Advanced Dungeons & Dragons: Treasure of Tarmin

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Advanced Dungeons & Dragons: Treasure of Tarmin

Advanced Dungeons & Dragons: Treasure of Tarmin is a single-player role-playing game for the Intellivision and Mattel Aquarius. It’s a licensed D&D adventure and the sequel to Cloudy Mountain (1982).

Gameplay
You explore a multi-level dungeon. Each level is a 10-by-10 maze inside a 12-by-12 area with surrounding hallways. Your goal is to defeat the Minotaur who guards the Treasure of Tarmin and claim his treasure chest. Battles are turn-based, but you see the dungeon from a first-person view for a 3D feel. You start with a basic bow, some food, arrows (varies by difficulty), and limited Spiritual and War health. Throughout the maze you can find weapons, armor, magical items, and treasure. Treasure can boost your score, provide potions (blue, pink, or purple in large or small sizes), or a bomb that can hurt your progress and even end the game depending on your strength. Enemies (besides the Minotaur) come in three colors indicating different difficulty levels.

Development and release
The game was written by Tom Loughry in 1981 and published by Mattel in October 1983. It was the second AD&D game for the Intellivision, after Cloudy Mountain, and it also released for the Mattel Aquarius. In 1983, Mattel Electronics commissioned an Atari 2600 version by Synth Corporation to resemble the Intellivision game. It was completed but never released after Mattel closed.

Reception
The German magazine TeleMatch gave it high praise, noting its strong first-person feel, large number of levels, and rewarding monster-defeat scoring, even rating it surprisingly well on their scale. In a retrospective, Ty Johnston of Black Gate called Treasure of Tarmin a game worth playing, full of thrills and fun.