Hello, my name is Cislyn, and I'm a Mordor addict. Mordor is one of two computer games
which I return to again and again for good dungeon-exploring fun (the other is
angband). I admit, I have found the
Lamurian High Priestess and The Destroyer of The Deep and killed them both, time and
again. I have pondered the deeper mysteries of dungeon repopulation (how do the monsters
grow back, and why don't the tougher ones just invade the upper levels anyway?). The
Giant King joined me one day and I rejoiced at selling him into slavery. If these
sound like the ravings of a lunatic, you obviously haven't played Mordor - it's one of
those things that has to be experienced to be understood. I'll try to explain a few
things about it anyway, though. I share these few facts on Mordor, what it is and why
it's so damned appealing, with others now in the hopes of bringing the joy of Dejenol to
others. Yes, that's right, I'm seeking to make more addicts...
In short, Mordor is a Windows game written in Visual Basic. Mordor appeals to me for
many reasons.
- It is surprisingly stable.
Mordor doesn't crash. I was able to still play Mordor when the motherboard
in my old computer was going bad, Windows was broken, IE didn't work, and
essentially no other Windows program would run without bringing up a Blue Screen
of Death. Speaking of which...
- Death is not a big deal.
Dying in Mordor is not a problem. When the character you've spent months and
months working on croaks, you have several options open to you - run another character
to rescue the corpse and raise it from the dead, wait for rescue and pay a bit of a fee,
or restore from a backup. Death is not really a thing to fear - it's sort of a fact of
life for lower level characters. I think my character has died twelve times now.
- Mordor is campy.
The sounds and images in Mordor aren't fancy - they're funny. When creatures die
they make little "yulch" type noises. When your character is paralyzed you hear a
strained "oh no!!". Snakes hiss, chests creak open, and when you run into walls you make
a little "oof" sound. It's great!
- Mordor's world is limited, but the creatures and items are not.
After years of playing this game, I still have not encountered every
monster, have not found every item. While all 15 levels of the dungeon have been
thoroughly explored, I still feel like there are new things to find and see. And what's
more, since the data files are highly hack-able, if/when I do see and find all the
nifty creatures and items, more can be added.
- You can become incredibly, stinking rich.
Inflation in the world of Mordor is ridiculous. A brown cloak which offers minimal
armor (obviously... it's just a brown cloak) costs thousands of gold. The
explaination offered for the high prices of items in the help file is essentially
"eh, it's good stuff, isn't it?!". A piece of bubble gum in Mordor (if such a
thing were to be found) would cost you at least 2,000 gold. The good news is that
selling stuff generates huuuuuge amounts of profit. Getting less than a few thousand
gold from any creature you kill is a reasonable cause for outrage. After a few forays
into the dungeon, you'll be a multi-millionaire. Once you've gained level 150 or so in a
couple of guilds, it's reasonable to expect to be a billionaire.
Sold on the idea yet? Nah, I didn't think so. Mordor isn't for everyone - if you demand
a plot and want super nifty graphics and a soundtrack that could hit the pop charts and
go all the way to the top, this isn't the game for you. If you want a game that Windows
won't hate, that is addictive and yet simplistic, I'd say try it out. You can download a
shareware version or order the game (if you decide to just take my word for it that
it's incredibly cool)
here