Total Chaos

Infobox VG| title = Total Chaos
developer = Team Chaos
publisher = Aminet
designer = Team Chaos
programmer = James Conwell
engine = The Chaos Engine
released = 2003 ("Total Chaos 5: Battle at the Frontier of Time")
2006 ("Total Chaos 6: The Newbie Edition")
2007 ("Total Chaos 7: Conflict of the Battlemages")
genre = Turn-based strategy/Card/Board
modes = Single player, Multiplayer
platforms = Amiga
media = Internet download
requirements = (2007) 32MB RAM and 128MB HD space
input = Mouse and keyboard

"Total Chaos" is a series of simple turn based strategy game / card game / board games for the Amiga. They were written by James Conwell and a group of developers known as Team Chaos.

"Total Chaos: Battle at the Frontier of Time" was released in 2003 [ [http://hol.abime.net/3861 Total Chaos: Battle at the Frontier of Time - HOL Amiga database ] ] onto Aminet [http://aminet.net/package/game/misc/TotalChaosAGA] .

"Total Chaos: The Newbie Edition" was first released in December, 2006 onto Aminet [ [http://aminet.net/package/game/strat/TotalChaosAGAr6 Aminet - game/strat/TotalChaosAGAr6.lha ] ] .

Gameplay

In "Total Chaos", players take the role of wizards who battle to be the 'last wizard standing' by eliminating all the enemy wizards and any independent monsters. The game allows up to eight players, any of whom can be human or computer controlled, as individuals or as teams.

Computer controlled wizards can be assigned a level of 1 to 9, however this only affects the cards (spells) they are dealt at the start of the game. Computer controlled wizards may be assigned to a human player's team whereby they will cast beneficial spells upon the human controlled wizard and his creations.

Each turn, a player may select and play a card, move and attack with his creatures and wizard, then shoot with any creatures that have ranged attacks. If the "Texas Trash'em" gameplay rule is active then each player must discard one card after selecting one to play.

The game takes place on a 17 x 14 tiled playing field. Creatures move square at a time (with some exceptions) up to their movement value, attacking by moving into an enemy unit. Attacking creatures are not harmed; only the defender takes damage, based attacker's Combat statistic. If the defending creature dies then the attacker moves into its square.

If a wizard is destroyed, all his creations immediately go into a deep coma. If the "Capture Enemy Creatures" option is active, the killer instead captures control of all creations owned by the destroyed wizard; they remain fully awake and are immediately available for movement and combat.

The last team remaining is the winner. Since a wizard is the heart of its team, if one is destroyed its team is taken out of play. The last wizard left with health is essentially the winner.

Spells

At the start of the game, each wizard is dealt a random selection of cards, representing spells. Some cards are rarer than others; some can only be obtained as a bonus spell, acquired by killing powerful monsters, or by meditating inside certain buildings.

Spells chosen in "Total Chaos" will never fail to be cast, although a small number of spells may still fail due to the resistance of the target.

Creature spells

Creature spells summon mundane animals or fantastic monsters that fight for the wizards. With a few exceptions ("vulture" and "aerial servant"), they are summoned adjacent to the wizard.

A creature may have one or more special attributes:
* "Flying" creatures such as bats, dragons, manticores, gryphons and vultures, eagles. Flying creatures can move their full distance in one step, allowing them to bypass intervening objects and creatures; this also allows them to attack from a distance.
* "Undead" creatures such as skeletons, spectres, wraiths and zombies can only be attacked by other undead creatures or by spells and magic weapons. Dead creatures that have been raised with the "raise dead" spell also become undead.
* "Mountable" creatures such as centaurs, horses, unicorns, nightmares and pegasus can be ridden by wizards. Any attack against the wizard and mount combination is directed at the mount, which must be killed before the wizard can be affected.
* "Shooting" creatures have ranged attacks, available after they move. This may represent bows (centaurs and elves), dragons breath, magic bolts (ogre mages) or even cows (Conwell's Cow Catapult). Most shooters require line of sight but some function as artillery.

Some flags are unique to "Total Chaos":
* "Trampling" creatures such as elephants, rhinoceros and rhinosaur can damage enemies adjacent to their target.
* "Scavenging" creatures such as arctic kitty wolves, arctic wolves, dire wolves and vultures are able to replenish their life points by scavenging the bodies of dead monsters.
* "Exophagy" creatures such as vampires can suck the life force out of enemy units during the act of attacking. Thus the exophagy creature's life force increases when attacking.

Other special creature qualities include:
* "Elementals": When an Earth, Air, Fire or Water elemental dies, it leaves behind an earthquake, vortex, fire or flood respectively.
* "Goblin bomb"s death triggers an explosion, dealing damage to all adjacent squares.
* "Hidden horror" looks like a sweet innocent little halfling but upon its death it becomes a ferocious red dragon.
* "Promotable creatures" 'level up' when they accrue enough kills; ogres, for example, can become ogre warriors or ogre assassins.
* "Artifact creatures" inherently belong to whomever has the most adjacent units, thus they can be captured and used in one's own army by obtaining adjacent numerical superiorty. One example is Conwell's Cow Catapult which needs nearby friendly creatures to be operated. Artifact Daleks, Artifact Bolters, Artifact Robots and Artifact Stone Golems are other artifacts creatures.

