History VideoGame / DarkCastle

* AnachronismStew: Wizards, dragons and [[WesternAnimation/{{Fantasia}} self-pushing brooms]] share the castle with lasers, conveyor belts, and iMacs.

* AnvilOnHead: [[spoiler:One keyring will free you, the other is booby-trapped with a 16-ton weight.]]

* FacelessEye: [[NightmareFuel Huge floating eyeballs that hurl fire or weep acid...]]

** TemporaryPlatform: Ditto.

** ConvectionSchmonvection :...but in ''Color Dark Castle'', the water was replaced with ''lava''.

* AnachronismStew: Wizards, dragons and [[Disney/{{Fantasia}} self-pushing brooms]] share the castle with lasers, conveyor belts, and iMacs.

* CriticalAnnoyance: Your heartbeat becomes audible and accelerates as you near death.

* {{Fireballs}}: Once Merlin gives you the fireball spell, it's a flaming death for the mooks standing in your way.

* GravityIsAHarshMistress: Step off a ledge, and you'll pause to look down before plummeting.
* HedgeMaze: An area introduced in ''Return to Dark Castle''.

* SaveGameLimits: In ''Beyond Dark Castle,'' you can only save from the Computer Room (with its five sets of matched SAVE and RESTORE levers).

* WeaksauceWeakness: Your character can die from ''falling down the stairs''.

A trilogy of {{Platform Game}}s for the AppleMacintosh. The original in particular has been ported to everything from [[UsefulNotes/{{Commodore64}} Commodores]] to Cell Phones.

* EmbeddedPrecursor:''Return to Dark Castle'' consists of three areas which you can visit in any order; two are remastered versions of the original games (and the third is larger than both put together).

* PlotCoupon: The Orbs.

* {{Fireball}}: Once Merlin gives you the fireball spell, it's a flaming death for the mooks standing in your way.

* {{Sequelphobic}}: [=MacUser's=] product index infamously dismissed the first sequel as "more of the same."

* {{Vaporware}}: ''Return to Dark Castle'' was released after ''12 years'' of development.

* AirborneMooks - Bats, vultures, and mosquitoes, among others.
* TheAlcoholic - The Black Knight. He has a conveyor belt of what are clearly mugs of beer set up next to his throne, and chugging them then flinging the empty mug at you is his only form of attack.
* AnachronismStew - Wizards, dragons and [[Disney/{{Fantasia}} self-pushing brooms]] share the castle with lasers, conveyor belts, and iMacs.

* AndThenJohnWasAZombie - [[spoiler:At the end of the second game, after returning to the Scores of Merit screen, Duncan is turned into the new BlackKnight.]]
* AnvilOnHead - [[spoiler:One keyring will free you, the other is booby-trapped with a 16-ton weight.]]
* BlackKnight - The BigBad.
* BookcasePassage - A fireplace, activated by tugging on a wall-mounted torch.
* CartoonBomb - One of the additions in ''Beyond Dark Castle''.
* ClockTower - One of the areas from ''Beyond Dark Castle''. There is another tower you climb in the original, but no clocks to be found.
* ComputerEqualsTapedrive - The mainframe in the Computer Room... although there's a 9" Mac just a few feet away.
* CriticalAnnoyance - Your heartbeat becomes audible and accelerates as you near death.
* DeflectorShields - Subverted; [[spoiler:the Shield power actually makes you briefly immaterial.]]
* DifficultyLevels - Four of them in the original.
* EmbeddedPrecursor - ''Return to Dark Castle'' consists of three areas which you can visit in any order; two are remastered versions of the original games (and the third is larger than both put together).
* EpicFlail - How you get past the Whip Henchman in Trouble III of the original. The sequels let you keep it or any other melee weapon you pick up instead of just dropping it, though you can only keep one melee weapon at a time.
* FacelessEye - [[NightmareFuel Huge floating eyeballs that hurl fire or weep acid...]]
* FunnyBackgroundEvent - "SADDAM WAS HERE"
* GainaxEnding - ''Beyond Dark Castle.'' Cleared up in the next sequel - which came out 19 years later.
* GravityIsAHarshMistress - Step off a ledge, and you'll pause to look down before plummeting.
* HedgeMaze - An area introduced in ''Return to Dark Castle''.
* HolidayMode - Stockings adorn the fireplace, and a Christmas tree supplants a decorative suit of armor.
* HyperactiveMetabolism - In the sequels, health depletes fairly quickly, leaving you only a few minutes in each area before you collapse. The way to restore your health is by picking up small bundles of food scattered around the levels.
* JetPack - More like a ''helicopter'' pack.
* KillItWithFire - Your only weapons are the rocks you throw, but with a powerup, they become fireballs.
* LifeMeter - Takes the place of the level timer starting in ''Beyond Dark Castle''.
* LightningCanDoAnything - [[spoiler:Hold the Shield up to a thundercloud to be imbued with its magic.]]
* TheMaze - Featured in ''Beyond'' and ''Return''.
* MouseHole - Ubiquitous, and complete with cute little brick arches. Disgorge plague-bearing rats.
* NonLethalBottomlessPits - Falling into one from anywhere in the castle will send you to the dungeon to fight your way out.
* NotTheFallThatKillsYou - Oh so averted. Falls in the third game are deadlier than in real life.
* OneHitPointWonder - Duncan, but only in the first game.
* OrcusOnHisThrone - The Black Knight.
* OurGargoylesRock - And are immune to rocks.
* PoisonMushroom - White potions with black labels teleport you. Black potions with white labels kill you. Got that?
* PlotCoupon - The Orbs.

