Realms of Arkania: Shadows over Riva

Realms of Arkania Shadows over Riva
Developer(s)	Attic Entertainment Software
Publisher(s)	TopWare Interactive Sir-Tech U.S. Gold
Designer(s)	Fantasy Productions
Series	Realms of Arkania
Platform(s)	PC (MS-DOS)
Release date(s)	DEU December 1996 INT 1997
Genre(s)	Role playing game
Mode(s)	Single player
Rating(s)	ESRB: Teen (T) USK: 12+
Media/distribution	CD
System requirements Intel 80486 CPU, 8 MB RAM, 60 MB HD space, VGA video card, DOS 5.0

Realms of Arkania: Shadows over Riva (German title: Das Schwarze Auge: Schatten über Riva) is a computer role playing game based on the German RPG system Das Schwarze Auge by Attic Entertainment Software. The original German version of the game was released in 1996. Sir-Tech released the English version in 1997.

Development Team

• Guido Henkel - Designer, Music
• Hans-Jürgen Brändle - Designer, Programmer
• Horst Weidle - Designer
• Lothar Ahle - Programmer
• Wolfgang Schulz - Programmer
• Ugurcan Yüce - Cover Artist
• Vadim Pietrzynski - Artist
• Markus Henrich - Artist
• André Taulien - Artist

The Northlands Trilogy and beyond

Realms of Arkania: Blade of Destiny was the first game in the trilogy, it was followed by Realms of Arkania: Star Trail, and Shadows over Riva. As a feature players could save after beating the game, this allowed players to import their characters into any of the sequels. The next game set in the The Dark Eye-universe was Drakensang: The Dark Eye (German: Das Schwarze Auge: Drakensang). However Drakensang is not a continuation of the Northlands Trilogy storyline and it is not possible to import characters saved at the end of Shadows over Riva.

Story

Shadows over Riva picks up where the party left off in Realms of Arkania: Star Trail. After uniting the Dwarves and Elves, the party stops by the harbor city of Riva which currently under siege by the orcish hordes. The city is on edge. The countryside's once lucritive dwarven mine has been decimated and occupied by the Orcs after a string well coordinated attacks. Inside the city for some unknown reason the magistrate refuses to recognize the threat the Orcs pose just outside the city gates. Meanwhile rumors abound of traitors in the slum ridden Hoberkian community and strange corpse disappearances within the city's graveyard, the Field of Boron.

As the party investigates each lead, more questions seem to surface than answers. After penetrating the dwarven mines the deviousness of the traps suggests that the Orcs have somehow become much smarter and more organized than normally possible. No longer are they fragmented tribes warring among themselves. They speak of a single, wise all powerful chieftain with the powers of a wizard. Upon confronting the chieftain deep within the mines he summons a massive demon from the underworld to fight the party. This alone is extremely unusual as orcs have never had the intelligence required to master magic, let alone the skills of one of the most powerful wizards. Since this has not been the only time the party has fought summoned demons, the party manages to kill the demon sending it back to the underworld. Upon killing the orc chieftain, a tiny worm emerges from chieftain's head and flees.

Returning to the city with this new information, the party still finds the city's magistrate apathetic. They befriend the Holberkians when they save one of them from a mob. Far from the traitors they had been painted, it turns out the Hoberkians are faithful friends. Being half Elves and half Orcs they have knowledge of the Orcish hordes, earning the enmity of the city which thinks they are responsible for the Orcish siege of the city. They too have noticed a pronounced change in the Orc's activity, suggesting an outside influence. They reveal a long absent sorcerer living on an island in the swamp who could have been responsible for the changes in the Orcs.

The next day one of the Hoberkians rows the party to the sorcerer's tower. There the party finds numerous experiments and letters all pointing to a person known only as Borborad and his shipment of two worm queens. One queen was delivered but a second was lost enroute when the urn sank with a cargo ship in Riva's harbor from a storm. Research notes further reveal a wealth of information on the worms spawns from the queen. They possessed extreme intelligence and could possess hosts by entering their brains through the nose. They were also linked telepathically to the queen who spawned them and could not be killed unless you killed the queen who resided within a hive which was invincible to attack due to the queen's magical spells.

