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Posted By	Discussion Topic: Blade of Darkness Review ---> 8.8 !
Froy King Shit *board owner*	posted on 02-28-2001 @ 1:05 PM
O&A Board Veteran Registered: Feb. 01	By now, those of you that read the site on a regular basis probably know how much we've been looking forward to this game after we saw the initial pictures. We've been captivated by the promise of intense melee combat complete with graphic decapitations. And barring Rune a few months ago, that's something we haven't had much of on the PC since Die By the Sword, a timeless classic. After giving this one a good go through, we can honestly say that this game is fun. It isn't perfect, but it's extremely entertaining and man is it sure is easy on the eyes. And that's really the first thing we have to talk about here. This game is just beautiful. The textures are incredible, the models (in most cases) are very well done, the lighting is superb, the water and particle effects are ridiculously nice… But as all of you know by now, all of this beauty comes with a price. The minimum specs on this bad boy, a whopping PII 400 with 64MB of RAM, wouldn't really strike most consumers as "minimum." And the recommended specs, an even whoppier PIII 500 with 128MB of RAM, could even make some hardened gamers blanch. But the worst part of it all is that, even with the recommended specs, the game will run a little choppy. I played it on both the minimum and a nice computer and the minimum was barely playable at certain points (even with everything turned down), and the nice computer (PIII 600, 256MB RAM, GeForce2 Ultra) when running everything at high, only had tiny slowdowns every now and again which really didn't affect gameplay. If you have the machine that can run it, you'll be treated to some of the most immersive environments available. First off, the architecture just wraps you up and sinks you right into the area that you are supposed to be traveling through, whether it be the intricate dwarven mines, or a huge ransacked castle. You can see the design, and how someone might actually have built those structures. The highly detailed textures don't hurt the process either. Take some time when you look through the screenshots to check out all of the work that went into creating the many different textures you'll see in the varied environments throughout the game. For instance, in this screen, you should take a look at the constellations running across the ceiling and the dirty soot look to give it that "lived in" feeling. The other couple of graphical bits I have to give props to before we move on to the gameplay are the lighting and effects. This game has some of the most realistic lighting models that I've seen to date. The sunlight looks like real sunlight. The real time lighting of torches allow for the casting of shadows and more ambiance. And every now and again, you'll run into some cool effects, not just from the power potions, or special attack moves, but from particle effects that run waterfalls, and reflective and shimmering effects across water. I could keep going, but I think I've kissed enough ass for today. Like I mentioned before, the game is not without its problems. Luckily enough, most of these problems aren't very extreme, and most don't actually revolve around the gameplay. There were some little weird AI quirks and camera difficulties, but we'll get into that more in a second. The main problems have to do with the interface. It seems that, when developing a game for umm… around four years, you would try to make it as accessible and as easy as possible to jump into, yes? You would think. But right off the bat, when loading up, you are confronted with the configuration of your machine, which usually would be pretty easy. The graphics side was easy enough for most gamers, but the audio gives choices that, to most people, will be totally undecipherable. We all obviously play games here a lot, so when we sit there and scratch our heads for a moment and then choose a setting at random to see if it works, we think that maybe this should have been made a little easier to understand. That aside, configuring your controls is a bit of work as well. Almost everyone that came by and tried playing the game needed help to figure all of that out. It's just an annoying system that could have used an overhaul. Getting into a single player game is easy enough, and when starting is actually a pretty nice set up. You'll choose between your four playable characters that all use different fighting styles and weapons. Since we've gone over that and the story in the previews, we'll skip the explanation. When you pick your character, you'll be dropped right into the start of the story. Depending on the character you pick, the storytelling will be slightly different, and you'll play through a specific beginning level. Once past the first level, the rest of the levels and challenges are the same throughout for each character, so pick your favorite. As you work your way through the beginning levels, you'll start to pick up the controls for movement, camera control, and combat. They are a little intimidating at first and will take a bit of time to get used to. But that's what the beginning levels are for, right? You'll get plenty of practice with all of the different controls right away too. This game does not skimp on action. There is rarely a time when you'll be able to wander for more than a minute or two without running into the next fight. Unfortunately, you'll also notice that many of the levels will be "find the key" puzzles where you'll need to grab a key or beat it out of something. Even so, it doesn’t interfere with the enjoyment of the game. Booby traps and jumping puzzles also make their way into the levels to keep you on your toes, but what you really should be looking forward to is that first enemy encounter. That's when the fun really starts. The combat controls will take a bit of time to master, but are easy enough to jump into at the beginning. When initiating combat, you hit your lock-on