Monsters & Magic was developed and published by Prickly Pear Software in 1983. It was released for the Commodore 64, TRS-80 Color Computer, and Dragon 32/64. I played the Commodore 64 version using an emulator and it took me roughly 2 hours to beat the game. It definitely sports some amazing fantasy cover art; some of the best I’ve seen in this young era.
In Monsters & Magic you have to enter a dungeon with the purpose of destroying the evil Dungeon Lord. In order to face the dreaded Dungeon Lord you have to face the other denizens of the dungeon first. An interesting twist is you get to specify how many monsters there are in the dungeon ranging from 1 to 50. Once the requisite number of monsters have been faced then you are immediately thrust into a showdown with the Dungeon Lord. Thus if it is a shorter game that you’re after then merely choose a low number of monsters to face. I felt guilty thinking about choosing only 1 to 3 monsters but I’m not a fan of self-immolation either so I decided to choose 10.
Character creation is a rather simple affair. You do not get to choose a class type and the game rolls between 6 and 18 for standard Dungeons & Dragons game attributes. You can choose to hit R on the keyboard to reroll the stats if you’re not happy with the results. Once satisfied you then choose a name for your character, random hit points are assigned between 1 and 16, random gold is bestowed, and then you can purchase armor and weapons. I had enough gold to purchase chainmail, a shield, a helmet, and a sword. Character creation now complete you can start on your quest to defeat the Dungeon Lord.
Once you enter the dungeon, everything is randomly generated and then inserted into your room description.
In the example above your location is randomly determined. Whether it be a chapel, a narrow passage, a high gate, or a monster lair; the room descriptor is randomly determined and then inserted.
Then there is a random description that is generated and inserted. In the above example the random descriptor is: the floor is cracked. There are many other descriptors such as: Sees a large jar, or There is hot food on the table.
The rooms that you traverse may or may not have a monster in them depending on how many monsters you selected to populate your dungeon. A Black Pudding, Ogre, Hill Giant, and Hobgoblin were some of the monsters that I faced. When combat ensues you and your adversary roll a 1d6 for initiative to see who goes first. Then each of you take turns rolling a 1d20 to see if you hit. If you do hit then you roll for damage based on the weapon type that you are using. Some of the more powerful monsters get multiple attacks on you. Combat was often a lengthy affair. When you defeat your opponent you are awarded with experience points and extra hit points. Experience points allow your character to level up or increase in levels. The higher the level of your character the greater your damage multiplier in combat.
In each room you enter you have the same 8 options to choose from. All of the options depicted above are self-explanatory. The SEARCH option generates random results which can be either good or bad. There seemed to be an equal chance for both; so later in my travels I avoided the search option completely. If the room’s descriptor contains something that can be opened; then you get a second random generation roll with the same probabilities of something good or bad. Sometimes you can find a magic sword or magic armor or even have one of your attributes raised. Or…you may set off a rust trap that destroys all of your weapons and armor, encounter an evil cleric that turns all of your weapons into clay, or see one of your attributes lose points.
Once you have defeated all of the monsters that populate the dungeon you are then thrust into a battle with the evil Dungeon Lord.
The Dungeon Lord is a tough encounter but once you defeat him then you’ve won the game.
Monsters & Magic represented a nice afternoon RPG diversion and will likely be one of the easier role-playing games I’ll play from 1983.
Prickly Pear Software would go on to develop and publish two more role-playing games: the Scepter of Ursea in 1984 and Darkmoor Hold in 1985. I will hopefully, with a good Luck roll and good Constitution roll, be reporting to you on those games in the far future.
Next up on the docket is the Return of Heracles and then hopefully I will have also solved my technical problems getting Escape From Mt. Drash to work for me.
Until next time…