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在 2000 年初，一家名为 Ikarion 的德国小公司着手开发一款动作 RPG 游戏《武装雄狮（Armalion）》。该游戏基于脍炙人口的德国桌面 RPG 游戏《黑暗之眼（The Dark Eye）》制作。不过这家公司最终破产并没能完成游戏的开发，做到一半的游戏被 Ascaron 买下，该公司以他们开发的足球管理游戏系列《冲击（Anstoss）》而闻名。在放弃了黑暗之眼的授权后，Ascaron 的子公司 Studio II 接手了游戏的开发并在 2004 年以《圣域（Sacred）》的名字将其发行。
毫无疑问，这款游戏是照着《暗黑破坏神 2》来制作的，它同样也是一款等距视角动作 RPG，有六个可选角色：战斗法师（Battle Mage）、黑暗精灵（Dark Elf）、角斗士（Gladiator）、炽天使（Seraphim）、女吸血鬼（Vampiress）和木精灵（Wood Elf，另外在资料片中还加入了恶魔 Daemon 和矮人 Dwarf）。角色升级时会学到并提升被动技能，但是每个角色要习得他们的独特能力必须靠别人传授，也只能用符文才能升级这些能力。使用这些能力不需要魔力，他们是自带冷却的，同时可以把它们衔接起来形成连击。
游戏也有多人联机系统（不过现在可能得靠 Hamachi[2] 来解决了），另设五个难度级别。同时，当然少不了可供收集的成吨战利品——普通级、魔法级、稀有级、绝世级以及成套的物品。听起来可能挺“暗黑 2”的，但是《圣域》的魅力潜藏在细节之中。
In the early 2000s, a small German company named Ikarion was developing Armalion, an Action RPG based on the highly popular German tabletop RPG The Dark Eye (Das Schwarze Auge). The company eventually went bankrupt, but the unfinished game was bought by Ascaron, known for its soccer management series Anstoss. Dropping the Dark Eye license, Ascaron's subsidiary Studio II continued developing the game and published it in 2004 as Sacred.
The game is unmistakably based on Diablo 2. It's an isometric Action RPG with six heroes: Battle Mage, Dark Elf, Gladiator, Seraphim, Vampiress and Wood Elf (plus Daemon and Dwarf in the expansion). They learn and improve passive skills upon levelling up, but each hero's unique powers is taught and upgraded by runes. Instead of mana, these powers are all cooldown-based, and can be connected to form combos.
There's also multiplayer (though you'll need to use Hamachi now), five difficulty modes and, of course, tons of loot to collect – normal, magical, rare, uniques and item sets. This may sound like a generic Diablo clone, but the charm of Sacred lies in the details.
《圣域 2》因与重金属乐队“盲人守卫”（Blind Guardian）[1] 合作而闻名，乐队打造了游戏的主题曲《Sacred Worlds》，同时，在游戏中完成特定的任务就可以看到乐队在游戏中进行演奏。
Sacred 2 is famous for featuring the heavy metal band Blind Guardian. They provided the game's main theme, Sacred Worlds, and upon completing certain quests you can watch them perform it in-game.
有些角色具有非常独特的能力——矮人是唯一能使用枪械的角色，女吸血鬼有两个形态，恶魔可以飞过障碍物，诸如此类。
Some characters have very unique abilities – the Dwarf is the only one that can use guns, the Vampiress has two forms, the Daemon can fly over obstacles, and so on.
《圣域》在游戏的一开始就能自由探索到它庞大开放世界的绝大部分，其中充满支线任务、城镇、NPC、洞窟、地牢以及各种各样的秘密供玩家发现。玩家能够购买马匹来探索如此庞大的世界，也可以骑乘作战，虽然会降低攻击速度，但是骑乘马匹时会提高基础属性，并且对远程角色也是非常有利的。
游戏的图像由预渲染的背景图片和全 3D 角色组合而成，尽管 3D 模型看上去可能有点过时，像素点也有点糙，但是模型的动作表现极其优秀，敌人们也拥有不同的武器和装备，而不仅仅是简单的模型换色。
开发者们在注重方方面面上细节的同时，也塞入了大量的彩蛋、致敬还有他们自己的幽默感。在游戏中玩家可以听到怪物搞笑的嘲讽、读到有趣的墓志铭、碰到开发者和封闭测试员、把一名落跑的新郎抓回教堂、挥舞起光剑甚至还能探索到《暗黑破坏神》中崔斯特瑞姆的重建场景。这一切让玩家把游戏平庸的主线剧情完全抛在脑后，沉迷于狂热的寻宝过程中，“再来一个任务”或是“再升一级”往往会变成玩家此时的口头禅。
抛去首发版本成堆的 bug 不谈，《圣域》可说是一款杰作，在全世界范围卖出了两百多万份游戏拷贝。《圣域》的成功不仅把 Ascaron 公司从破产的边缘拉了回来，也让制作组能够开发资料片《圣域：魔都魅影（Underworld）》，该资料片加入了两个新角色和许多新区域、物品和敌人。游戏的续作《圣域 2：堕落天使（Sacred 2: Fallen Angel）》于 2008 年发售。
续作采用了全 3D 图像，在小心谨慎地提升了游戏的核心体验之后，在别的方面却进行了大刀阔斧的革新。角色方面，除了标志性的炽天使得以保留，其他六个角色都焕然一新：比如戒律守卫者、黑暗仲裁者等等。游戏还引入了光明与黑暗两个阵营系统，玩家的选择将会改变角色在游戏中的定位：是世界的拯救者亦或是一切祸乱的源头。
Sacred features an extensive open-world map, with most of it being freely accessible from the start. It's packed full with side-quests, towns, NPCs, caves, dungeons and secrets to uncover. To explore this vast world, you can buy horses and actually fight while riding them – they decrease your attack speed, but offer stat bonus and are great for ranged characters.
The graphics blends pre-rendered backgrounds with fully 3D characters, and, while they may look somewhat dated and pixelated up close, the 3D models have great animations and enemies all wear diverse weapons and gear, besides the usual palette-swapping.
This attention to details is constant, and the devs also included many easter eggs, references and their own sense of humour. You'll hear amusing taunts from monsters, read funny tombstones, meet developers and beta testers, drag a runaway groom back to the church, wield lightsabers and even visit a recreation of Diablo's Tristram. With all that, the shortcomings of its bland story are almost forgotten. You'll find yourself excusing “just one more quest” or “just one more level-up”, while addictively searching for more treasure.
Despite a rather buggy initial release, Sacred was a huge hit, selling over two million copies worldwide. This success rescued Ascaron's finances and funded the Underworld expansion, which adds two heroes and many areas, items and enemies. Eventually, the sequel arrived in Sacred 2: Fallen Angel (2008).
The game now uses fully 3D graphics, and while the core gameplay was carefully maintained, there are some big changes. Of Sacred's classes, only the iconic Seraphim was kept – the other six classes are all new, such as the cybernetic Guardian, or the dark Inquisitor. Two campaigns are now available, Light and Shadow, which change your role in the game – either as saviour of the land or as the source of its problems.
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1 译者注：“盲人守卫”（Blind Guardian）是德国老牌力量金属乐队，和 Helloween 一同开创了德式速度金属和力量金属时代，其歌曲主题常与《魔戒》等相关。
2 译者注：Hamachi，一款组建虚拟局域网的软件，加入同一 HAMACHI 网络的用户可以使用此软件实现局域网内计算机之间进行的所有活动。
《电脑 RPG 游戏史（The CRPG Book Project）》原书信息
英文原版主编：Felipe Pepe
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