With a pump-action shotgun in hand and a leather vest over his shoulders, Kyle Vlaros turned Blackthorne into the goriest, meanest puzzle-platformer on the MS-DOS market in 1994.
Prince of Persia with a pump-action shotgun
Press the fire key in Blackthorne, and Kyle Vlaros pulls a 12-gauge from his back to blast a green-skinned mutant into pixelated sludge. Press back-shotgun, and he fires blindly over his shoulder without even turning around, dropping a bad guy while walking away like an action movie star. It was a incredible flex from Blizzard Entertainment, who were still making a name for themselves when Interplay Productions published the game in 1994.
The core mechanics owe a massive debt to Jordan Mechner's rotoscoped classic Prince of Persia, but the rhythm here is completely defined by gunplay. Instead of parrying swords, you press against the back wall to slip into the shadows, letting enemy fire whiz past your face. The moment they stop to reload, you step out from the dark and let them have it. That cover mechanic turns every room in the Mines of Androth into a tactical duel where patience beats fast reflexes.
How Blackthorne balances precise platforming and brutal puzzles
Beyond the shootouts, you spend a lot of time figuring out how to reach high ledges and open locked blast doors across 17 distinct levels. Kyle can roll under low obstacles, hoist himself onto ledges, and drop down carefully, but his movement is slow and heavily deliberate. If you misjudge a jump over a pit in the Karrellian Swamps or miscount your steps before a leap in the Wasteland Desert, gravity takes over, and a long drop means immediate death.
To get through Sarlac's strongholds, you have to manage an inventory of utilitarian gadgets alongside your upgrades:
- Remote Wasps: Flying explosives you pilot through narrow air shafts to hit switches behind sealed doors.
- Spider Mines: Traps that crawl along floors and walls to clear out generators or camp out for patrol guards.
- Hover Bombs: Heavy explosives designed to burn through sturdy door locks and ground hazards.
- Keycards and Potions: Essential pick-ups handed over by enslaved Androth natives when you free them from their chains.
Later levels in the Shadow Keep force you to execute these puzzle solutions while under heavy fire from dark counterparts called Andromedogs. The jump from methodical logic to sudden violence separates this 1994 release from pure action games.
The deliberate pacing that split players down the middle
Not everyone loved the heavy weight of the controls. Magazines at the time praised the slick VGA visual presentation and atmospheric sound design on Sound Blaster cards, but PC Gamer and rival outlets noted that the movement felt sluggish compared to pure arcade platformers. The rotoscoped animation frames mean that once you commit to a jump or a ledge climb, you are locked into that movement until the animation finishes.
The ultimate test of patience is the total lack of save files during a level. The original MS-DOS game strictly uses a four-character password system (like FBWC for level two or K3CH for the final push) given out only after clearing a stage. Missing a jump right before a level exit means repeating the entire 20-minute map from scratch, which ruined plenty of afternoons.
Where to play Blackthorne online today
If you want a dark fantasy adventure with heavy shotguns, clever inventory puzzles, and high-stakes combat, this forgotten piece of 90s PC history still delivers. The dark 256-color art looks sharp, and mastering the back-wall cover mechanic gives you a real edge once you get into the game's strict, deliberate rhythm.
You can play Blackthorne free in your browser right now without downloading anything or messing around with DOS memory tweaks. Jump straight into the first mine level, practice taking cover in the background shadows, and make sure to test out that slick over-the-shoulder shotgun trick on the very first monster you encounter.