After returning to Riva the party speaks with the magistrate about their suspicions. Instead of immediate action, the magistrate simply dismisses the group. Within the day they are framed for murder. It is at this time that an underground movement contacts the group and offers them sanctuary as well as the use of an underground tunnel system that surfaces in every temple They are informed of the underground's suspicions that the magistrate is under some unknown influence, possibly a worm spawn. If so, it would explain the framing of the party of murder as they know too much and are a threat to exposing the entire plot.

They are told to rescue a group of wizards from the magistrate's prison island during the night. There they see an attempted worm implantation which the wizard manages to fight off. After the rescue, the wizards inform the group that it was the magistrate who had an expedition to recover the sunken ship items from the harbor. One of the urns, when found was brought to him. Upon opening the urn the worm queen was released and possessed the magistrate and established a hive used its worm spawns to possess various people around the city. What these people see and hear the worm queen sees and hears. The group is told that the one remaining urn in the sunken ship is required to learn more about the queen and a means to defeat them. After obtaining the urn from the merfolk that live in the waters near Riva's harbor the wizards spend a few days studying the queen inside.

When they finally summon the group they give them a shrinking spell that reduces them to worm size allowing them to enter the magically reinforced hive. They fight their way through the hive, pick their way through a confusing maze, and fight off telepathic nightmares sent by the queen. Finally they come face to face with the massive queen and stave of her magic and pincer attacks.

After killing the queen they return to their normal size smashing the hive as they grow, since the magic protecting the hive walls died with the queen. Everywhere across the city the worm spawns are dying and falling out of their hosts. Unfortunately none of them recall them being under their influence. So the group is still wanted fugitives and are forced to escape the city. But they go with the knowledge and satisfaction that they saved everyone from the Orcish invasion. Without the queen's leadership, the Orcish horde fragments back into their warring tribes. Even though they still outnumber the alliance of Elves, Dwarves, and Humans, they are no match for their combined might.

The realms of Arkania are safe once again thanks to group of heroes. But somewhere Borborad rages. His vengeance sworn against all who managed to defeat his plans this time.

Side Story

There is a side quest involving the disappearances of corpses from the city cemetery known as the Field of Boron. The group finds one freshly dug grave to be a fake leading to a shapeshifter's quarters below ground. Upon killing the shapeshifter and its demon summon, there is information indicating the presence of a Felimia, an Elven vampire.

This leads the party to another side quest to investigate the sewers where they run across a massive humanoid rat, the city's rat catcher, and an old slight hag. Upon further wandering through the sewers the group runs into the city's secret underground resistance. There the old hag suddenly displays inhuman powers as she grabs the nearest elf and proceeds to kill him and change into a beautiful elven female sporting vampiric canines.

The group finds out from different citizens that the last time the city caught the Felimia, they imprisoned her in a coffin buried in the Field of Boron. Digging up the coffin the group finds it empty with a hole in its bottom that leads to the shapeshifter's quarters. The Felimia had bypassed the charms place on the cover of the coffin by breaking through the bottom of the coffin.

Later the underground contacts the group and gives the message that the last time they fought the Felimia they used Moonlight and that Moonlight can kill the Felimia. With the help of the underground the group finds the Felimia's liar behind a magic mirror. There they find a magically locked trunk that belonged to the resistance and open it with the password given to them. Inside is a moonlantern, moonstone, a cloak, and magic dagger.

The cloak turns out to be an invisibility cloak that allows the wearer to turn invisible to normal people but also the ability to see the Felimia. At this point the resistance member dons the cloak and sees the invisible Felimia standing right next to them in the room and attacks her with the dagger chasing her into a room of mirrors.

Finally the group kills the Felimia in the room of mirrors when they light the moonstone and place it into the lantern. The beam of the lantern rebounds off several mirrors until it strikes the Felimia who was charging at the group. The moonlight kills the Felimia reducing her to nothing in a brilliant flash of light. With this the underground resistance is forever grateful to your group and later aids you when you are framed for murder.

External links

• Realms of Arkania: Shadows over Riva at MobyGames
• Shadows over Riva maps and descriptions
• Realms of Arkania eGroup