http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/king-of-dragon-pass/id335545504?mt=8

just grabbed it, so i can't review, but...if you're a Runequest fan, what's not to love?

It is one of the best strategy/roleplaying games ever released, and it has aged phenomenally well.

The $10 tag seems a little steep.   So is it basically an old school text based adventure game at it's heart but then with the strategy layer on top of it?  Also is there any replay value?

$10 is really cheap for it. It is not a throwaway iPhone app. It is a really complex game and (as someone once wrote) one of the few games where you succeed through wisdom, not simply intelligence. In essence:

You play the role of an Orlanthi (pseudo-Celtic) tribal council, and make both strategic and personal decisions. The council members are each individualised characters with variable skills and different personalities, which will be reflected in the advice they give you, and the effectiveness of your tribe (since they will determine how much of your magic you can allocate to war, healing, agriculture and so forth - and magic is really-really important). A Humakt-worshipping member will tend to suggest war as a solution to your problems and always seize an opportunity to fight chaos, while a more peaceful Mother Earth priestess type might prefer diplomacy and a conservative approach. A good lawspeaker will not only get your tribe out of sticky legal situations, but emissaries from all over the land will approach him with gifts to ask his advice in different disputes. The characters advance, but they also grow old (and their portraits change as they do), and sometimes have open or hidden flaws which may affect the course of the game.

The game is divided into seasons. Each season, you can take one or two strategic actions with your tribe and characters - like building a defensive wall, sending out an emissary or explorer, going on a raid against a nearby tribe, engaging in sacrifices to the gods or embarking on Heroquests. There is also a chance for one or more random events. These are complex decisionmaking opportunities, such as:

• A group of refugees approaches your tribe. Do you take them in as thralls and appear like an asshole? Do you adopt them as freemen, potentially arousing the guilt of other tribespeople? Do you shower them with gifts? Do you send them on their way without a bite of food? And what do you do when a year later, the slavers who had owned them turn up in your village?
• A young couple of different social backgrounds is in love (a vice in Orlanthi society). Do you chastise them? Do you annull the marriage? Exile the man? Buy off the relatives?
• A merchant wishes to sell you a bag of thunderstorms. Do you buy his gift? It will be useful in battle, but what if a curious tribesman opens it?

These situations have amazing variety, and a lot of potential resolutions. They feed into each other and sometimes they trigger long feuds (the outcast finds home in a hostile tribe, who use him as a rallying point against you) or bring you unexpected bounty years later (as the outcast returns to your tribe, now a great hero). They are also profusely illustrated with beautiful watercolour paintings. Like, a hundred or more of them. The music is beautiful. The interface is abstract, but easy to use.

And of course, after a while, as the fortunes of the tribe rise so much that you can think about reaching the endgame -- becoming the titular King of Dragon Pass. And yeah, lots of replay value, although not an infinite amount of it.

Really, it is worth every single cent (and I paid way more than $10 for it Way Back Then).

[edit]Everything is better with Youtube[/edit]

Thanks for that.  One more question.

How logical are the actual choices.  By that I mean in traditional text based games often you succeeded through trial and error.  Often you didn't have enough information to act on or the choices seemed ill suited to the question.   So generally you picked something made it a few more steps then died, went back and tried something else.  While that was fun 25 years ago.  Frankly it sucks now.

You said the game relies on wisdom, can I take that to mean that you are given enough information to act on and/or the choices you can choose from feel logical at the time, even if later they may bite you in the ass because, the tribe you sent away later haunts you.  That kind of thing.

Windows/Mac version is $19.95 for a burned CD, or you can download the demo: http://a-sharp.com/buy/

I still haven't tried it but the iPad version does sound like a deal that's too good to pass up, especially with some very long flights coming up.

kryyst: They are not "fail/fail/succeed/fail" kind of context-free choices. Some decisions are better, some are worse, and some can come back and haunt you, but they are non-binary, and the council members always give you their opinions before you make a choice (based on their personalities and experience). Consider it "soft decision-making" - a bit like directing a flow rather than making life or death decisions that can destroy you, if it makes sense.

Wisdom comes from balancing the actions of the tribe in a way that makes you stronger, earns you friends, but doesn't make you a weak-willed fool. Most strategy games are about being an insufferable asshole who never, ever gives ground. KoDP tends to reward behaviour which is considered virtuous in tribal society - i.e. generosity, honour, and a careful balance between tradition and daring. Your end goal after all is not destroying other tribes (the worst you can do to them is harrass them so much they move to a different part of Dragon Pass to get as far from you as they can), but uniting them and becoming their king. Of course, often, making a virtuous choice is hard (like giving of magic and food in times of need, or shielding an unjustly exiled fugitive against a tribe even if it ends a long period of peace), or not entirely straightforward.

One note of caution (which may apply to those who prefer a completely fair simulation): KoDP's AI doesn't really play by the same rules as you do, and it is impossible to actually lose. You can manoeuver yourself into a very dire situation, but there are no loss conditions that result in you getting wiped out (there are a few in the endgame). But it is not a conventional strategy game in most senses - more like its own thing.

So there's this, and then the Traveller game coming out for iOS systems.

Where's the Droid love?

Quote from: Melan;477677KoDP tends to reward behaviour which is considered virtuous in tribal society - i.e. generosity, honour, and a careful balance between tradition and daring.

Important distinction there. This is no D&D-land a.k.a. libertarian Wild West with swords and 20th century assumptions of morality. When you make choices, the world wil react to them in the way an Iron Age society might.

Quote from: Peregrin;477687So there's this, and then the Traveller game coming out for iOS systems.

Where's the Droid love?

The Android platform will start attracting A-list developers when Android users start regularly paying for Apps (which will then kill a selling point of Android [More FREE apps]).

Also when Google fixes the graphics APIs.

Quote from: Melan;477677kryyst: They are not "fail/fail/succeed/fail" kind of context-free choices. Some decisions are better, some are worse, and some can come back and haunt you, but they are non-binary, and the council members always give you their opinions before you make a choice (based on their personalities and experience).

Oh, regarding this... You might be lucky enough to have an advisor on the clan circle who's marked by three dots in the bottom right corner of his portrait. That symbol means that he always offers the best advice, and you should listen to him unconditionally.

Bullshit and nonsense! You should always, always listen to the guy with this symbol:

It represents wisdom and ancient knowledge.

Commie Mutant Traitor!!!

Thanks for the info guys, sounds really good.

Updating just to say that, according to the game´s official blog, they are working right now on a version for the Ipad.

And finally they released the complete soundtrack (man, I wanted this since the pc release ).