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{{work|wppage=Albion (video game)}}
'''''Albion''''' is a computer role-playing game released by Blue Byte Software in 1995 for the PC. It was originally released in German, then translated to English for the rest of Europe.
The game was technically unimpressive, but featured an imaginative and rich setting combining fantasy and science-fiction elements in an original, if at times slightly confusing way. The story centres around the adventures of Tom Driscoll, a pilot for a [[Mega Corp|multinational corporation vast enough to excavate entire planets]], as he crash lands on one such planet. This world, dubbed "the Nugget" by the corporation and called Albion by its inhabitants, turns out to be full of life and inhabited by an alien sentient species as well as Celtic humans. It's also teeming with literal magic. Tom and his fellow crash-landed Terran Rainer Hofstedt set out to find their spaceship, which surely isn't going to excavate the planet to pieces now that it turns out it's actually full of life... [[Corrupt Corporate Executive|right!?]]
''Albion'' includes a complex back-story and detailed descriptions of the game world. Talking to the right people will reveal much information about topics relevant to the area you're currently in, including their cultures, philosophies, history
The game features an interesting mix of 2D and 3D perspectives: while most indoor and outdoor places are seen from two isometric views, all dungeon crawling has to be done in 3D. Most of these dungeons lack light sources, forcing the party to rely on [[Ten-Second Flashlight|rather short-lived torches]] to get anywhere, making dungeon exploration downright scary. This is done especially well in the very first planetside dungeon: while exploring the [[Noob Cave|decidedly unassuming cellar]] of their host house, the main characters suddenly get stranded in almost total darkness, armed with nothing but daggers and knives, hearing only the growls of resident [[Our Monsters Are Weird|feral kangaroos]] out to get them. You get treated to some [[Survival Horror]] right there, if only for a few minutes
[[I Thought It Meant|Not to be confused with the setting of]] ''[[Fable (
{{tropelist}}
* [[Actually Four Mooks]]
* [[All in
▲* [[Actually Four Mooks]] - Used clearly in the outside maps, not always in dungeons, but also more deceptively in the latter. In a dungeon, you might ''see'' four mooks, but when you fight them, it can turn out each of ''them'' is actually a separate battle with four mooks.
* [[Already Undone for You]]
* [[A God Am I]] / [[Physical God]] - Somewhere in between these, the leader of the Kenget Kamulos can transform into the avatar of Kamulos.▼
* [[
▲* [[All in A Row]] - On the 2-D maps; in 3-D, you just get a first-person viewpoint for everyone at the same time so that you can't see any character, as if they all occupied the same point in space.
▲* [[Already Undone for You]] - Drinno, the dungeon under the druid school on Gratogel. If Bero's already gone through the maze, how come none of those obstacles have been removed or show any sign of tampering?
▲* [[Arc Symbol]] - The eye of the Goddess is a minor example.
▲* [[Battle Theme Music]] - Only one, unfortunately.
* [[Boss in Mook Clothing]]
▲* [[The Big Guy]] - Drirr.
▲* [[Black Mage]] - Khunag.
▲* [[Boss in Mook Clothing]] - Since there are very few actual bosses in the game, some of the tougher monsters are occasionally used as [[Mini Boss|Mini Bosses]] of sorts. Best example are the demon-type enemies, which are often tough, resistant to magic, and cast devastating spells. They're a joke if you have [[One-Hit Kill|the Banish spell]], however.
* [[Character Portrait]]
* [[Climax Boss]]
* [[Competitive Balance]]:▼
** Tom, Siobhan: [[Mighty Glacier]].
* [[Creepy Basement]] - Quite literally in at least two occasions (ie; in the basement of a house), and loosely elsewhere. One young boy laments the flying creatures he has to deal with to get beer for his parents... said creatures are four-foot-long locust-wasp hybrids.▼
** Rainer, {{spoiler|Joe}}: [[Joke Character]]/[[The Load]].
▲* [[Competitive Balance]]
**
**
** {{spoiler|Mellthas}}, {{spoiler|Khunag}}: [[Squishy Wizard]].▼
** {{spoiler|
▲** {{spoiler|Mellthas}}, {{spoiler|Khunag}}: [[Squishy Wizard]]
** In general, Iskai tend to be [[Glass Cannon|Glass Cannons]] and/or [[Fragile Speedster|Fragile Speedsters]], due to their [[Prehensile Tail]] giving them a significant attack boost, but them having a very limited (and usually poor) selection of armour. Humans tend toward [[Stone Wall|the]] [[Mighty Glacier|inverse]].