Creatures have statistics which govern how effective they are at attacking and how much damage they can take, move ratings which control how many squares they can move per turn, maneuver ratings which determine how easily a creature can break off combat and magic resistance for defense against magical assaults. There are numerous other statistics and the computer deals with them transparently so as not to unduly burden the player with numbers.

Object spells

* "Magic Wood" creates eight trees which can be entered by any wizard to receive protection and a bonus spell after a random number of turns.
* "Shadow Wood" creates eight trees which may attack adjacent enemies, and may harm undead opponents.
* "Walls" can be used to block movement and ranged attacks.
* "Dark citadels" and "Magic castles" last for a random number of turns. When a wizard is inside one of these buildings they cannot be attacked until the building is destroyed. They grant bonus spells in the same way that Magic Woods do.

Growth spells

Growth spells, once cast, can never be controlled by anyone. They divide, multiply and die randomly on their own accord such as Gooey Blob and Magic Fire.
* "Green Slime" is similar to Gooey Blob but not so unfriendly.
* "Orange Jelly" is very similar to Green Slime except it has a very high growth rate and much less hitpoints.
* "Fire" and "Flood" spread randomly and attack anything, even their own team.
* "Violet Fungi" has a very slow growth rate unless planted on top of a corpse. It does not cover up monsters the way slimes and jellies and blobs do and does not attack in the way Fire does. Violet Fungi never dies randomly as other growths do, they must instead be killed outright. The Violet Fungi attacks all adjacent enemies at the end of each turn.
* "Earthquake" grows very slowly and is limited to horizontal or vertical growth. When it grows it destroys anything in its path.

Other spells

In addition to summonings, "Total Chaos" includes other spells, such as:
*Offensive spells: examples include "Hand Grenade", an area effect attack; "Magic Bolt", a direct attack requiring line of sight; "Dark Power" and "Justice", may destroy a creatures with weak magic resistance; "Brain Drain" attacks a target's brainpower statistic.
*Wizard spells, which effect only the casting wizard. Examples include "Magic Sword" and "Magic Bow" which improve a wizard's combat rating; "Magic Wings" allows a wizard to fly; various "Shield" spells to protect the wizard from specific kinds of attack; "Reflector" is a counter to incoming shots.
*Defensive spells such as "Armour", "Magic Shield" and "Brain Boost" allows a wizard to protect his creatures.
*Necromancy spells include "Raise dead", which transforms a corpse into an "undead" creature; "Resurrection" transforms a corpse into a living creature.
*Charm spells include "Subversion", which attempts to steal another wizard's creature; "Charm" attempts to charm all objects on the board.
*Micellaneous spells include the extremely rare "Turmoil" which randomizes all creature and object positions; "Bury" removes corpses from play; "Wrath of God" kills all creatures on the board except wizards.

Critical response

The "Total Chaos" games were highlighted in "Retro Gamer" magazine, ["Retro Gamer" volume 2, issue 1; "Creating Chaos"] in which they were described as an updated version of the ZX Spectrum game "Chaos". "Although "Total Chaos" retains the top-down view of the original, it introduces new gameplay additions, additional spells and varied battlefields." Retro Gamer concluded "Shame it's not on the PC, as this is one of the best updates around."

The "Amiga Games Database" review [ [http://www.angusm.demon.co.uk/AGDB/DBM1/TotChao.html Total Chaos - Battle at the frontier of time ] ] of "Total Chaos:" Battle at the Frontier of Time concludes that "Total Chaos is Fun without an end."

"Total Chaos:" Battle at the Edge of Yesteryear achieved a score of 100% in the "Aminet Games Database" [http://de5.aminet.net/docs/rview/TotalChaosAGA-Review.jpg] which, after a lengthy explanation, concluded: "This is the best strategy game ever."

References

External links

* [http://totalchaos-aga.sytes.net/ Total Chaos fanpage] - in Portugal
* [http://xavprods.free.fr/chaos/index.html Total Chaos fanpage] - in France
* [http://aminet.net/package/game/strat/TotalChaosAGAr6 Total Chaos AGA: The Newbie Edition]
* [http://main.aminet.net/docs/rview/totalchaosagav5_review.jpgRetro Gamer Magazine review of Total Chaos]
* [http://www.angusm.demon.co.uk/AGDB/DBM1/TotChao.html Amiga Games Database review of Total Chaos]
* [http://aminet.net/docs/rview/TotalChaosAGA-Review.jpgAminet Games Database review of Total Chaos]