Missed Classic 129: Valhalla (1983) - Introduction

 Written by Morpheus Kitami

Its time for a marathon. Today's topic, Eldritch Games, the company behind The Hound of Shadow and Daughter of Serpents. Two horror adventure games that got missed the first time through, and seemingly ones that deserve the title Missed Classic. But an astute reader will have already noticed that this isn't The Hound of Shadow. Like all good stories, it does not start where you think.

Wait, what do you mean Vetinari started up Hound of Shadow? Serves me right for first writing this entry in 2022.

The principal team behind Eldritch Games consists of Chris Elliot, Richard Edwards, Mike Lewis and Carl Cropley. Mr. Elliot did not do anything before Hound of Shadow, at least that I know of. Lewis and Cropley were friends long before, and we'll get to them quickly. Today's title covers a game Richard Edwards had a hand in, the Norse mythology driven Valhalla...which is an adventure game with real-time gameplay. Can't I get a game without some annoying aspect like that?

And this game has combat. Not sure how extensive it is, but that is apparently part of the game. I remember someone once telling me adventure games were generally not violent. I can't help but feel like I've never seen one that was about non-violence...uh..Leisure Suit Larry...?

Valhalla is potentially the greatest game you have never heard of. Showered with the utmost praise back when it first came out, it even got a mention in a top games of all time list in 1991. Long after any glamour of the game should have worn off. This should mean that the game has something to it. It has quite a team for a 1983 game, even if most of those people never had a hand in a game ever again. (One went onto work with Gang of Five, and did Strangeloop, which I covered on my own blog) The British version of the Sierra title Time Zone? I don't actually know what that means, don't tell me. I may play it some day and I would like to keep my mind fresh for it.

The citation in question is for ACE, their 41st issue, which includes other titles such as, The Hobbit, Adventureland, Wonderland, and The Boggit. The Boggit is a parody title from Delta 4 Interactive, known for The Town With No Name and Psycho Killer, both kind of adventure games? From what I understand, playing those games is sort of like discovering that while you slept, everything in your house has been covered in feces. People liked The Boggit though, and it was made with PAWS, so it can't be that bad.
So...meh to horrendous depending on your opinion, classic, classic, probably good. That doesn't seem too bad a decision...

Valhalla was released on the ZX Spectrum and the C64, and the C64 version locked up on me. So I'm going to be doing something I wouldn't normally do...deep breathes...I'm going to play the ZX Spectrum version. Eh, outside of the incredibly annoying tape sounds that happen each time I start up the game, its not too bad. I've had more trouble with the CPC, ST and early Macs than this. I don't necessarily hate those systems either.

But first, let us talk about Norse mythology itself. Despite the fact that we are well aware of its existence, we are not really aware of what it entails, knowing more of the Marvel Comics characters than of the actual stories. We just know bits, hidden between other stories, somewhat forgotten.

To begin with, the cosmology of Norse Mythology is a little unusual. The world began in the void, which had three places in it already, Niflhelm, the dark world, Helheim, which is Hell, and Muspell, a flaming hot region controlled by Surt. Many rivers flowed between them. One such river turned into ice as it went into the void, but the part of the void it reached was not far from Muspell. Where the two met gradually caused the ice to form and melt, until a "quickening" formed in the drops and a humanoid was born, Ymir, father of the frost giants. And mother, for the frost giants were born in his arm and knee pits.

You might be asking, how did this man eat in the void? Why, a giant cow called Audhumla, who generated four rivers of milk from her udders. What did the cow eat? Why, salty blocks of ice. And funnily enough, as she licked the ice, she revealed a man in the ice, and after three days a man called Buri was freed. His son, how he had a son is not mentioned, married a giant's daughter and sired three sons, Odin, Vili and Ve.

As Ymir is alleged to be very evil, Odin and brothers killed him, and his blood drowned every frost giant except two, who escaped and would continue their race. Nice job, Odin. With Ymir's corpse, they made Midgard. To inhabit it, they made a man and a woman from trees, with one brother giving them one life, another intelligence and movement and the third form and senses. Finally, they made themselves a heaven, Asgard, to see what was going on in the world. Later they would add in the realm of the dwarves, under the Earth or the realm of the elves, under Asgard. And it's only at this point that you find out this all takes place on a giant ash tree, Yggdrasil.

The gods of Norse mythology are called the Aesir, all children of Odin except Loki. Loki is the human-sized child of a frost giant that Odin adopted because he's a nice guy. Unfortunately for Odin, Loki is evil and spends most of his time screwing animals and monsters that create some great monster which will result in the death of one of the Aesir when Ragnarok comes at the end of days.

Most of the actual stories tend to involve Thor and Loki, runt giant and adopted child of Odin, going around doing brotherly stuff, Thor being stupid and smashing or drinking his way out, Loki trying to be smart and failing. One character I found amusing in all this is Ratatosk, a squirrel gossip who goes to a giant eagle and a giant snake on Yggdrasil and provokes them.

The story of Valhalla, such as it is, is that I am a minor god* eager to enhance his status, so I'm going to go on a quest for 6 Norse Gods to find their lost items. Ofnir, Drapnir, Skornir, Skallr, Felstrong and Grimnir. A key, a ring, a shield, a sword, an axe and a helmet respectively. Some of these I did read about, but others seem...absent. As if they were made up. Or perhaps they were from some bit of mythology I missed. I can only carry one weapon at a time, so I'm going to have to figure something out regarding two of these.
*Looks like my name paid off for once.