key, which will lock you onto your opponent and will always keep you facing whatever him. If there are more than one baddies trying to get you, you can just hit the lock-on key again to switch targets. There are several ways to actually proceed in a fight. First, if you have a bow, you can attack from a distance and take off as much life as you can before starting your attack. The problem with this method is that it is really hard to aim a bow and most of the time you'll end up pulling your arrows out of the wall, and not your opponent, after the fight is done. You can also pick up chairs and bones and whatnot and throw them, but most fights will revolve around jumping in with your sword. Once combat starts, you will have several moves at your disposal. Each of these is accomplished via hitting a directional key and the attack button. These regular attacks can be strung together in effective combinations that shouldn't give your opponent any time to attack back. There also are a bunch of special moves, some of which are resigned to certain weapons, which can be linked in with your regular line of moves into attacks that can wipe an opponent out in one pass if done correctly. These moves are done in much the same way as you would see in a console fighting game. Hit three buttons at once it does a move, hit attack and left and attack and left again and do another move. Once you get used to these attacks, which are different for every character, you can start kicking some serious ass. You'll receive new moves as you progress through the game and go up in level. You can see a list of moves by hitting F1 during the game to see how they are done and what level they become available to you. Levels are gained through defeating enemies. The higher level the enemy, the more experience you'll get. The amount of experience will also depend on the kind of creature that you end up defeating. They range in size, skill, and behavior. There are the little grunty creatures that can be offed in one whack even when just starting the game, to devious knights that will wait for your attack and deliver the appropriate response. For the most part, these fights are incredibly challenging, especially when confronted with more than one enemy, but there are some problems, and some cool little conventions that should keep you interested even when fighting the same creature types over and over. The main problem with the fight model has to do with the patterning of attacks. Many of the creatures actually follow a pretty set pattern of behavior depending on their distance from you. Each of the enemies have their own special attacks and combos, so once you figure out when they are most likely to do them, you can sidestep and give them a good whack. This doesn't mean the battles are easy though. In fact they're quite the contrary. Even the very patterned creatures like skeletons can give you a jolt by doing something different all of the sudden and most creatures hit really hard. The more intelligent creatures such as the rogue knights can really kick the living crap out of you. They'll actually bide their time until they see an opening and then attack. And when in groups they'll even try to surround you. Fighting against groups of enemies has it's own fun advantages however. They can hit each other, and if you manage to get them to hit each other, you may not have to raise a sword or shield in your defense. Some of the creatures take more offense to the mistakes than others. Orcs will actually fight each other to the death if they are hit by comrades to many times, while skeletons will just knock each other silly without a care in the world. The other main problem with the combat system in the game is the camera control. For the most part, it works very well. But occasionally, it'll go all wonky and you'll be staring at the sky or straight down on your head. Those are not good camera angles for beating off four disgruntled orcs. Those problems were few and far between however. Once you've played through a bunch of the single player, you can try jumping into multiplayer, although this was really a half assed attempt at it. There is no Internet matching support here so you'll need to play over a LAN. Originally, we thought the multiplayer would have more than two players fighting in arenas at the same time. Unfortunately, all of the battles will be between two players with the others watching and waiting for their turn at a battle with the winner. Hopefully, they'll have a better system for the sequel. After all is said and done, Blade of Darkness was a pretty darn satisfying experience. The battes are intense, the gore is outrageous, the levels are well designed, the graphics are superb, and there is a save anywhere feature. Thank God for that. So if you are looking for a challenging and beautiful adventure, you'll want to check this one out. Just make sure you have a machine that can run it. -- Dan Adams -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Want to share your opinions with the world? Talk about it on the IGNPC message boards, or send some mail to IGNPC about this story. Presentation An awkward menu system and dumb initial setup process are really annoying. The manual and box are business as usual. 6.5 Graphics What else can I say. This game is just plain awesome. The design team used their time well to make this one. 9.5 Sound Pretty normal fare. The music is pretty good, but some of the sounds are annoying, especially the Amazon's battle yells. 7.5 Gameplay Sometimes quirky, but most times good, the battle system is full of fun action. Levels come down to finding keys, but that doesn't seem to detract from the enjoyment. 8.5 Lasting Appeal The single player should take a while to finish with each character. Multiplayer is fun, but won't hold your interest for very long. 7.5 OVERALL SCORE (not an average) 8.8 ~Matt/Froy from Jersey The Hell Hole Official Protector of Gay Marco & SwampJunk...if he ever decides to post. Also providing total immunity to Fayth

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