Legend of Faerghail

1990 SyksyIt's hard to say anything bad about this game, since everything that works in the preview version that came into my hands works really beautifully. But as is the custom with preview versions, nowhere near everything works. The scores at the end have nevertheless been worked out as if everything worked, and as if the accompanying materials were something other than a bundle of photocopies missing the map (you get lost in the game's outrageously huge world in less than a moment) and a few pages from the end...

The gist of the thing is classic, i.e. everything goes nicely wrong, the elves come storming into town, and in the end the mayor in desperation sends some utterly inept young lad/lass to fetch reinforcements from the neighbours, and on the side to puzzle out what it is that's got those elves so offended. You're allowed to take a few completely inexperienced pals along, of course, unless you happen to be one of the lucky ones with old Phantasie or Bards Tale save files tucked away.

As you can guess from the compatible games, the combat system is row-oriented, i.e. each character can be in either the killing, charging, defending or fleeing row. Thieves and monks can also sneak all the way round behind the baddies' backs.

Legend of Faerghail has professions aplenty, really enough of them, so for once the player has to make choices. Usually, you see, there just happen, by sheer coincidence, to be exactly as many classes as there are blokes who fit in the gang. This time, though, there are clearly more classes, and you especially can't get as many spellcasters along as you'd like, because in the early stages it takes a fierce amount of steel to keep them alive.

Among the game's well-executed details, let me mention for instance the way a blow that hits a character can damage the armour instead of the person. That, you see, is how it mostly goes in reality; armour protects precisely against the blows that couldn't be parried with sword or shield - but gets damaged in the process. (On the other hand, a blow against good armour can also be very destructive for the weapon - in reality, that is. The samurai, for example, developed some pretty wild cuts that got at the unprotected spots. Who'd knowingly batter their own soul, after all).

Another praiseworthy point is the way the time of day shows in the landscape, i.e. if it's morning, the sun is low in the east and the sky glows red, etc. And as the sun goes down it is of course wise to start looking for shelter. The figures that move about in the nights of fantasy worlds are by no means always illusions conjured up by eyes in the twilight.

Really the only thing that gets criticism is Faerghail's trees, which you just can't squeeze past for love or money. If the trees in Finland's forests were like that, Christmas-tree thieves wouldn't have much hope, nor for that matter would lumberjacks, nor anyone else for that matter, of getting into the forest, I mean. Maddening, in short; a chainsaw absolutely has to be added to the weapon list.

Short and sweet: I can't be bothered to play Bard's Tale/Phantasie-type role-playing games, but I have to admit that Legend of Faerghail really is the best of this type of game.