▲* [[Creepy Basement]]
* [[Cutscene Power to
** The ship's AI specifically refers to this incident later, which it presumably learned from and {{spoiler|beefed up the 'bots}}.
* [[Disability Superpower]]
* [[Disc One Nuke]]
** Unless after selecting the enemy to attack and before starting the attack round, you switch out the ammo with a shield.
** Another example is the spell Frost Avalanche, which can be acquired for free on the first island. This spell freezes every monster and the stronger it is, the longer the freeze lasts and the more damage it does, so if you place all your heroes to the rear row of the combat grid and cast this spell, it is basically impossible for monsters to hurt you. Getting the spell at this point is a bit tricky: you need to leave most combat in the first main quest and solve it to acquire Sira, and then clean up the whole first island for her to reach level 9, but this takes less than 2 hours of real time, and makes the rest of the game very easy.
* [[Durable Deathtrap]]
* [[Eldritch Abomination]] - [[Genius Loci|Argim]], at least physically. He's actually quite friendly, but his body is the whole building he "resides in," a single gigantic living organism, with a green energy blob thing as its core that he can communicate through. (It resembles an iskai trii, a semi-telepathic forehead organ.) Those mouths everyone has a trouble identifying are all his. There's a way to destroy the core, and if you do, the entire building 'dies'.▼
* [[Eldritch Abomination]]:
▲*
** The [[Our Demons Are Different|Fears]] consist of large hands with glowing eyes on the palms. They're called so for a reason.
* [[Eldritch Location]]
* [[Eleventh-Hour Ranger]]
* [[Emotions vs. Stoicism]]
* [[Empty Room Psych]]
* [[Enemy Scan]]
* [[False Innocence Trick]]
* [[Fetch Quest]]
▲* [[A God Am I]]
* [[Green Aesop]]
* [[Guide Dang It]]
** Just in case anyone misses it,
** Some of the secret passages in dungeons are ''really'' difficult to find, as well.
* [[Heroic Sacrifice]]
* [[Hitchhiker Heroes]]
* [[Hollywood Darkness]]
* [[Hollywood Density]]
* [[Hopeless Boss Fight]]
***
* [[Human Aliens]]: {{spoiler|Subverted: they're actually from Earth}}.
▲*** {{spoiler|This troper did it with fireballs (and the snare), not having any idea how Knunag’s worked.}} Takes a lot longer than {{spoiler|50 casts}}, though... No recollection on how I survived it.
* [[
* [[
* [[Intelligent Gerbil]]
* [[Interspecies Romance]]
** It's explicitly stated that
▲* [[Intelligent Gerbil]] - Mostly averted with the Iskai. Sure, their basic premise is "cat people," and there's something about scent glands, but beyond that, their physiology and culture is commendably original.
* [[Kleptomaniac Hero]]
▲* [[Interspecies Romance]] - [[Mindlink Mates|Mellthas and Sira]]. Complete with a [[Psychic Link]]. [[Younger Than They Look|Oh, and she's 12]]. [[Age Is Relative|But that's ok]].
** Some of the drinking cups from the Toronto can actually be sold, giving you a early advantage. There are exactly four of them (two in the diner one in the hall between the dormitory sections and one in the hangar), they are slightly larger than the other cups, and have a purple-greyish tint that only becomes visible after you pick them up.
▲** It's explicitly stated that iskai age at roughly twice the speed of humans - they reach adulthood at 10 and are likely dead before 50 - so Sira is a woman in her prime by the standards of her species.
* [[Let's Play]]
▲* [[Kleptomaniac Hero]] - And how. The game is loaded with all manner of totally useless items that [[Vendor Trash|you can't even sell]]. You can however fill up your inventory with an endless supply of plates, forks, and drinking cups.
* [[Linear Warriors, Quadratic Wizards]]
▲* [[The Lifestream]] - The Iskai idea of afterlife.
* [[Lost Forever]]
▲* [[Let's Play]] - A ''long'' one by [[Kikoskia]], starting [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TNdrSweF30c here], as well as [http://bloggingalbion.blogspot.com this funny blog].
▲* [[Linear Warriors, Quadratic Wizards]] - Even moreso than usual, since even after spells are learnt, they need to be cast a few dozen times before they're more than a waste of SP. [[Magikarp Power|Once you do, though...]]
▲* [[Lost Forever]] - Everything in {{spoiler|the Khamulon}}, since you can't return there after you complete it.
