Niccolò Machiavelli was a Florentine diplomat, author, philosopher, and historian who lived during the Italian Renaissance. He is best known for his political treatise The Prince (Il Principe), written around 1513 but not published until 1532, five years after his death.

None of this is in any way relevant for Microprose's 1995 strategy game "Machiavelli The Prince", in which you assume the role of a Venetian merchant prince between the year 1300 and 1492. In fact, the game is a remake of 1994's "Merchant Prince" by Holistic Design, in which Machiavelli is never mentioned at all. What is very "Machiavellian" however is the way you conduct your business: gameplay doesn't limit itself to mere exploring and trading, but also involves managing your popularity by hosting parties and commissioning art, gaining influence in politics and the church by bribing senators and buying cardinals, as well as less savoury activities such as hiring arsonists and assassins to hurt your competitors.

All in all it's a very intriguing historical 4x turn-based strategy game that seems to have flown under the radar a bit and is definitely less well-known than some of Microprose's other releases. All the more interesting to check it out now!

Joining hosts Martijn ("Tijn") and Florian ("rnlf") we have three guests who are all brand new to the show. First of all there's Greg, who is a big fan of play-by-mail games and has a Machiavelli the Prince multiplayer game going for 4 years now. Next up is Leon, who is the creator of one of the very few if only surviving fan websites about Machiavelli the Prince (see links below if you want to check it out). And last but not least we have John aka "Dr. Riley" who is a history teacher and as such can help us determine the historical accuracy of this game.

We also received a voice message from DGC member Juan ("Reidrac"), who has fond memories of playing Machiavelli the Prince back in the day along with his sister. Juan also creates retro games himself, do check out his website linked below for those.

Enjoy!

[ download mp3 ] (112 mins, 128 MB)

Many thanks to DGC member Pix who helped produce the show, as well as DGC member console who edited the episode. Many thanks to them and all who make this show possible!

* Machiavelli the Prince fan website by Leon

* Dr. Riley plays Machiavelli the Prince on YouTube

* Holistic Design's official website

* Juan's website where he publishes his retro games