* {{Pun}} - Your quest is, literally, to topple the Black Knight's throne.
* SaveGameLimits - In ''Beyond Dark Castle,'' you can only save from the Computer Room (with its five sets of matched SAVE and RESTORE levers).
* ScoringPoints - Each enemy has a specific point value, and the original has a bonus timer for each level.
* SecretLevel - Only found in ''Return to Dark Castle''. Could also be found in some of the pre-Mac OS X alpha builds by changing certain resource [=IDs=] around.
* {{Sequelphobic}} - [=MacUser's=] product index infamously dismissed the first sequel as "more of the same."
* SequenceBreaking - The infamous UsefulNotes/SegaGenesis port can be won in less than a minute by heading directly towards the Black Knight. While helpful, the Shield and Fireball aren't required to complete the game.
* ShovelStrike - Among the weapons introduced in ''Beyond Dark Castle''.
* SpikesOfDoom - Extend and retract in an automatic cycle.
** TemporaryPlatform - Ditto.
* SuperDrowningSkills - Falling into the water in the "Fireball" levels of the first game will kill you...
** ConvectionSchmonvection - ...but in ''Color Dark Castle'', the water was replaced with ''lava''.
* StaircaseTumble - If you don't climb down stairs correctly, you fall. This includes a single-step staircase.
* ThrowABarrelAtIt - The Brewery Henchman. The Boulder Henchmen from the original are also using this concept, even though they're not using actual barrels.
* TortureCellar - The Trouble area.
* {{Vaporware}} - ''Return to Dark Castle'' was released after ''12 years'' of development.
* VideoGameRemake - ''Color Dark Castle'': A remake of the original with enhanced graphics made to celebrate Delta Tao's acquisition of the series.
* WeaksauceWeakness - Your character can die from ''falling down the stairs''.

* SequenceBreaking - The infamous SegaGenesis port can be won in less than a minute by heading directly towards the Black Knight. While helpful, the Shield and Fireball aren't required to complete the game.

* TheAlcoholic: The Black Knight. He has a conveyor belt of what are clearly mugs of beer set up next to his throne, and chugging them then flinging the empty mug at you is his only form of attack.

* CartoonBomb
* ClockTower

* DifficultyLevels

* EpicFlail

* HedgeMaze

* HyperactiveMetabolism

* TheMaze

* OrcusOnHisThrone: The Black Knight.

* ScoringPoints
* SecretLevel

* ShovelStrike

* ThrowABarrelAtIt - The Brewery Henchman.

A trilogy of {{Platform Game}}s for the AppleMacintosh. The original in particular has been ported to everything from [[{{Commodore64}} Commodores]] to Cell Phones.

* OrcusOnHisThrone: Literraly the Black Knight.

* TheMaze

* AnachronismStew - Wizards, dragons and [[{{Fantasia}} self-pushing brooms]] share the castle with lasers, conveyor belts, and iMacs.

* IncrediblyLamePun - Your quest is, literally, to topple the Black Knight's throne.

* PortingDisaster - The PC-DOS, the SEGA Genesis/Megadrive, and finally the CD-i ports.
** PC-DOS: Because no graphics cards nor sound cards existed when the Macintosh was around, both had to be heavily downgraded to compensate for being inferior. Plus, and strangely, the controls were changed and the rocks could be aimed using the keypad (in case you had no computer mouse).
*** Sega Genesis: The first video game console to have a port of this game, it was heavily criticised with negativity due to washed out graphics, crazy controls because of not having a mouse to aim with seperately and so on, like Bach's Togue in D Minor being the ONLY song in the whole game.
**** CD-i: The whole level can't be displayed, and the controls are once again mangled. Pressing Up+2 for ducking, having to hold down Button 1 to aim the rocks, and re-done sound effects.

A trilogy of {{Platform Game}}s for the AppleMacintosh. The original in particular has been ported to everything from [[{{Commodore64}} Commodores]] to {{Cell Phone}}s.

* FunnyBackgroundEvent: "SADDAM WAS HERE"

* GravityIsAHarshMistress: Step off a ledge, and you'll pause to look down before plummeting.

* OurGargoylesRock

* SequenceBreaking: You can complete the game in less than a minute by heading directly towards the black knight. While helpful, the shield and fireball aren't required to complete the game.

* SuperDrowningSkills - Falling into the water in the "Fireball" levels of the first games will kill you...

* StaircaseTumble: If you don't climb down stairs correctly, you fall. This includes a single-step staircase.
* TemporaryPlatform - Extend and retract in an automatic cycle.

* GravityIsAHarshMistress - Step off a ledge, and you'll pause to look down before plummeting.

A trilogy of platform games for the AppleMacintosh. The original in particular has been ported to everything from [[{{Commodore64}} Commodores]] to {{Cell Phone}}s.

* AnvilOnHead - [[spoiler:One keyring will free you, the other is booby-trapped]] with a 16-ton weight.

* SuperDrowningSkills - Falling into the water in the "Fireball" levels of the first games will kill you . . .
** ConvectionSchmonvection - . . . but in ''Color Dark Castle'', the water was replaced with ''lava''.
* TemporaryPlatform - Ditto.