Realms of Arkania: Shadows over Riva (German title: Das Schwarze Auge: Schatten über Riva, translated as "The Dark Eye: Shadow above Riva") is a role-playing video game based on the German role-playing game system Das Schwarze Auge by Attic Entertainment Software. It is the sequel to Realms of Arkania: Blade of Destiny and Realms of Arkania: Star Trail. The original German version of the game was published by TopWare Interactive in 1996. Sir-Tech released the English version in 1997.
The game was re-released for Windows in 2009 on GOG.com, and for macOS in 2013; it released in 2014 on Steam.
Plot
Shadows over Riva continues after Realms of Arkania: Star Trail. After uniting the dwarves and elves, the party stops by the harbor city of Riva, which is under siege by the Orcish hordes. The countryside's once-lucrative dwarven mine has been decimated and occupied by the Orcs after a string of well-coordinated attacks. For some unknown reason, the magistrate refuses to recognize the threat the orcs pose just outside the city gates. Meanwhile, rumors abound of traitors in the slum ridden-Hoberkian community and strange corpse disappearances within the city's graveyard, the Field of Boron.
As the party investigates each lead, more questions seem to surface than answers. After investigating the dwarven mines the traps' design suggests that the Orcs have become much smarter and more organized than normally possible; they are no longer fragmented tribes warring among themselves. They speak of a single, wise, all-powerful chieftain with the powers of a wizard. Upon confronting the chieftain deep within the mines, he summons a massive demon from the underworld to fight the party. The party defeats it and sends the demon back to the underworld. When they kill the Orc chieftain, a tiny worm emerges from the chieftain's head and flees.
Returning to the city with this new information, the party still finds the city's magistrate apathetic. They befriend the Holberkians when they save one of them from a mob. As half-elves and half-Orcs, they know of the orcish hordes, but earned the enmity of the citizens, who think they are responsible for the Orcish siege of the city. The Hoberkians noticed a pronounced change in the Orcs' activity, suggesting an outside influence. They reveal a long-absent sorcerer living on an island in the swamp who could have been responsible for the changes in the orcs. The next day, the party is escorted to the sorcerer's tower, where they find experiments and letters pointing to a person known only as Borborad and his shipment of two worm queens. One queen was delivered but a second was lost en route when the urn sank with a cargo ship in Riva's harbor during a storm. Research notes further reveal much information on the worm spawned from the queen. They possess extreme intelligence and could possess hosts by entering their brains through the nose. They are also linked telepathically to the queen who spawned them and could not be killed unless the queen is killed. Queens reside in hives which were invulnerable to attack due to the queen's magic.
After returning to Riva, the party speaks with the magistrate about their suspicions, who dismisses them. Within the day, they are framed for murder. An underground movement contacts the group and offers them sanctuary and the use of a tunnel system that surfaces in every temple. They are informed of the movement's suspicions that the magistrate is under some unknown influence, possibly a worm spawn. They are tasked to rescue a group of wizards from the magistrate's prison island. The party witnesses an attempt at implanting worms into the wizards. After they are rescued, the wizards inform the group that it was the magistrate who ordered an expedition to recover the sunken ship items from the harbor. One of the urns was brought to him, which released the worm queen when it was opened. It possessed the magistrate, established a hive, and used its spawn to possess various people around the city. The worm queen is able to hear and see everything the possessed townsfolk see and hear. The group is told that the one remaining urn in the sunken ship is required to learn more about the queen and a means to defeat them. After obtaining the urn from the merfolk that lives in the waters near Riva's harbor, the wizards spend a few days studying the queen inside.