Archon: The Light and the Dark is a computer game developed by Free Fall Associates and distributed by Electronic Arts. It was originally developed for Atari 8-bit computers in 1983, but was later ported to several other systems of the day, including the Apple II, Commodore 64, Amstrad CPC, ZX Spectrum, Amiga, IBM PC, Apple Macintosh, PC-88, and NES. It was designed by Paul Reiche III and Jon Freeman and programmed by Freeman's wife, Anne Westfall. Reiche also produced the artwork for the game.

Inspiration

The game was inspired by three sources. One was a Conan chess game set. The next was a real-life chess game, with players fighting for spaces, presented by the Society for Creative Anachronism. The third was the combat chess-like game played by Chewbacca and R2-D2 as seen in Star Wars.[1]

Description

On the surface, Archon appears similar to chess, but there are a number of significant changes.

While the board is similar to a chessboard, and the various pieces are similarly designed to have various offsetting abilities, when one piece attempts to take another, the removal of the targeted piece is not automatic. Instead, the two pieces are placed into a full-screen 'combat arena' and must battle (action-style, with the players running the pieces) to determine who takes the square.

Combat

Generally (but not always) in combat, a stronger piece will defeat a weaker piece in either defending or capturing a square. It is also possible for the fight to result in a double-kill, in which both pieces are eliminated. This uncertainty adds a level of complexity into the game, since it is not always possible to predict if taking a square will be successful.
Screenshot of Archon on the Commodore 64

Different pieces have different abilities in the combat phase. These include movement, lifespan, and weapon damage & attributes. The weapons vary by range, speed, rate-of-fire, and power. For example, the pawn (represented by knights on the 'light' side and goblins on the 'dark' side) attacks quickly, but has very little strength; its weapon, a sword or club, has limited reach and power. A dragon is considerably stronger and can attack from a distance, while a golem moves slowly and fires a slow but powerful boulder.

Some pieces have special abilities. The Phoenix can turn into a ball of fire, both damaging the enemy and shielding itself from enemy attacks. The shapeshifter assumes the shape and abilities of whatever piece it is up against. MikroBitti magazine once noted that the Phoenix and the shapeshifter facing each other usually end up as the most boring battle in the entire game - as both combatants' capabilities are simultaneously offensive and defensive, they tend to use it whenever they meet each other, and thus both rarely get damaged.

Light/Dark Cycle

Each character's strength is also affected by the color of the square on which the combat occurs and by a light-and-dark cycle on the variable squares, indicated by the changing color of the board. The light side is stronger on the white squares and during the light cycle, and the dark side is stronger on the dark squares and during the dark cycle. Characters have more hit points and do more damage when on like colored squares, and have fewer hit points and do less damage on opposite colored squares.
[edit] Spellcasting

Each side also has a spellcaster piece (the Sorceress for the dark side, the Wizard for the light side) that can cast seven different spells; each spell may be used only once per game by each spellcaster. The spells are:

* Teleport - teleports one of your pieces to any square.
* Heal - fully heals one piece.
* Shift Time - reverses the light/dark cycle.
* Exchange - swaps the board locations of any two pieces.
* Summon Elemental - summons one of four elementals randomly to a chosen square to battle an enemy piece -- the elemental disappears after the battle.
* Revive - returns one of your defeated pieces to the board.
* Imprison - prevents the target piece from moving until the light/dark cycle returns to its color.

Power Points

The spells may not be cast on pieces currently sitting on one of the five power points, which are located at the center of the board and the center of each of the four sides. That is to say, power points are proof against magic. The spellcaster of each side initially occupies a power point.

Endgame

The game is usually won when either one side destroys all the opposing pieces or one of the sides is able to occupy all of the five power points. More rarely, a side may also win by Imprisoning its opponent's last remaining piece. If each side has but a single piece, and the two pieces destroy each other in a double-kill, then the game ends in a tie.