering it a commercial failure. It sold disproportionately well in Finland thanks to a glowing review in
Pelit ''Pelit'' ("Games") is a Finnish video games magazine published in Helsinki, Finland. History ''Pelit'' dates back to 1987, as an annual extra games-only issue of '' MikroBitti'' and ''C-lehti''. Another annual issue was published in 1988, and in ...
. ''King of Dragon Pass'' had initially been conceived for the
Apple Newton The Newton is a series of personal digital assistants (PDAs) developed and marketed by Apple Computer, Inc. An early device in the PDA category (the Newton originated the term), it was the first to feature handwriting recognition. Apple started ...
. Following Apple's announcement of the iPhone in 2007, Dunham was drawn back to the potential of the game for a handheld platform, and an updated version of the game was released for
iOS iOS (formerly iPhone OS) is a mobile operating system created and developed by Apple Inc. exclusively for its hardware. It is the operating system that powers many of the company's mobile devices, including the iPhone; the term also include ...
on September 8, 2011. This version was updated to be a universal iOS app for compatibility with the iPad on September 6, 2012. The original Windows version was re-released by
GOG.com GOG.com (formerly Good Old Games) is a digital distribution platform for video games and films. It is operated by GOG sp. z o.o., a wholly owned subsidiary of CD Projekt based in Warsaw, Poland. GOG.com delivers DRM-free video games through it ...
on August 28, 2012. David Dunham announced in March 2013 that the iOS version had sold 30,000 copies. HeroCraft
ported In software engineering, porting is the process of adapting software for the purpose of achieving some form of execution in a computing environment that is different from the one that a given program (meant for such execution) was originally desi ...
the iOS version to Android and released it on August 12, 2014. A Windows Phone version, also by HeroCraft, was released a month later on September 23. A new PC version based on the Android version was released July 29, 2015; it runs on Windows or Mac OS X.


Sequel

A spiritual successor, '' Six Ages: Ride Like The Wind'', was announced in 2014, released for iOS on June 28, 2018, and PC and Mac in 2019.


Reception

The game's hand painted watercolor artwork won the Best Visual Art prize in the 2000 Independent Games Festival. '' Rock, Paper, Shotgun'' described the game in retrospective in 2017 as "a management game, yes, but at its heart is an ongoing RPG chronicle." In 2016, the game placed 5th on Rock Paper Shotgun's The 50 best strategy games on PC list. Reviewing the iPhone version at ''
TouchArcade ''TouchArcade'' is a mobile video game website that launched in 2008. Arnold Kim of ''MacRumors'' worked on the site and its editor-in-chief was Eli Hodapp from 2009 to 2019. ''TouchArcade'' has been recognized as one of the best mobile game ...
'', Eli Hodapp described it as "one of the most in-depth and strategic gameplay experiences I've had so far on my iPhone," describing the game as a conglomeration of ''
Civilization A civilization (or civilisation) is any complex society characterized by the development of a state, social stratification, urbanization, and symbolic systems of communication beyond natural spoken language (namely, a writing system). ...
'' and ''
Choose Your Own Adventure ''Choose Your Own Adventure'' is a series of children's gamebooks where each story is written from a second-person point of view, with the reader assuming the role of the protagonist and making choices that determine the main character's actio ...
''.


References


External links

*
''King of Dragon Pass''
at HeroCraft * {{moby game, id=/king-of-dragon-pass, name=''King of Dragon Pass''
''King of Dragon Pass''
at
Metacritic Metacritic is a website that 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 average). Metacritic was created by Jason Dietz, Marc ...

''King of Dragon Pass''
at Apple's App Store 1999 video games Android (operating system) games Classic Mac OS games Fantasy video games Greg Stafford games HeroCraft games Independent Games Festival winners Indie video games IOS games Robin Laws games Role-playing video games Single-player video games Turn-based strategy video games Video games based on tabletop role-playing games Video games developed in Russia Video games developed in the United States Windows games Windows Phone games