In a few months it will have been 20 years since the founding of this game company. It was formed in Germany by Erik Simon and Holger Flöttmann and went on to develop and publish games across several genres, primarily for the Atari ST and Commodore Amiga in the early '90s European market. I can't say I like all of their stuff but they did have some gems and great variety so I figured they could use a tribute thread.
The line between developer and publisher is somewhat blurry with Thalion Software. Some of their games are credited to Eclipse Software, another German company. Looking at credits shows that those games share staff with other Thalion games anyway.
Here are the games released by Thalion -
Chambers of Shaolin
Formats: Amiga, C64, CD32, ST
Year: 1989
Chambers of Shaolin set itself apart from most other fighting games at the time by its training mode which had the player do various tasks such as balancing and dodging. Gameplay-wise it was no International Karate but it wasn't a bad start for the developer. Grandslam published this and some other early Thalion games in the UK.
http://www.the-nextlevel.com/hosted/...shaolin_06.png
Warp
Formats: Amiga, ST
Year: 1989
http://www.the-nextlevel.com/hosted/...er/warp_08.png
Wings of Death
Formats: Amiga, ST
Year: 1989
Wings of the Death was their second shooter, an intense vertical scroller with all kinds of unique creatures. Good stuff.
http://www.the-nextlevel.com/hosted/...f_death_06.png
Dragonflight
Formats: Amiga, PC, ST
Year: 1990
Thalion's first RPG was met with fairly good reviews. It was available in German, English, and French.
http://www.the-nextlevel.com/hosted/...nflight_08.png
The Seven Gates of Jambala
Formats: Amiga, CD32, ST
Year: 1989
This was a decent enough platformer developed by TCB (The Care Bears) but I don't think it compared to similar stuff on console at the time.
http://www.the-nextlevel.com/hosted/...jambala_03.png
Enchanted Land
Formats: Amiga, ST
Year: 1990
This game is probably best known for how far the programmers pushed the ST hardware at the time. It had tons of layers of parallax scrolling and transparency effects. It was also made by TCB. Why a developer called The Care Bears would make a game named after a heavy metal song I have no clue but it's a solid platformer with catchy music.
http://www.the-nextlevel.com/hosted/...ted%20land.gif
A Prehistoric Tale
Format: Amiga
Year: 1990
The Lost Boys
This single-screen platformer reminds me of the C64 game Dino Eggs (except Dino Eggs was more exciting).
http://www.the-nextlevel.com/hosted/...rehistoric.gif
Leavin' Teramis
Formats: Amiga, ST
Year: 1990
This wasn't a bad overhead action game but it was soon surpassed by games like Alien Breed.
http://www.the-nextlevel.com/hosted/...%20teramis.gif
Tower Fra
Format: Amiga
Year: 1990
An air traffic controller sim developed by Atlantis.
http://www.the-nextlevel.com/hosted/...wer_fra_07.png
Atomic AKA Atomix
Formats: Amiga, C64, PC, Spectrum, ST
Year: 1990
In this puzzle game, it shows you the type of molecule you need to make and you need to figure out the paths to move them all to the right spots to connect them. It's similar in concept to the old Namco arcade game Phozon except this is more puzzle-y. It's worth checking out.
http://www.the-nextlevel.com/hosted/...r/Atomix_3.png
Magic Lines
Formats: Amiga, ST
Year: 1990
Like Atomix, this was a puzzle game developed by SoftTouch. I don't recall enjoying Magic Lines much. I just remember it being super time constrained/trial-and-error based.
http://www.the-nextlevel.com/hosted/...c_lines_02.png
Tangram
Formats: Amiga, ST
Year: 1991
I like Tangram but it can be a bit frustrating. The object of this Asian themed puzzle game is to place the shapes on the right into the blank shapes on the left. Pieces can be rotated but often it requires really precise aligning.
http://www.the-nextlevel.com/hosted/...tangram_02.png
A320 Airbus
Formats: Amiga, PC, ST
Year: 1991
A flight sim.
