Sacrifice (computer game)
| Sacrifice | |||
|---|---|---|---|
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| Studio | Shiny entertainment | ||
| Publisher | Interplay entertainment | ||
| Erstveröffent- lichung |
Windows: November 5, 2000 November 24, 2000  |
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| platform | Windows , Mac OS | ||
| genre | Real time strategy game | ||
| Game mode | Single player , multiplayer | ||
| system advantages preconditions |
PC : 300 MHz, 64 MB RAM, 500 MB hard disk space, DirectX compatible graphics card | ||
| Age rating |
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Sacrifice ( English for "victim") is a real-time strategy game by Shiny , which was released in late 2000. The player controls a wizard who summons creatures and leads them into battle against other wizards.
Gameplay
Each mission takes place on an island that limits the action area. Every wizard has his own altar. From there he sets out to find mana wells and to get them into his possession by building manaliths. In conjunction with special mana creatures, these buildings ensure that the wizard receives new mana, without which he cannot do magic.
As soon as a basic mana supply is ensured, the magician summons combat creatures. Such incantations are only possible when the magician has souls . The number of souls limits how many and what kind of creatures he can summon. In order to strengthen one's own position of power, one strives for more souls.
You can only get new souls from opposing creatures. When a creature dies, its soul is set free. While the "owner" can simply collect them again, as an opponent you have to sacrifice the dead creature on your own altar in order to get to the soul. This essential aspect in the struggle for power gave the game its name.
The creatures are controlled indirectly by commands. Usually you strategically arrange your small army in different formations and order the creatures to follow the wizard. As a rule, sooner or later you come across an opposing magician. The creatures will fight automatically as long as they are not told otherwise. The wizard himself can intervene in the fight with his own magic spells.
In such battles the point is not yet to win the game, but to take souls from the opponent. If a wizard is killed in battle, he can be resurrected from his mana supply. How quickly that happens simply depends on how good the care is. Even as a dead spirit he can still give orders to his creatures, but he cannot do magic and, what is crucial, he cannot take in the souls of his own dead creatures.
A fight often remains in balance for a long time: the souls of killed creatures are taken up again by their respective wizards and used to summon new creatures. But if one side is stronger, a sensible strategy emerges to first kill the opposing wizard, and then kill and sacrifice his creatures as long as he has not yet resurrected.
To finally defeat the enemy, his altar must be desecrated. This also happens through a sacrifice, only on the opposing altar. If a wizard dies in a desecration, he is defeated. So he will do everything possible to interrupt the desecration. It is often not difficult to get secretly to the opposing altar; Carrying out the desecration smoothly is the bigger problem.
history
The single player mode embeds this gameplay in a non-linear story. Told by the magician himself in retrospect, the story begins with the narrator having to flee from his old world and now seeking refuge in a new world. He prays, and the five gods of the new world are all ready to put him in their service:
- Persephone, goddess of life, rules Elysium (capital: Idylliac)
- James, god of the earth, rules over the field (capital: Agothera)
- Stratos, god of the air, rules over Empyrea (capital: Thryhring)
- Pyro, god of fire, rules Pyroborea (capital: Helios)
- Charnel, god of death, rules Stygia (capital: Dys)
The player now has to choose a god. This decision is not final, however, after each episode the magician stands in front of the five gods again and can then follow another. But already in the first mission it becomes clear that there is discord between the gods. In the course of history, a war arises between the gods, in which the magician's decisions inevitably place himself on one side. Which that is is up to the player, and even after one has apparently become a devoted servant of a god, the story offers late options to overflow to the other side.
The god you are serving will teach you new spells on each mission, as well as the ability to summon new, more powerful creatures. Spells and creatures are very different depending on the god.
This design results in a high replayability of the single player mode.
success
Sacrifice received some excellent ratings in the game tests of computer magazines. However, the great praise was not followed by commercial success. The development of a successor was therefore stopped. All support from the game developer Shiny was soon discontinued and the website for the game was taken offline. Nevertheless, there is still a core of loyal players who keep the fan base alive and compete against each other in multiplayer mode.
Web links
- interplay.com - Sacrifice ( Memento from April 4, 2003 in the Internet Archive )