Overview
Dungeons & Dragons: Order of the Griffon is a TurboGrafx-16 exclusive RPG based on the Dungeons & Dragons license. Specifically, it uses the lore and geography of the Mystara campaign setting; which makes it one of the few D&D games to deviate from the standard Forgotten Realms setting. Other games based on the Mystara setting include the Capcom brawlers Tower of Doom and Shadow Over Mystara, as well as Warriors of the Eternal Sun. Unusually, the game uses the first edition D&D rules set rather than the Advanced D&D rules set, which was more common for games due to its more rigid structure and many refinements.
Despite being developed by Westwood Studios, the creators of real-time first-person dungeon crawlers Eye of the Beholder and Lands of Lore: The Throne of Chaos, the game instead uses a strategic turn-based combat engine similar to SSI's Gold Box series. Player characters and enemies are represented on a grid, and take turns based on their initiative. The player can create a four-person party out of pre-generated characters, with three choices per class of Fighter, Mage, Cleric, Thief, Elf, Dwarf and Halfling. (Elf, Dwarf and Halfling were separate classes rather than races in first edition D&D.)
Story
Lord Korrigan of Redlebb Keep tasks the players, an envoy group from the benevolent Order of the Griffon, to investigate the cause behind an increased presence of undead creatures within his kingdom, and the player eventually gets embroiled in a region-wide uprising led by the vampire lord Koriszegy and his minions the Iron Ring. The player must visit numerous dungeons and towns to find four special jewels in order to stop the vampire's plans from coming to fruition.
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