The manual is quite dense for a Speccy game, I'm used to these things being a page or so long, but this is an actual manual, not just the inlay of a cassette. If you were unfamiliar with adventure games this would be a decent introduction. Decent outside of the game being hard and weird. You even get a complete verb, character and item list. (Or as complete as they dare give you) Valhalla promises to be utterly unforgiving, because death is an inevitability, for you and everyone else, but because you are a god, you cannot die, you just reappear in Hel. Unfortunately, both food and money is in limited supply and you need both.

Aw, man, look at their noses, this is another anime game!

 And you're not going to be the only one wandering around. Some of the gods of Norse mythology, most of the famous ones, anyway, will be wandering around. And they too, have money and food and need it. Enemies too, allegedly. But all is not lost, for those friendly to me will follow my orders. So I can say something like "Thor kill giant", and Thor will do it if he likes me. This will probably be helpful. (There's a complete verb list too, very helpful, but seemingly limited)

Also, some characters come back to life. That includes me, although I end up coming from from Hell. The manual states that some smart characters will just intentionally do something lethal if they're low on health since resurrection heals and restores your health. Though regardless, at some point I'm sure the game will end up in an unwinnable state. But enough talk, it's time to see how the game plays.

Firstly, here's a video. This isn't going to be the same as this text playthrough, it's more for a general feel of the whole game. Note the oddly smooth animation, how characters move across the screen, the rapidness of hunger's approach, and the general slowness of the game. If it seems like I'm ignoring obvious actions, remember, I have a verb list, that action I'm ignoring I probably can't do at all.

After quite a long wait time, the game begins. I start off in Valheim, next to four people and a monster. As I go to check who Skadi is...probably not the Goddess of Skiing, Loki attacks me by throwing a fireball. I charge after him. I have no weapon, so he kills me. Nice.

I'm now in Hell, Hel's domain. Tyr is here too, he attacks Hel. Reminder, I haven't actually yet done anything. Fortunately, my near and dear friend Tyr beats off Hel. I assume if he didn't attack her she would kill me. A guy named Kon arrives from the west. I try to leave...and I can't. Tyr takes out Kon while I do so, and the mysterious man leaves just as quickly as he arrived. All four exits are blocked, so I'm stuck here. Hel arrives again. Okay, am I locked out or is there some way out of here. Then Tyr fights and then kills Hel. Oh, that's possible? I thought defeat was code for kill. (I didn't realize this until just now)

The only thing I can spot here is a chest, I need a key to open all chests, that's the way it works. I got a ring as I arrived, but that only allows me to travel on ringways, of which the game helpfully tells me there are none here. So...I'm stuck in Hell. I buy an axe off a guy who Tyr fights, named Gripe, even though he later attacks me despite me having bought his axe. It's just an awkward turn around, people fight, sometimes die or go away, and then come back with little reason to it.

I go off to get more water...uh...I mean mead, a manly drink for manly men which doesn't taste at all like mediocre wine, and find out Hel killed me while I was away. That was really the best case scenario. This leads me to another part of Hell, which has a way out. Now I'm in Midgard. How I'll get back to Asgard is another guess.

Wandering around some, I find myself in front of a castle, not that I can go into it. Or further east on the road. Where you can go is a mystery until you type in one of the four cardinal directions, there is no disguised exits, just one of those four at most. Anyway, I fight a giant named Krank and get killed, because of course I do.

What follows is a comical series of deaths on my part. I go out of Hell to fight Kon again, despite having been in Hell, I die, but I always come back. Sometimes I get stuck in Hel and Tyr's eternal fight and fight Hel for a moment, dying of course. I break the cycle by attacking someone else, but I don't really get anything out of the guy I defeated. So, I'm stopping here. A few observations before you start guessing the score though.

This game is really weird on a fundamental level. Like on a gameplay level it's alien to most adventure games. I wouldn't have noticed this if I didn't spend 30 minutes screwing around in the FM Towns version of Ultima I, but the game plays very much like Ultima wearing an adventure game's skin. I'm surprised you don't get a "ztats" option. (Pressing z reveals your stats in Ultima, in case you didn't know) Certain actions, like the jump function, which is basically teleportation, make this clear.

Characters seem to move little off-screen, which is good, so mostly they just attack the player when they're on the same screen as the player. Unfortunately, they start in the rooms the player is most likely to be in. They seem to be well thought out, but that's just my first impression.

Finally, the parser is very well-designed. For what it lacks in number of actions, it more than makes up for in quality. Pretty sure this is the best parser I've ever seen. If you misspell something it even has a form of autocorrect, and if it doesn't know what you mean it allows you to retype it without taking an action. Or at least if you can put the new action in before time advances. I simply haven't seen a better system.

Here's another little game for this title alone. You might be aware that a lot of musicians have named a song after this place, because why wouldn't you make a song about a place where warriors go to drink before a great, world-ending battle? At least, I've heard a lot of songs about it. Guess which one ol' Morpheus thinks is the best and win yourself 10 CAPs. Or just pick out one you've heard you think is interesting.

This Session: 1 hour

Note Regarding Spoilers and Companion Assist Points: There's a set of rules regarding spoilers and companion assist points. Please read it here before making any comments that could be considered a spoiler in any way. The short of it is that no CAPs will be given for hints or spoilers given in advance of me requiring one. As this is an introduction post, it's an opportunity for readers to bet 10 CAPs (only if they already have them) that I won't be able to solve a puzzle without putting in an official Request for Assistance: remember to use ROT13 for betting. If you get it right, you will be rewarded with 20 CAPs in return. It's also your chance to predict what the final rating will be for the game. Voters can predict whatever score they want, regardless of whether someone else has already chosen it. All correct (or nearest) votes will go into a draw.