Fan ofTwo Point Hospital? The name Bullfrog Productions is one that is starting to slip away through the sands of time now, but the former British developer has a proud legacy of fantastic strategy and sim titles behind it.We’ve all heard of the likes of Theme Hospital and Populous (those of us who are as old as I am), but their greatest effort, in my eyes, was Dungeon Keeper.
In this 1997 RTS, players battle not to defend the world from an invasion of horrific dark creatures, but to lead that invasion,to be the baddie. You’ll order your minions to dig out your dungeon block by block, craft the rooms you’ll need to house, feed, and train your hordes to level them up, then summon them to you through portals.
Playing as asan anime-level villainis just too much fun.
You need to create the rooms first, you understand. These creatures (beyond the basic Imps) have specific requirements and typically won’t lift a lumpen, warty finger for you if you only have a little tunneled-out earth to your name. Underworld horrors they may be, but they have standards.
The life of a Dungeon Keeper isn’t an easy one. At the end of each stage, a powerful knight dubbed the Lord of the Land must be defeated to proceed. They’ll usually be accompanied by a range of fantasy trope enemies, from giants and fairies to archers and thieves, who will serve as your standard enemies throughout the levels.
The thing I enjoyed the most about the original game was the way it ramped up steadily. In the early stages of a campaign, you’d have some basic flies, beetles, and spiders to command, with your ranks gradually growing as the game went on.You don’t fight the main villainbecause, well, it’s you.
Soon, you had dragons, spell-flinging warlocks, and even the likes of the horrific flatulence monster that is the Bile Demon.The latter is an iconic red blob of a creature design if ever there was one, and the sort of thing that H.P. Lovecraft couldn’t have even dreamed up after a late-night cheese binge.
Similarly, warlocks are specialized researchers and Bile Demons and trolls craft doors and traps in your workshop. You’ll advance from simple spells to speed up your minions and basic wooded doors to an enormous roster of deadly offensive and supportive tools.It’s enough to make you change your perspective on what villainy really is.
These are all the things I continue to love about Dungeon Keeper, and its sequel, which arrived in 1999, expanded on that with an array of new creatures (the formidable Dark Angel being my favorite) and mechanics. Dungeon Keeper 2 offered a more varied campaign and a sandbox mode,but the most exciting part of the package was the trailer for Dungeon Keeper 3.
It was the briefest of teaser trailers, consisting of little more than dramatic close-ups of the formidable Horned Reaper, but it was enough. I was thrilled to think that another Dungeon Keeper was on the way, a bigger and even more ambitious entry.
I was just getting to grips with Dark Elves and Dark Angels, and perfecting the hilarious art of dropping hordes of singularly-weak goblins onto enemies and watching the resultant chaos.What could possibly await in the next game?
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The War For The Overworld That Never Was
Tragically, though, it wasn’t to be. The third instalment was canceled. A December 2024Epic Games Storeinterview quotes Nick Goldsworthy, Dungeon Keeper 2 lead producer, as saying:
“One of the big design questions was whether we could take the autonomous mechanics of the Imps and apply them to things like building castle battlements or interacting with forests, woodland, or burrows … EA decided to shift resources to bigger productions, like theHarry Pottergames, and many team members were reassigned.”
The more I learn about the game that could have been, the sadder I feel. A huge war between good and evil, spilling out onto the surface world? Potential castle-building? The scope of it all (by early 2000s standards) could have been immense.
I picture it all looking something like a battle from the Lord of the Rings movies.
The Dungeon Keeper name has only really reared its head again since in the shape of a mobile game, and it was one that, well, didn’t fare brilliantly.We’ve had similar experiences since, but nothing that has come close to the series I so adored.
I still return to the game every so often, and do all my favorite things within it.
I delete bridge squares and leave the confused enemy AI trapped among lava.
I wince at those awful torture animations as I slowly convert enemy forces to my cause.
I watch my spider wander around the outside of my prison, firing its freeze spell at the Heroes inside just to be a jerk.
I use the possession spell, take control of the Horned Reaper, and smash the opponent’s Dungeon Heart (which causes instant defeat if attacked enough) while easily absorbing damage from their whole force.
Most importantly, I always place boulder traps around Hero Gates, so that enemies are crushed instantly on spawning in (picture the Raiders of the Lost Ark boulder, only Indy doesn’t get away from it).
For all of these reasons, and so many more, it remains a travesty that there was no Dungeon Keeper 3. We probably had anall-timer RTSslip out of reach there.
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