The History of TA: Kingdoms

Cavedog Entertainment released Total Annihilation: Kingdoms in June 1999 and supported it online through its Boneyards service. Within a year, Cavedog had been closed. The game passed through several owners and returned to sale on GOG in 2011.

Timeline

Date Event
1995 Humongous Entertainment creates Cavedog Entertainment as a label for games for a general audience.
1996 GT Interactive buys Humongous.
September 1997 Cavedog releases Total Annihilation.
7 April 1999 Cavedog announces Kingdoms for a worldwide release in June.
8 April 1999 Boneyards, Cavedog's online service, opens a public test for Total Annihilation.
25 June 1999 Kingdoms goes on sale in more than 45 countries.
16 November 1999 Infogrames announces that it will buy 70% of GT Interactive. The deal is complete by 17 December.
8 December 1999 The Darien Crusades, an online war for Darien on Boneyards, is in open public testing.
6 January 2000 Cavedog cancels Amen: The Awakening and plans The Iron Plague for March.
February 2000 GT Interactive announces the closure of Cavedog.
6 March 2000 The Iron Plague is released.
10 May 2000 Infogrames announces that GT Interactive will be renamed Infogrames, Inc.
2003 Infogrames, Inc. becomes Atari, Inc.
24 February 2011 GOG adds Kingdoms, with The Iron Plague, to its catalogue.
July 2013 Wargaming buys the Total Annihilation franchise in Atari's bankruptcy sale.

Development and Release

Kingdoms was the second game in Cavedog's Total Annihilation series. Clayton Kauzlaric was its lead designer, Brian Brown its lead programmer and Ron Gilbert its producer. The developers page names everyone in the credits.

Cavedog set the June release date in April 1999. By then, its website had the Atlas of Darien, an interactive history of the four houses. Cavedog also promised new units for free download after release, as it had done for Total Annihilation.

The game reached shops on 25 June 1999 in English, French, German, Italian and Spanish. Cavedog's announcement listed more than 100 battle units, 50 wandering monsters and other characters, and 48 campaign missions. It also listed 30 multiplayer maps, the Cartographer map editor and support for Boneyards. In January 2000, Cavedog said that Kingdoms had entered PC Data's sales chart at number 1.

The Patches

The patch notes in the game's install describe three updates:

  • 2.0 made the game at least twice as fast and cut its memory use by 24 MB. It reduced the attack of the Veruna Dirigible, improved the aim of the Zhon Wisp and added 2 maps.
  • 3.0 added new units. Aramon gained the Ark and the Grenadier. Veruna gained the Mer Warrior, the Ballista and the Centaur. Zhon gained the Swamp Beast, the Giant Barracuda and the Giant Orm. Taros gained the Dark Hand and the Fallen Angel. Every monarch could now summon its house's god.
  • 4.0 brought a 500-unit limit and fixed a fault with more than 500 maps. It allowed more than one computer player per person in multiplayer, and let players use Creon in multiplayer games.

The notes give no dates. The Iron Plague's readme describes the game as version 3.0, so 4.0 came after the expansion.

Boneyards and the Darien Crusades

Boneyards was Cavedog's free online service, with matchmaking and chat built into the game. To join, a player registered a user name, password, email address and the CD key from the Kingdoms box. Players met in chat rooms called gatherings, inside the War Room. Wins, losses and scores went to Boneyards automatically and fed its ladders.

The Darien Crusades was a campaign for the whole Boneyards community. A map of Darien was split into 313 territories, each linked to a Kingdoms map, with 182 new maps in all. Players joined one of two sides. At the start, the Order of Honor held the west and the Council of Terror held the east. A territory changed hands after enough wins, with its toughness, recent results and neighbouring territories all counting. Players rose through ten ranks.

Patch 3.0 changed the Crusades. Occupied territories showed a flame for the number of players there, and a territory could fall without a battle. The host of a game could also choose between the original units and the Crusades balance. Wikipedia describes that balance as giving defensive structures more damage against most tier 1 units.

Closure and the Rights

Cavedog's owner, GT Interactive, was in financial trouble in 1999. Infogrames bought control of it at the end of that year. In February 2000, GT Interactive announced that it would close Cavedog. The Iron Plague followed in March. Wikipedia's article on the game places the release just before Cavedog's collapse, so the sources differ on the order.

GT Interactive took the Infogrames name in May 2000 and became Atari, Inc. in 2003. The rights to Total Annihilation stayed with Infogrames and then Atari. In July 2013, Wargaming bought the franchise when Atari's assets were sold. GOG's store page for Kingdoms names Wargaming.net next to Cavedog Entertainment.

Kingdoms Today

GOG added Kingdoms and The Iron Plague in one pack on 24 February 2011, at a price of $5.99. Steam sells the original Total Annihilation but does not sell Kingdoms. Cavedog's own Boneyards service has shut down. Core Prime has rebuilt it. See how to play it today.

Sources