The Bard's Tale
1985 · RPG · Apple II / Multiple
Overview
The Bard's Tale (1985) is Interplay's dungeon-crawling RPG set in Skara Brae, frozen under Mangar the Dark's Eternal Winter, and reportedly the best-selling computer RPG of the 1980s.
Deep Dive
The town of Skara Brae lies under Mangar the Dark's spell of Eternal Winter, overrun by monsters. The player builds a party of up to six characters from several classes and explores in first person, while fights are turn-based and described in text. Bards play songs that act as long-lasting spells, and most versions have the player cast spells by typing four-letter codes from the manual. Some versions let players import characters from Wizardry and Ultima III.
Developer Story
Michael Cranford designed the game at Interplay, and Electronic Arts released it for the Apple II and Commodore 64 in December 1985. It sold a reported 407,000 copies, and sequels followed in 1986 and 1988.
Did You Know?
- It was originally going to be called Shadow Snare.
- Zzap!64 gave the Commodore 64 version 94% and a Sizzler award.
Sources & further reading
- The Bard's Tale (1985 video game) — Wikipedia
