Spellbreaker is the last in the Enchanter Trilogy by Infocom. It was designed by David Lebling, and was released to the public by Infocom for single player play in the fall of 1985. It followed Enchanter and Sorcerer, which was a disappointing offering compared to this interactive gem. Spellbreaker’s popularity sent it to numerous platforms besides the personal computer, including the Commodore 64, Amiga, and Apple II. It features a cool fantasy theme that gamers have come to expect from the world of Zork.
Spellbreaker takes place, again, in the world of Zork.
Following the progression of the young wizard, Spellbreaker sees the player in charge of the Circle of Enchanters…the most coveted position for powerful wizards. This marks a great accomplishment, given how weak the wizard was in the initial game of the series. Unfortunately, the position comes with drawbacks, especially when things are going wrong in a world reliant on magicks. For reasons that need to be determined, the world’s magicks are beginning to fail, even those cast by high powered wizards like yourself. Sometimes even the simplest spells will fail, and sometimes they will just go horribly, horribly wrong, creating unpredictable and often dangerous outcomes. The user is going to have to find the source of this problem and eradicate it to bring life in Zork
back to normal.
As mentioned above, Spellbreaker is a very difficult game, rated as an expert level game by Infocom. There are many puzzles to solve and many of them have multiple and intricate solutions. Despite the difficulty of solving puzzles, the game is very logical, and the solutions to the puzzles will make sense, even if it takes a while to find them. However, it is possible to complete most of the game, only to realize that a mistake or omission many hours previous have thwarted any further progress. Spellbreaker is made even more complex by its own plot. With magic failing in the world, sometimes the most logical spell to use to solve a puzzle will simply not work, or will change things completely.
Overall, Spellbreaker is a really fun and complicated game. There are tons of items to find, and the playing field is really large, contributing greatly to the game’s complexity. The Cubes of Foundation will intrigue the user as a new tool, and so will the surreal scenes and puzzles. Spellbreaker will present a great challenge for those logical and patient enough to stick with it.
