The Summoning is an isometric-view fantasy role-playing video game developed by Event Horizon (later renamed DreamForge) and published by SSI in 1992. The sequel to Event Horizon's first game, DarkSpyre, The Summoning replaced the random-generated dungeons of the previous game with pre-designed levels. The title featured numerous magic items, as well as a spell-casting system utilizing virtual hand gestures. The game also utilized "runes" as a way to magically gain abilities or items. The game had several features typical of dungeon crawls, such as random treasure, weapon and armor options, treasure chests, and the use of a mannequin to visually aid in inventory management. The dungeon in The Summoning was broken up into separate levels and sections, with different types of monsters (such as undead) and NPCs being found in each. The featured weapon in the game is a large two-handed blade called "Warmonger." When first found, it is rusty and not very effective. But by repeatedly using it to kill, the magical blade becomes an immensely powerful weapon. The blade is actually a sentient, evil being with bloodlust.
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Agreeably, there are a few merits to this game:
Enemies variety is decent, while there are only so many sprites in the game, most enemies will alternate between casting or using melee weapons quite frequently; either cornering you or roaming. While the environment is undeniably lacky, there are quite a few miscellanies of traps, boulders, lava tiles and pits for the player to mind his surrounding and forget the bland scenery.
While it is definitely better than most gold box SSI games, it's still one of their worse games, not particularly interesting or innovative by 1992 standards. By then, you had games like Ultima VII, Might and Magic IV or even Darklands - all with an open world and better storytelling.