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"Arise, Midnight!’’ he called as he rode, "Arise the Free! Peril and doom lie at our gates. Waken your valour, arm yourselves with courage! We ride to conquer Doomdark forever! Arise Midnight, arise!"
Extract from the introductory novella to The Lords of Midnight

"From the ruins of blasted Ushgarak I pledge that the Moonprince's triumph be short lived! Shareth my daughter will lure him to her Frozen Empire and to his doom! This I vow for this is...Doomdark's Revenge!"
Tagline of Doomdark's Revenge

The Lords of Midnight is a series of two seminal and one mediocre Strategy Games by Mike Singleton. The first two games were released in the mid 1980s with the third in 1995. A fourth game was in development twice before the project was curtailed by Singleton's death. Interestingly the descriptions of the climate and seasons in the first game bear a passing resemblance to those in A Song of Ice and Fire.

The original game, The Lords of Midnight was released in 1984 on the ZX Spectrum and ported to the Commodore64 and Amstrad CPC. It was highly praised for its innovative combination of a strategic war game and a heroic quest and allowing the player to play either option or both simultaneously. It would later be ported to modern OS's and platforms. Set in the realm of Midnight, the game revolves around "The War of the Solstice" - the Big Bad Doomdark, Witchking of Midnight, unleashes his armies on day of the Winter Solstice, the coldest and darkest day of the year attempting to crush the Free once and for all. Starting with just four characters - Luxor the Moonprince, his son Morkin the Free, Corleth the Fey and Rorthron the Wise you attempt to recruit sufficient forces to stop his armies and go on the offensive, capture and destroy his Artifact of Doom the Ice Crown and finally raze his home citadel to the ground.

The sequel, Doomdark's Revenge was released in 1985 and increased the complexity of the gameplay. This time the plot revolved around Doomdark's daughter, Shareth the Heartstealer, incensed by the death of her father in the first game capturing Morkin and the attempts of Luxor, Rorthron and Morkin's betrothed Tarithel the Fey to rescue him and defeat Shareth.

The third game Lords of Midnight:The Citadel was released on PC in 1995 but is widely considered to be inferior to the first two installments. This time Morkin is attempting to defeat Boroth the Wolfheart and rescue Luxor who has been captured and imprisoned by him.

Work was started on the planned third installment Eye of the Moon after the release of Revenge but the project stalled. It was restarted in 2011 but development ceased with Singleton's death in 2012.

Lots of useful information on the series can be found at Icemark - The Home of Midnight and The Midnight Chronicles where you can also buy updated versions of the first two games for modern devices.

Both Lords of Midnight and Doomdark's Revenge are free on GOG.com.


The series provides examples of the following tropes:

