In that last paragraph I have, obviously, stacked the deck ludicrously in favour of one particular reading. Given that he is invariably a pompous aristocrat with delusions of grandeur, it makes it very difficult to see why anyone would root for the nominally ‘good’ side in this conflict. Anyway, eventually, you’ll slaughter enough of these low-level rubes to attract the ire of the Lord of the Land himself, a self-important blowhard who serves as the final boss of any given level. Any harm that is being done here is done purely in self defense. Ostensibly, these adventurers are here to end your reign of terror over the land, but the truth that becomes fairly evident as you play is that maintaining a proper evil lair is a full-time job, and frankly, you are providing paid employment, as well as food and lodgings, to a group of willing volunteers. Around this time, at least in the opening levels, the first bands of intrepid adventurers will start to descend into your den of villainy, the gentle rumble of productivity in the soundscape giving way to a cacophony of chaos as your loyal subjects go to war. In fact, sound in general is the one area where Dungeon Keeper most clearly excels, with moody industrial music providing the perfect background atmosphere for the cries and cheers and, yes, fart noises of your busy minions as they spar in the training room or do research in the library.īefore too long, though, you will have built all the rooms available to you, brought in a suitably motley crew of underlings and prepared them for combat, and started to exhaust the limited gold supplies needed to pay for all of this. Past that, the seduction comes in the form of a well-paced set of tutorial levels, which each dole out enough new concepts to keep from becoming stale, while avoiding an information overload from throwing in too much too fast, as well as the basic satisfaction of watching a group of cackling, shrieking imps dig out tunnels and chambers to your specification at the click of a button, the sounds of their pickaxes chipping rhythmically at the rock providing a constant and pleasant feeling that things are being achieved. Every level has a similarly pithy introduction, as well as an epilogue describing the fate of the hamlet in question once you have had your evil way with it, and they are all outstanding. Before you even start playing the first level, you are greeted by the incredible narration of Richard Ridings (known these days as the father of both Freya Ridings and Peppa Pig), voice dripping with disdain, describing the idyllic village of Eversmile upon which you are about to wreak havoc, and how its people are “plagued only by aching facial muscles, and not anthrax as we had hoped”. Don’t think too hard about it, just build a nice big torture room so that you might coerce some hapless would-be heroes to join your legions of the damned.Ĭertainly, it does a good job of making its evil seductive. In the world of Dungeon Keeper, evil is better than good, because evil has more fun.
The game does raise some pretty deep philosophical questions… and then answers them with fart noises. It is hard to approach Dungeon Keeper without having something to say about the nature of evil, and its depictions in video games and the media at large.
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