Stonekeep

Pros: The interface and controls are surprisingly user friendly. WASD! Fully voiced by professional actors, a rarity in 1995! Great audio design, with atmospheric use of sound effects and music (open SETUP.EXE in DOSBox to change the music to Roland Sound Canvas for higher quality!). Charming FMV based graphics. Has a fun story with memorable characters (read the included novella, Thera Awakening, for added immersion). Creative rune-based magic system. Rewarding progression. The automap is handy and can be annotated to your heart’s content… …In fact, the entire journal system is great, as you can write down your own notes alongside clues the game keeps track of for you. Infinite inventory space… Cons: …but the inventory system is a mess, as everything is placed in one long list. Pro tip: to scroll faster, use the right mouse button, and to scroll even faster, use Page Up/Down on the keyboard. Somewhat shallow stat system. Thanks to a very limited tileset, there’s not much visual variety in the environments. Expect to see the same wall textures for hours at a time. Lots of backtracking, especially early on. No strafing means scanning walls for secrets is a slow and tedious process. Some of the puzzles are too obtuse for their own good. Possible to soft-lock yourself into an unwinnable state. Save often and in multiple slots, and back them up just in case! I learned this lesson the hard way… Overall: Realistically I would rate Stonekeep somewhere around a 3.5/5. It’s fun, has good ideas and great presentation, but is let down by a few irritating flaws. But in the end its charm won me over, and the game’s playability and atmosphere made it undeniably addictive, bumping it up to a 4/5. There are certainly better examples of the genre out there, but Stonekeep is a solid dungeon crawler all around, and worth your time if you can forgive its shortcomings. An easy recommendation for both novice and experienced dungeon crawler fans.

I played Stonekeep when it first came out and loved it so much I played it back to back 3 times. Now, 17 years later, I picked it up again on GOG and, yes, it's just as addictive as ever. Sure, the graphics are pixely (how on earth did they seem that good way back when??) and the gameplay requires a LOT of walking backwards and forwards, but ignore those two minor things and this is still one of the best games ever made. I can see, in 30 years time, still picking up Stonekeep now and again for a quick whirl around the dungeons. And, let me tell you, those spiders and other creepy crawlies might be nothing but lots of big pixels, but they still creep me out! Buy this if you haven't already. Awesome game.

This is quite simply one of the greatest western RPG's ever created. A wonderfull balance with a huge amount of game hours, but i have an important question! Is this version patched??? When originaly released this game was full of bugs, most notably one that actualy stopped you progressing that far into it! So to those who have downloaded this version, have you made it past the mine with the chained up dragon, i think its the bit where you use a globe to enter the spirit/fairy world? If this getts a posotive response then get this game now!!! if negative, avoid like the plauge... its less than half the game!

Why did I rate this game at five stars? Well, it's not because of the storyline, that's actually one of the worst aspects of the game. It's not because of the voice acting, that's probably the second worst aspect of the game, nay, the greatest part of this game is the sheer amount of items that you can collect and equip yourself with. I always found games in the Elder Scrolls series apealing because of the loot collecting factor, and yes, there was quite a bit to collect in those nonlinear advententures. This game, however, allows you to carry how much youy want, for however long you want. I remember a point in the game where I was carrying 100 Sharga swords! I didn't even remember picking them all up. The combat is also top notch. While primitive by modern standards, I find it challenging and refreshing, and I don't understand why the style wasn't utilized in more games. Simply equip the weapon you want to use and click the area of the screen you want to attack the weapon with. You can also throw almost any item in the game at an enemy. I recall in desperation tossing a key at a snake, and killing said snake with the key. There are other throwing weapon alternatives, of course. You can still use the daggers you find at the begginning of the game with great effectiveness whilst throwing them at Throgs. As for the graphics, they are similar to Doom and the earlier Mortal Kombat games in that they have heavy use of live action photos rotoscoped into the game. A more accurate comparison would be that of the graphics for Harvester (a game I wish was on GOG's list). So what are you waiting for? Get the heads of three men long dead for Wahooka already and buy the damn game!

Stonekeep is an interesting game... not quite like any other RPG I've played. In many ways it feels like an RPG mixed with an adventure game. There are all sorts of random objects to find, some weird creatures to meet and talk to as well as ones to fight, your character and his companions are pre-made, and there are some really tough puzzles to solve at some points. The RPG parts of the game come from the dungeon exploration, which works similarly to the early Might and Magic games where you move one square at a time and turn in 90-degree intervals, but combat is real-time, and you can move around while frantically stabbing at enemies. There's no leveling up, instead you just practice different weapon (and other) skills and they improve. It's pretty fun, although there isn't as much equipment to find as I would have liked, and I though it got a tad boring in the middle of the game. Also, the characters and acting are quite cheesy, especially at a certain stage in the game, so players should be ready for a tongue-in-cheek experience. If this strange mix sounds like it could be your thing, definitely take a look. There's quite a bit of content here for $5.99.