Abandoned Places

Abandoned Places: A Time For Heroes is a role-playing game developed by ArtGame for the Commodore Amiga and published by Electronic Zoo in 1992. International Computer Entertainment released the MS-DOS port.

The game designed by Francis Staengler and Steve Fábián introduces you to a world of adventure set in a world named Kalynthia. Four heroes are on a quest to save their world from the hands of the evil archmage Bronagh.

Abandoned Places takes on a typical save the world storyline that is very common in the '90s. The story has a pretty dark storyline because there were initially 12 heroes. What happened to the other eight that aren't featured in the game? This goes back to where the heroes originate from. Trapped in stone and buried under the Temple of Heavens Light lies all 12 heroes, but the wizards of Kalynthia only have the power to raise four of them to defend the land. What happened to the rest? Forgotten and trapped.

The game, clearly inspired by Dungeon Master, puts the player in control of four characters. The four characters are made up of two warriors, a priest, and a mage. Each character has their own weakness and unique traits/abilities and an inventory that they can use to carry individual items. A minimalistic portrait updates the player on the character's health and status.

The game begins in the temple's depth, where you are introduced to the game controls for the first time. The player's team can be controlled through a rather small 3D window where the player is given a first-person perspective of your team's line of sight. This seemed a bit odd for me as the first person view made it quite blocky and difficult to maneuver through; however, this is an integral part of the game's design as you are required to observe your surroundings through this to obtain clues. It is easily understandable that the developers have attempted to make the world as detailed as possible even though the graphics look quite essential. There is no in-game music other than the low-quality introductory music.

When you are not exploring dungeons, the game switches to a 2D birds-eye view of the area. You can actually navigate your party through cities and the countryside. You can travel on the map using all sorts of transport (horses or ships, for example) with total freedom. This is where Abandoned Places differs from pure dungeon crawlers such as Eye of the Beholder, and it's one of the best aspects of the game.

The combat system present in the game is cool-down-based, affecting both your weapons and magic. In my opinion, this is a bit difficult as each weapon has to be individually clicked to be used, so a majority of the fights would be of you frantically clicking buttons on the screen, oblivious to what is going on in the game.

Although the graphics are average, the game is okayish, and the lack of sound is pretty disappointing. Still, the game, in general, is very in-depth and provides a considerable challenge in terms of difficulty (even for veteran RPG players).