Archon (Amiga NTSC) - A Playguide and Review - by LemonAmiga.com
40Archon was the first game by Electronic Arts, published in 1985 for almost all home computers and consoles. This is an arcade battle game wrapped up in a chess sim, with hardly any rules, and a great sense of battle. I think this is a classic, so lets boot up an NTSC machine and try it out.
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Production Notes:
Captured: 6th February 2022
Narrated: 15th February 2022
I first discovered this game back in January of 2019, when Lukozer reviewed the C64 version. I'd seen it but never played it, as the format initially seemed complicated. But I loaded up the Amiga version and it played great, if a little on the fast side. So I got used to playing this in PAL mode, so it made the arcade sections a bit easier, and that's why I recommend this in my review. I guess in 2 player mode it is better in NTSC, but the computer was too fast for me most of the time. I also played this on AmigaLive around 2020, where myself and Lorfarius played it for one of his review videos. I'm not even sure it came out?
This was one of the last games to be recorded for the series, although not the very last. The game had been on my list for a few years, and I figured it was a great time to play it, considering I was also finishing up recording footage for the Medieval Banquet series around that time. For this I wanted to warm up, but those two warmups didn't go well, and I lost the game both times. So I figured it might be difficult when I started the recorder for this run; but in fact I made it look easy. Each play is totally different, and you can never predict a certain victory.
You can hear I am beginning to struggle with the narration due to having no lower teeth on one side. I chose not to get used to the false teeth, as they push my front teeth forward and this is not helpful. The audio gremlins have returned again, and this one is very loud in the mix because of that. Hopefully I'll get hold of a new amp soon.
During the edit, I found a Canadian site with the original box art on there. I thought I'd mentioned the fact that Free Fall was based on the founders names in the narration, but it appears I didn't. I didnt mention the creators of the game either! So I put those detail in during a quiet moment.
Danscore:
It isn't often that a video game gets to reinvent the wheel. Chess has been around in Britain since at least the times of King Henry II, but here comes EA - with their very first release - which takes a different angle to the classic board game. Now the game isn't all about who is the strongest on paper, but who is the smartest and fastest. This means even a pawn against pawn has limitless factors, which could decide the outcome. Sometimes the terrain gets in the way, and can even bog the player down if you get too close, or soak up all the players shots, leaving them waiting for the beep before they can attack again. This means each attack must be a calculated shot, sometimes taking damage if it means surviving for another day. And it is a day; because days and nights are represented in semi real time, and this affects the players on the board. Such an idea would be difficult to reproduce on a table-top, but this is where the immediacy of a video game takes over. We've seen games like BattleChess and North and South, which took board game battles to new levels, and the heroes of might and magic series tried to take the dice rolling and movement points approach. But this game came before all of those, and like all of the best ideas, a modern remake would be a huge hit on mobile platforms. I'd give this 9 out of 10. The game play is solid, even without music, or anywhere near great graphics. It reminds me of the Atari Cowboy game where you had to shoot a gunfighter and avoid a wagon. A timeless classic.