Also known by its working title Into the Darkness, Enclave is a Dark Fantasy Action-Adventure game released by Starbreeze Studios (who later made the The Chronicles of Riddick video games) for the Xbox and the PC in 2002. Its most notable feature is a complete aversion of No Campaign for the Wicked: the game consists of two full-length campaigns, one where a nameless hero vanquishes evil and saves Celenheim, and the other where a nameless minion leads the Darkness to the triumph they were denied centuries ago. As you progress through either campaign, other fantasy characters join your group, though you can only steer one of them during missions.
A sequel was announced in 2003, but with no news whatsoever since then, it seems to have become an Orphaned Series. The original game was, however, ported onto the Wii in 2010. A remaster by Ziggurat Interactive was announced in 2021 for PlayStation 4, Xbox One and Nintendo Switch.
Tropes found in this game:
- Alignment-Based Endings: The game features two campaigns, Light and Dark, and accordingly a good and an evil ending.
- Ambiguously Human: The Ancestors, who are themed after the Roman Empire. If Alecto is any indication, they all have pointy ears despite not otherwise resembling elves.
- Ambiguous Situation: Vatar plummeted to his doom when Zale opened the rift that separated the Enclave from the world. Vatar's current residence deep beneath the earth is simultaneously treated as a physical location the players can travel to and a kind of extradimensional prison that requires a virgin sacrifice in order to summon him from by the game's story.
- The Arch Mage: Zale.
- BFG: The two secret characters carry a GIGANTIC rifle/cannon that's done in '50s retro-future style. The rifle launches a missile at enemies for massive damage.
- Boom, Headshot!!: Attacking an enemy's head does increased damage. Headshots with sniper or magical arrows, in particular, can do enough damage to drop any enemy instantly. Unfortunately, the erratic movements of enemies and quantum hitboxes makes this difficult for even skilled players to pull off.
- Boxed Crook: The Knight and Huntress start off like this, having both been imprisoned for being unable to pay Celenheim's exorbitant taxes. After helping repel an outlander invasion at the start, they're offered their freedom in exchange for their continued martial services.
- Card-Carrying Villain: Everyone on the darkest side, but especially Mordessa, a sorceress clad in black whose second scene involves her summoning the player to an insect-infested pit just in time to watch her execute a minion for failing her.
- Checkpoint Starvation: There aren't any. Especially frustrating given the overall difficulty, slightly wonky jumping mechanics, and occasional instant death traps (generally located at the very end of the level).
- The HD remaster added checkpoints, which consume 10 gold to resurrect the player upon death. This alleviates much of the frustration of casual play, but still demands a perfect run from players if they want to collect all the gold in a level.
- Dark Fantasy
- Dark Is Evil: Quite rightly.
- Early Game Hell: Zigzagged. Later levels throw more and harder enemies at the player, but early levels see the player starved of quality equipment and the gold necessary to fully outfit themselves.
- The Emperor: Alecto.
- Evil Overlord: Demon Vatar.
- Guys Smash, Girls Shoot: Most female playable characters specialize in ranged combat; most melee specialists are male. The axewoman Halfling and the male Wizard are the only exceptions.
- Golems: Summoned by the Druid.
- Great Offscreen War: Vatar vs. Celenheim.
- Hobbits: Hafling.
- Interestingly, halflings are coded like classic RPG barbarians, being quick, lightly armored melee combatants with wild hair, face paint, and a preference for axes.
- Interface Screw: The Huntress and Assassin are hit hard with this in third person, as the bow's aiming reticule doesn't quite match where they fire. As a result, it's quite easy to completely miss the enemy standing a foot away. First-person averts this but makes it easier to walk off a cliff.
- Light Is Good: Not the straightest example, since while the player characters of Light are quite heroic, the people upstairs who they are supposed to work for are supremacist, arrogant jerkasses.
- No Campaign for the Wicked: Averted. The Darkness campaign is just as long (and at times, more interesting) as the one for the Light.
- One-Gender Race: Not officially, but we never see male halflings or female gnomes, orcs, goblins, ogres, and ancestors.
- Only Six Faces: Like most video games of the time, Enclave uses stock models for its enemies with essentially no distinguishing characteristics. What sets Enclave apart is that you can play both sides of the story, meaning when you play the dark campaign you murder armies of identical clones of the characters you play in the light campaign, and vice versa.
- Our Monsters Are Different:
- Our Demons Are Different: Vatar was one, a personification of evil and fear. In the backstory, Zurana also became one after her magical experiments went awry.
- Our Dragons Are Different: Fyrlakith, the guardian of the Tome of Souls.
- Our Elves Are Different: Huntress is a member of an isolationist Elven clan.
- Our Goblins Are Different: Goblin.
- Our Gnomes Are Weirder: Stone Gnomes are regular enemies.
- Our Liches Are Different: Lich.
- Our Ogres Are Hungrier: Berserker is an elite Ogre fighter.
- RPG Elements: You can spend the gold you collect on the mission to purchase better equipment between them.
- Secret Character: Collect 13000 gold pieces in the Light campaign and you'll unlock a 9320 Battle droid. Doing the same in the dark campaign will give you Feticia.
- Soul Jar: Vatar's lair houses an enormous heart protected by magical barriers. Vatar cannot be harmed while the heart is intact, which begs the question of why he needed the magic of the Enclave to achieve invincibility.
- The Starscream: The dark campaign reveals this to be Mordessa's role. Her plan isn't merely to summon Vatar, but to bind him to her service.
- Suspiciously Small Army: A predictable consequence of engine limitations. Despite many levels being presented as raids/defenses of fortified outposts, enemy forces will never have more than a few dozen enemies who attack in waves of 1-4 at a time. The player, when they're given any manpower at all, will only have an ally or two fighting alongside them. This is especially egregious in the dark campaign, given that the forces of evil heavily outnumber the denizens of the enclave.
- The Undead: Lich and her summons.
- Vain Sorceress: Mordessa and Zurana. Also, Sorceress and Lich.
- Weapon Specialization: Each class has its own, almost perfectly mirrored by their evil counterparts:
- Axes: Halfling/Goblin
- Crossbows: Knight/Berserker, Huntress/Assassin, Engineer/Bombardier, Halfling/Goblin
- Daggers: Huntress/Assassin, Druid/Lich, Wizard/Sorceress
- Longbows: Huntress/Assassin
- Magic staves: Druid/Lich, Wizard/Sorceress
- Shields: Knight/Berserker, Engineer/Bombardier, Halfling/Goblin
- Swords: Knight, Bombardier
- Thrown explosives: Engineer/Bombardier
- Warhammers: Engineer, Berserker
- Summon Magic: The Astral Staff and the Staff of the Damned can summon an Earth Golem and shadowy skeletons respectively.
- Women Are Wiser: Averted. The Dark side has more notable women in their ranks.