Dark
Messiah of Might and Magic marks a real departure for the long-running RPG
franchise. Whereas other entries were pretty much straight forward RPG, Dark
Messiah puts itself more in the “thinking man’s FPS” type of quest, employing
open-ended RPG elements and cinematic FPS action. Not only that, but the game
also utilizes the Source engine, making for some truly impressive physics and
nice graphical effects. Unfortunately, while the game almost nails the formula,
it falls victim to a bevy of technical flaws and bugs that render the game
unplayable at times. Dark Messiah has a lot of good ideas going in, but
ultimately gets bogged down with stability issues.
Dark
Messiah of Might and Magic puts you in the shoes of Sareth, a servant of the
wizard Phenrick, as he embarks on a mission that snowballs into an epic
adventure. You begin with some fairly simple skills; you have basic weapons
know-how and you have a night-vision ability to let you see in the dark. As you
progress, you gain more abilities depending on how you play the game.
Dark
Messiah allows you to choose your own paths in terms of character development.
You can be a spell-caster, fighter, assassin, or archer. However, the game is
fairly open in terms of how you can upgrade your character’s attributes. You can
set them up with some healing magic abilities and still beef up your melee
combat rating, effectively making you a paladin-type character which is pretty
nice, or many other combinations.
Another
element that’s worth noting in Dark Messiah is the environments, which are quite
interactive and allow for some cool death sequences. You can kick enemies into
spiked walls, and collapse platforms onto groups of foes, making for some truly
inventive moments while taking out your enemies. The game gives you a lot of
choice while fighting your battles. In some situations it is possible to take
your enemy out in a matter of seconds by properly using the environment, while
not utilizing it could take you a long time. On the same note, it’s pretty fun
to run up behind an enemy standing next to a ledge and kick them off.
The
game’s multiplayer portion can also be fun, featuring Deathmatch modes as well
as the Crusader mode. You begin by choosing your side (Human or Undead) and then
from several pre-created classes: Priest, Mage, Warrior, Assassin, and Archer.
Each character has their own abilities, so whatever your playing style is you’ll
be able to utilize it to its potential. Assassins actually have an ability that
lets them mask themselves as a member of the opposing team to sneak in for the
kill, a good move for deceptive players.
However, not all is so sunny in Dark Messiah. The single-player campaign begins
to lose steam before too long. After the marvel of the initial few areas, it
feels like the game drones on. While the concept of choice is used quite
strongly here, it still falls into the realm of boredom after the first couple
of hours.
Also,
the game suffers from some very nasty stability issues. The game would
frequently crash, as things as rudimentary as changing a sound or video option
would cause the game to go into a freak-out and lock up the review PC. About
three out of five times the game was booted up, it would lock up. Arkane Studios
is currently trying to address the game’s bugginess in future patches, but for
people who picked up the retail copy (or bought it off Steam for that matter)
for 50 bucks, it sure can be disappointing when the game doesn’t even load
up.
Graphically, Dark Messiah looks good, benefiting from what the Source Engine has
to offer. Characters have the same “life-like without being creepy” facial
expressions that have become a staple of the engine and the environments are
very detailed and extremely interactive. The game takes advantage of Bloom
lighting and several other good looking graphical effects to make it shine.
However, the engine does take some nasty framerate hits at times, something that
seems like a polish issue more than anything else.
The
sound is also quite good. The voice acting is pretty decent as are the sound
effects, and the score ties in with the mood of the game nicely.
Dark
Messiah of Might and Magic is a disappointment in that it shoots for the moon,
but falls victim to itself and its own incompleteness. Maybe with substantial
patching, the game might be worth a look.
|
|
Gameplay: 7.0
Dark Messiah
gives you a ton of choices when it comes how you approach your battles, and lets
you choose how you want to create your character through the building of
attributes. The game also makes great use of physics through the Source engine,
making for some cool death sequences for your enemies. However, the game
succumbs to serious stability issues, and the single-player campaign dwindles
after a couple of hours.
Graphics: 8.5
Dark Messiah
looks pretty good, once again benefiting from the Source engine. The textures
are pretty impressive, as are the facial details and animation. The game does
fall prey to some nasty framerate hits.
Sound: 8.0
The music is very
good and sets the mood nicely for the game, and the voice acting does the job
well.
Difficulty: Medium
Multiplayer: 8.0
The multiplayer
section is pretty fun, offering unique class-based combat and allowing for tons
of possibilities when fighting online.
Concept: 7.5
While the game
does has some great ideas, they don’t really come to full fruition, leaving the
game feeling somewhat unfinished.
Overall: 7.0
Dark Messiah
feels like a missed opportunity, with some huge ideas but a definite lack of
polish.