  • Acceptable Breaks from Reality: In feudal systems if someone swears loyalty to you, you automatically also gain the loyalty of their vassals - so if a Duke swears loyalty to you, you (in theory at least) gain the loyalty of all of the Counts, Barons and Knights loyal to him. To avoid making the game too easy or too hard, if you or Shareth recruit a lord with vassals neither of you gain those vassals as loyal lords as well - you still have to recruit them individually (though it's nearly always automatically possible to recruit a lord's former vassals using him). Otherwise the game would be a race to recruit certain key lords, gaining the loyalty of their vassals and consolidating them into groups so no lord could be recruited away from you. Without this limitation, you could gain control of the entire Fey (nineteen lords total) and Giant (twenty-two lords total) factions by recruiting a single lord from each one and the entire Barbarian (sixteen lords total) and Dwarf (twenty lords total) factions with just two lords from each. The Icelords would be harder but you'd still be able to recruit all forty-six lords by recruiting just six key lords.
  • Artifact of Doom: The Ice Crown in the first game. It blankets the land in "Ice Fear", sapping the strength and morale of the Free armies and commanders.
  • Bad Ending: In the first game if Luxor and Morkin are killed or the Free's capital Xajorkith is conquered and Morkin is killed, you lose the game. In the second game if Luxor dies, it's all over.
  • Big Bad: Doomdark in the first game, Shareth in the second and Boroth the Wolfheart in the third.
  • Brainwashed and Crazy: Morkin, courtesy of Shareth, in the second game.
  • Chromosome Casting: The first game has zero female characters.
  • The Computer Is a Cheating Bastard: Downplayed in the second game. Shareth starts with six icelords already loyal to her giving her a slight advantage, but with luck and the right recruitment attempts you can quickly catch up.
  • Empathic Weapon: The Ice Crown is an evil version of this. If Doomdark's armies are capturing Free keeps and citadels, defeating Free armies and generally winning the Ice Fear it generates gets colder sapping the Free's strength and morale even further. Conversely if the player is doing well in battles and capturing forts and citadels himself, the Ice Fear lessens in power. It can also sense the approach of Morkin and redirects more and more Ice Fear at him to try and stop him reaching it not realising he's immune. Do well in battles and get Morkin close enough (or capture the crown with him) and the Ice Fear becomes little more than a slight nuisance. Do badly in the war, fail to get Morkin close enough or get him killed and the Ice Fear can utterly paralyze your lords and armies ability to resist the enemy onslaught.
  • Event-Driven Clock: Each character you control has their own personal clock. The start of each day is dawn, and as the lords move, it cycles through noon then going to dusk. It is used as a justification for move distance, where night time means a lord cannot move further. Because each lord has their own personal clock, there's interesting side effects: move a lord into a forest to encounter a neutral lord before moving said lord's liege into the same location to get a new recruit, or spotting enemy armies and rushing up reinforcements in response.
  • Everyone Calls Him "Barkeep": In the first game most lords have names like this. Most lords have names in the construction "The Lord of <name of location>" or "Lord <name of location>", e.g "The Lord Of Shimeril" or "Lord Blood". Your four starting characters and a few others have personal names. Averted in the second game, all lords aside from Luxor, Rorthron and Shareth have the construction "<personal name> the <race>", e.g "Imorthorn the Fey"
  • Evil Chancellor: Doomdark was originally Gryfallon the Wise, advisor to Lord (later King) Ushgarak. He killed Ushgarak and assumed his throne once Ushgarak had conquered a large amount of Midnight.
  • Evil Is Deathly Cold: Doomdark's powers and the Ice Crown make Midnight much colder and less hospitable than it was in ages past.
  • Evil Overlord: Doomdark in the first game is a very stereotypical example.
  • Failure Is the Only Option: In the second game you can theoretically recruit any neutral lord with the right character except Shareth - she's hardcoded to be unrecruitable for obvious reasons.
  • Failed a Spot Check: Due to engine limitations, in the first game you could only see armies if they were on plains - any other terrain made them invisible until you were right next to them. In the second game you could see the armies banners behind the terrain feature - it was relatively easy to spot them in forests and hills but easy to miss them in mountains making it much more realistic.
  • Gateless Ghetto: Both Midnight (in the first game) and The Icemark (in the second game) are perfectly rectangular lands completely surrounded by (in game) impenetrable icy wastes.
  • Golden Ending: In the second game, if Shareth dies, Morkin is rescued and he plus all three of your starting characters make it back to the starting point alive you win an overwhelming victory. This reveals the "Watchwords of Midnight" on Luxor's Moon Ring.note  At the time of the game's release, the first player to win this way and send in the Watchwords to the publisher won custom miniatures of the main characters from the game.
    "The brave and the free fear no foe. Forth, mighty hosts of Midnight! Unto death or victory we go!"
  • Grim Up North: Doomdark's home citadel of Ushgarak and Shareth's palace are both at the far north of their respective maps.
  • Half-Human Hybrid: Morkin is half human and half fey (the setting's version of elves). This makes him almost completely immune to the Ice Crown's Ice Fear.
  • Heroic Neutral: In the first game, the Utarg of Utarg (a barbarian lord) is initially unrecruitable. If Doomdark's armies encroach enough on his territory and you are doing well enough he gets angry enough to allow you to recruit him and his forces. If you are doing badly it's possible for him to join Doomdark instead. In the second game all lords except your initial three and Shareth plus her initial six loyal Icelords are neutral to start with - both you and Shareth must recruit lords to your banner.
  • In Name Only: The third game. The switch from turn based to real time strategy and completely different feel of the third game meant aside from the mythos it had little in common with the first two games.
  • Insurmountable Waist-Height Fence: Morkin's prison is surrounded by impenetrable icy wastes in the second game - you have to take Tarithel through underground tunnels to get to him.
  • Invulnerable Horses: Averted - both skirmishes and major battles can result in your mounted characters losing their horse. As this cuts your movement in half your priority often becomes finding a wild horse to remount yourself.