** In addition, {{spoiler|Khunag}} will never rejoin your party if you kick {{spoiler|him}} out after {{spoiler|obtaining the High Knowledge}}.
* [[Magic Versus Science]]
** Also partially the source of conflict between the planet and the colony-ship, {{spoiler|although that's revealed to really be more of a spiritual battle of sorts
* [[Magikarp Power]]: All spells start out kind of weak and need to be practised to get them to really work as advertised. The more powerful the spell is, the more it is like this; the most extreme example is naturally Goddess' Wrath, which simply destroys all opponents when it's finally learnt properly, but is useless for a long time before that.
* [[Mega Corp]]
* [[Mix-and-Match Critters]]
* [[Non-Lethal KO]]
** Except for the first boss, who's nursed back on his feet later. That doesn't mean you don't get to take his equipment though (which includes one of the more decent weapons in the game).
* [[One-Hit Kill]]
** Melthas's Banish Demon/Banish Demons/Demon Exodus (which differ in their range of effect). Only work on supernatural creatures, meaning Fears, Animals, Plagues and Storms, but since these are some of the most serious opponents starting at Gratogel and almost to the end, it's nothing to be sneered at.
** Khunag's Kamulos's Gaze destroys one opponent.
** Harriet's Goddess' Wrath destroys all opponents. Just guess how hard it's to get that working properly.
* [[One-Winged Angel]]
* [[Optional Party Member]]
* [[Our Demons Are Different]]
* [[Our Souls Are Different]]
* [[Planetary Romance]]
* [[Planet Looters]]
* [[Point of No Return]]
* [[Prehensile Tail]]
* [[Proud Warrior Race Guy]]
* [[Rare Candy]]
* [[Religion Is Wrong]]
** Rainer lampshades the irony of Terrans looking down on religion because it's irrational, while Celts diss it as being [[Mind Screw|TOO RATIONAL]].
* [[Sapient Ship]]
* [[Scary Scorpions]]
* [[Science Is Bad]]
▲* [[Science Hero]] - Rainer, at least sort of.
* [[Sequence Breaking]]
* [[The Smart Guy]]
* [[Son of a Whore]]
* [[Stat Grinding]]
* [[Status Buff]]
* [[Stuck Items]]
▲* [[Status Buff]] - Sira has one that increases offense, and Mellthas has one that increases defense.
▲* [[Stuck Items]] - And if you screw up, they're potentially stuck for the entire game. At least they're lightweight. In addition, cursed items can't be unequipped until you uncurse them. They're also permanently destroyed if you do, which can actually be a disadvantage sometimes, since some of them have magical charges or are quite potent as equipment. Fortunately, they also break at least as easily as ordinary items, meaning that a cursed weapon will break soon enough and be automaticaly de-equipped, but ready to be used again if desired once it's repaired.
* [[Take Your Time]]
▲** There is actually some realism in this. Ever seen those big honking industrial robots on TV? Now imagine them coming at you with that Hugh-Jass welder. Mind you, the cleaning robots look about as threatening as oversized Roombas. ([http://www.sluggy.com/comics/archives/daily/040404 Then again...])
▲* [[Take Your Time]] - It doesn't matter how much time you spend on the Toronto, and later in Jirinaar. The ceremony the Sebainah invited you to will always happen two days after your meeting with her. Bero can survive an infinite amount of time in that little room of his, surrounded by demons and predators. The conspiracy in Beloveno won't go anywhere if you don't talk to people about it. {{spoiler|The latter is the most egregious example: it doesn't matter what you do, and how much time you spend doing whatever you like Herras will live, as long as you avoid talking to one person, who just happens to live halfway between Herras, and the guy who first told you about the plot to kill him. If you do stop to have a word with him, you will immediately be notified that Herras was killed because you weren't fast enough to warn him.}}
* [[Time Keeps On Slipping]]
* [[Too Awesome to Use]]
* [[Underground Monkey]]
* [[Unwinnable By Mistake]]
* [[Vendor Trash]]
* [[With This Herring]]
** On the other hand the Dji Kantos, who give you the big quest, don't have that much to offer. However, you do get to meditate on their island to increase your stats with no effort, which is very useful in the long run.
* [[Wutai Theft]]
{{reflist}}
[[Category:Amiga]]
[[Category:Eastern RPG]]
[[Category:German Media]]
[[Category:Albion]]
[[Category:Science Fiction Video Games]]
[[Category:DOS]]
[[Category:GOG.com]]
[[Category:Ubisoft]]
[[Category:Pages with working Wikipedia tabs]]
[[Category:Video Games of the 1990s]]
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