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Moonstone: Videogame or Board Game?

Ask most people to describe Moonstone: A Hard Days Knight and they’ll probably call it an action RPG.

They’re not entirely wrong.

The game contains gold, weapons, armour monsters, cities, experience points, quests… all the classic ingredients are there. Yet after more than two decades of chatting with Moonstone creator Rob Anderson, it’s clear the game’s true roots lie somewhere else entirely.

Moonstone isn’t really an RPG in the traditional videogaming sense. At its heart, it’s a fantasy board game brought to life through a videogame.

Everyone Remembers The Combat

Mention Moonstone to most players and they’ll immediately recall the red dragon, being dragged into the boggy depths by mudmen, hacking a trogg in two, backstabbing their pals in multiplayer, all that gore… and rightly so.

Moonstone’s combat remains one of the most distinctive and memorable systems seen on the Amiga. But that’s (literally) only half the game. The other half is what happens between the battles.

But what about the Map?

Before every knightly duel; before every dragon encounter; before every mudman ambush…

Players spent their time on the world map. Travelling, planning, exploring, consolidating, making decisions, taking risks, competing. Moonstone constantly asks:

“What will you do next?”

And that’s where its hardcore tabletop roots begin to reveal themselves.

Moonstone’s map is one of the most exciting clusters of pixels ever assembled. It ignited players’ imaginations.

Most players view Moonstone’s world screen as a videogame map, but in reality it behaves much more like a game board. Players:

  • Take turns
  • Choose destinations
  • Manage resources
  • Evaluate risks
  • Compete against rivals

The map is not simply connecting battles; rather, it’s the lifeblood of the game. Combat is the dramatic consequence of decisions made on the strategic layer; the board game layer is what gives Moonstone its enduring uniqueness.

Dungeons & Dragons: The Dungeon Master

When discussing Moonstone’s influences, most people focus on the obvious board-game inspirations. Yet Dungeons & Dragons may actually be the most important influence of all. Both Rob and Todd Prescott repeatedly cite Dungeons & Dragons as a major foundation behind Moonstone’s design. D&D contributed:

  • Monsters
  • Magic items
  • Exploration
  • World-building
  • The idea of player-driven adventures

But perhaps more importantly, it contributed the feeling that the world exists independently of the player.

Many of Moonstone’s systems feel as though a dungeon master is quietly manipulating events behind the scenes, because – in a sense – the game is doing exactly that through a series of odds. The player is constantly confronted with choices:

  • Do I risk another lair?
  • Should I challenge the Dragon?
  • How much should I pay Mythral?
  • Should I return to my home village?
  • What stat do I level up?
  • Dare I visit Math again so soon?

Moonstone doesn’t force a path; it presents opportunities fraught with danger. And then it lets players create their own stories – that’s emergent tabletop design.

The influence Dungeons & Dragons had on *any* early videogame RPG cannot be underestimated.

Talisman: The Journey Is The Game

Of all Moonstone’s inspirations, Talisman may be the easiest to recognise once you know where to look. According to both creators, Games Workshop’s classic fantasy board game played a significant role in shaping Moonstone’s structure. The similarities are remarkable. In Talisman, players:

  • Travel around a fantasy world
  • Collect equipment
  • Encounter monsters
  • Increase their abilities
  • Search for special objects
  • Prepare for a final journey towards the centre of the board

The journey in Talisman effectively becomes the game, a design philosophy which also sits at the heart of Moonstone.

The similarities between Talisman and Moonstone are uncanny. It’s a brilliant adventure and still going strong today – at 5th edition!

Dark Tower: The Missing Link

If Talisman explains Moonstone’s structure, Dark Tower provides its soul.

This is perhaps the most fascinating influence because relatively few modern players know the game. Yet Todd Prescott directly identified Dark Tower as a major influence and even described it as being near-identical to Moonstone in several respects. (It is!) Looking at Dark Tower’s design today, the similarities are extraordinary. Players:

  • Move through kingdoms
  • Gather resources
  • Build strength
  • Collect keys
  • Return to the centre of the board
  • Confront a final challenge

Dark Tower almost feels like a tabletop blueprint for Moonstone’s world map.

Like Talisman, Dark Tower heavily inspired Moonstone as a simple glance confirms. You can download and play a Flash-based version from https://archive.org/details/dark-tower-flash-game

Every Game Creates A Story

This may be Moonstone’s most important inheritance from tabletop gaming.

Players remember…

“The Dragon ate me and stole my last three lives.”

“That terrifying sound when the fifth mudman I didn’t expect dragged me under.”

“I finally found the Moonstone and another knight used their scroll of acquisition to steal it!”

“My back-stabbing mate stole my sword of sharpness, the twat.”

Those aren’t scripted events; they’re emergent stories.

The best board games create these memorable moments through systems and player decisions; Moonstone does exactly the same thing.

Why Nobody Has Quite Recreated It

Looking back today, you could argue that admiring developers pinched the wrong parts of Moonstone. They copied:

  • The gore
  • The monsters
  • The violence

But the real magic was hiding underneath…

  • The turns
  • The map
  • The emergence of the dragon, mid-game
  • The competition between knights, whether AI or human-controlled
  • The resource management
  • The stories

In other words, the board game roots.

Board Yet?

Perhaps the greatest misconception about Moonstone is that it’s an action RPG. In reality, it feels more like three tabletop experiences fused together:

Dungeons & Dragons

For the world, monsters, atmosphere and emergent storytelling.

Talisman

For exploration, progression and the journey toward a central objective.

Dark Tower

For kingdoms, keys, a sprinkling of resource management, and the frantic race toward a final confrontation.

Wrapped around all of this was some of the most memorable combat seen on the Amiga.

The gore may be what most players remember, but – in this writer’s opinion – the board game is what made Moonstone special.

And perhaps that’s why, more than thirty-five years later, it still feels unlike anything else.