http://www.the-nextlevel.com/hosted/..._airbus_04.png
Lethal Xcess
Formats: Amiga, ST
Year 1991
This was the sequel to Wings of Death. It seems most people consider the first game better, and I agree. This one's slower paced but it's still worth playing.
http://www.the-nextlevel.com/hosted/...al%20xcess.gif
Trex Warrior: 22nd Century Gladiator
Formats: 1991
Year: Amiga, ST
This was initially a commercial release in Germany but came free with a magazine in the UK a couple years later. Like some other 3d computer games at the time, it was an evolution of Battlezone yet it was also a sign of the future with its polygon environment, first-person arena shooting. It was a cool game for its time worth mentioning in the history of the FPS and vehicular combat genres. The springboards were a neat touch, too.
http://www.the-nextlevel.com/hosted/...warrior_08.png
Ghost Battle
Formats: Amiga, ST
Year: 1991
I love this game's music but the game itself sucks due to how slow and clunky it plays. The developer, Interactive Design, previously did the puzzle game Charly. I think they were absorbed into Thalion.
http://www.the-nextlevel.com/hosted/..._battle_07.png
Amberstar
Formats: Amiga, PC, ST
Year: 1992
http://www.the-nextlevel.com/hosted/.../amberstar.gif
No Second Prize
Formats: Amiga, ST
Year: 1992
NSP was a motorcycle racer. The polygon environments were among the smoothest in the genre although the mouse-only controls took a bit of adjusting. Still, it was impressive stuff for the time.
http://www.the-nextlevel.com/hosted/...d_prize_03.png
Neuronics
Formats: Amiga, C64, ST
Year: 1992
http://www.the-nextlevel.com/hosted/...uronics_04.png
Lionheart
Format: Amiga
Year: 1993
This is pretty much the Euro equivalent of Rastan, a fantasy hack 'n slash platform game. Graphically, the game is gorgeous with lots of colour and parallax scrolling. The art and atmosphere really make it stand out. it plays well, too, although the console-only crowd might find it a little awkward if they're not used to the "press up to jump" controls that were still common in computer games at the time.
http://www.the-nextlevel.com/hosted/...onheart_11.png
Ambermoon
Format: Amiga
Year: 1993
Thalion's last RPG was their best one from what I played. It was a mixture of 2d and 3d. Due to the company's demise, only the German version made it to stores. An English version came out about five years later (but not as a commercial product). I believe it's considered freeware but I'm not totally sure.
http://www.the-nextlevel.com/hosted/.../ambermoon.gif
So those are the games Thalion released. Eclipse Software had a few other 16-bit computer games not published by Thalion such as Cardiaxx, Monster Business and Last Ninja Remix, an Amiga remake of System 3's C64 game.
Thalion hit financial trouble and folded in 1994. Eclipse survived and developed the Iron Soldier mech action series which originated on Atari Jaguar and later appeared on Playstation and Nuon.
http://www.the-nextlevel.com/hosted/...soldier1_1.jpg
http://www.the-nextlevel.com/hosted/...oldier%203.jpg
Some of the creators of Amberstar and Ambermoon went to Blue Byte (another German game company founded in 1988) where they made the 1996 PC RPG Albion which is considered an unofficial follow up to the Amber games. I always had issues running this game but I loved what I did get to play. Its art style was so different from the typical Tolkienesque PC RPG, and it was a mix of 3d corridors and handdrawn 2d sections. Someday I plan to give it a proper play.
http://www.the-nextlevel.com/hosted/...er/albion2.jpg
http://www.the-nextlevel.com/hosted/...ter/albion.jpg
After leaving Blue Byte, Erik Simon became head of development at JoWood. Holger Flöttmann went to Ascaron Entertainment. This excellent Thalion fansite has tons of info on games and people for those interested -
http://thalion.exotica.org.uk/
What do you think of Thalion or anything related to it?