  • Keystone Army: Luxor the Moonprince in the first and second games. If he is killed in the first game, you lose control of all other characters except Morkin - you can only regain control of them if Morkin finds Luxor's Moon Ring. If Morkin is killed in the first game, Luxor and the Free's capital citadel of Xajorkith become the final keystone - losing either means game over. If Luxor is killed in the second game, you lose outright. On the evil side of things if you destroy the Ice Crown or conquer Doomdark's home citadel of Ushgarak in the first game you win instantly. On a tactical level if an army commander is killed (either in a Random Encounter or during a battle) his entire army disbands immediately.
  • Killed Offscreen: Due to the way the second game works, it's entirely possible for Shareth to be killed before you even encounter her by a neutral lord.
  • Let's Split Up, Gang!: Not recommended in the second game. The recruitment mechanics mean you can recruit (subject to using one of right characters) any neutral lord who is on their own but the same rule applies to you. Anyone apart from your starting characters can be recruited away from you using the same mechanic by Shareth or another neutral lord so you should always have at least two lords in the same place.
  • Mooks: In the first game, Doomdark's armies are just thousands of warriors or riders. Averted in the second game, even the evil Icelord faction has individual lords with unique characteristics.
  • Multiple Endings: In the second game. Aside from the Bad Ending mentioned above the most basic victory is the rescue of Morkin. The best ending is achievable with the death of Shareth and the safe return of Luxor, Morkin, Tarithel and Rorthron to the starting point.
  • Mutual Kill: It's entirely possible for two lords to kill each other in battle, or be slain be each other's soldiers.
  • Names to Run Away from Really Fast: "Doomdark, Witchking of Midnight" and "Shareth the Heartstealer" are not very nice people at all. Averted by "Lord Blood" in the first game who is one of the Free lords and can be recruited to your cause.
  • North Is Cold, South Is Hot: While it doesn't have any in game effect, the lore of both games describes the southern regions of both realms to be warmer (or at least less cold) than the frigid northern areas.
  • Oh, Crap!: A common strategy in the first game is to grab as many lords and soldiers as you can and rush to the Keep of Blood, right in the middle of a large plain in the middle of the map and face Doomdark's initial armies from this defensive point. This works for a short time, but when you start a day to see the entire north of the plain covered in enemy armies it's time to make a panicked run south to safer locations.
  • One-Man Army: Lords in the first two games can personally slay many enemy soldiers in battle. Some very powerful characters (Rorthron the Wise, Lorgrim the Wise and Farflame the Dragonlord) can wipe out small armies or garrisons in one or two attacks.
  • Orcus on His Throne: Averted. While Doomdark doesn't personally appear in the first game, his armies go on the offensive from the very start of the game. If you don't actually do anything you will lose the game sooner or later. In the second game, Shareth immediately starts trying to recruit lords to her cause from the very start and again if you don't do anything she will eventually find you with a huge horde of lords and armies assuming neither you nor her are killed by a neutral lord first.
  • The Power of Love: The only way to free Morkin in the second game is to approach him with his betrothed Tarithel.
  • Put on a Bus: Corleth the Fey doesn't appear in the second or third games.
  • Random Encounters: In the first and second games you could encounter dangerous creatures such as wolves, trolls and dragons. However you could always see them before you moved into their location allowing you to (usually) opt to go in a different direction and avoid the combat.
  • Real-Time Strategy: The third game much to its detriment.
  • Seeing Through Another's Eyes: The Moon Ring Luxor wears allows him to do this and is the in game reason you can control a huge number of characters in different places - he can see whatever any loyal lord can see and direct their actions. In the first game if Luxor is killed, you lose this ability and can only control Morkin - if Morkin finds the Moon Ring you can regain it.
  • Shoot the Messenger: Shareth the Heartstealer kills the sole surviving member of the Doomguard who managed to reach her palace to inform her of her father's death.
  • Shout-Out: The Moon Ring resembles the ring "Narya" as worn by Gandalf in The Lord of the Rings with similar ability to inspire hope and remove despair from allies though Narya lacks the Moon Ring's powers of vision and command.
  • The Smurfette Principle: The second game has precisely one female character on each side: Tarithel for the good guys, Shareth for the bad guys.
  • Turn-Based Strategy: The first and second games used this. You moved during the day and the enemy moved during the night. Battles were resolved offscreen at the end of each night.
  • Two Lines, No Waiting: The first and second games had this. (Semi) optional in the first game - you could either play the game as a straight wargame, ignoring Morkin's quest to destroy the Ice Crown or as a straight quest, ignoring the war and concentrating on Morkin's quest. However due to the way the Ice Fear worked and the vast number of enemy armies it was much harder to win using a single method. If you played the war only you couldn't rely on the Ice Fear lessening as Morkin got closer and closer to the Ice Crown. note  This makes your armies and commanders much less effective to the point where they may refuse outright to attack enemies due to being too afraid. If you played the quest only, you couldn't rely on friendly armies blocking for Morkin, tying up enemy armies so Morkin can get closer to the Ice Crown without being waylaid by enemy forces. The most effective strategy involves simultaneously getting Morkin to the crown and fighting Doomdark's armies on the ground at the same time. Even if you are aiming for the war victory, capturing the crown then getting Morkin and the crown somewhere safe while you storm Doomdark's fortress is far easier than slogging through the full power of the Ice Fear. Averted in the second game - Luxor will get killed by either Shareth or a neutral lord if you just tuck him out of the way and try to rescue Morkin only - the rescue takes far too long. Since you cannot achieve any level of victory without either rescuing Morkin or if he is killed, killing Shareth you are forced to play both lines simultaneously.note 
  • The Unfought: Doomdark does not personally appear in the first game, only his armies. Averted in the second game as Shareth personally leads her forces against Luxor.
  • Video Game Remake: The first two games have been updated and re-released for modern devices and operating systems.
  • Weather Manipulation: Shareth has this power in the second game. In the background novella she's capable of raising storms. In game she can send cold mists ahead of her armies - these slow her enemies and drain their morale and energy, similar to her father's Ice Fear in the first game.
  • You Killed My Father: Shareth's obstensible motive for revenge, but played with in that she's angry that Luxor killed him before she could get around to it herself.

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