Re:Retro

Dungeon Keeper: Going back to basics

by Joel on May 11th, 2008

Okay, I’m stumped. Not that I mind, really. Not much anyway. It’s a little annoying knowing that you can’t beat a video game that you’ve played before. I’ll get over it, though.

Before I begin another mind-numbing round of Dungeon Keeper, which is, to me, one of the best games ever produced by Bullfrog Productions, I’m going back to the basics of the game in hope of retrieving as much useful information that will help me through my relearning phase. No, it’s not cheating. Let’s call it a reconnaissance.

Well, Dungeon Keeper’s interface is pretty much like that of real-time strategy games. For a more detailed, if not accurate, description, I turn to Wikipedia:

The player uses a mouse, represented in the game as a hand, to interact with a bar on the left-hand side of the screen, allowing him to select which rooms to build and which spells to cast. Rather uniquely, the player can use the hand to pick up creatures and objects in the dungeon and carry them around, allowing for tactics such as gathering an assault force and dropping off the creatures en masse once a beachhead has been established.

The hand also allows the player to “slap” objects and thereby interact with them: creatures will hurry up when slapped, chickens in a hatchery will “splat,” and some traps will be triggered. Prisoners in the torture chamber can thus be treated with a hands-on approach.

The main game view is in isometric perspective; however, this view can be zoomed and rotated. The player also has the option of possessing one trap or room section. A smaller part of the map is shown as a minimap in the top left corner of the screen.

Right. Treat it like an RTS. That not only speeds up my understanding of the game, but also my reaction time. Time to research the shortcut keys and a good build order.

Here’s another cool Dungeon Keeper video. It’s actually a review, but since it’s in Deutsch (German), I can’t really understand much. Watching the video helps, though. I’m learning how to make rooms properly. Hurray!

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POSTED IN: Blowing people up, Blowing stuff up, Electronic Arts, Humor, PC, Re:Retro, Role-Playing Games, Strategy, Videos