From The Bomb - Dungeon Siege III
By RelentlessKnight 3 Comments
Dungeon Siege is one of those games that I had played and it felt too similar to Neverwinter Nights seeing how it's the same engine. And the fact that there's a movie directed by the German man himself, Uwe Boll. From what I played in the first game, you start off as a farmer under attack from Krug goblins as the Kingdom of Ehb is getting invaded. You have to fight back and rally other companions to help you. It wasn't much of a eye-popper in the storyline or the fact that the story wasn't memorable to me.
Anyways, when I heard that Obsidian is making this game which they brought the rights for it - at first I thought like anyone who played those games, broken-ass gameplay with glitches and exploits that can knock your teeth out. But I also is interested on how it actually looked and how Obsidian tried to the gameplay through overhauling the different engine unlike their previous work with New Vegas and actually having a compelling game.
What I saw from the Quick Look EX that Giantbomb posted yesterday impressed me to even take another chance to get this game. Ryan Davis is joined by Nathaniel and some intern. What really changed is the integration to consoles as it seems like it's more console-friendly seeing how it demoed on the 360 and not in the PC like the previous installments of Dungeon Siege.
The control/camera view is basically top-down like the previous Dungeon Sieges and a hint of Magicka. I was somewhat impressed that they didn't finally changed what the Dungeon Siege experience is about (i.e changing into a first/third person) though throughout the demo, they had never zoomed in/out to see how it looked like. Also that at parts it felt like there's a disadvantage with the camera as in every top-down game suffer from - the geometry of trying to find where you actually are and hoping that you're not struck in one.
From what I heard for the storyline is pretty much bits of information and I was frustrated that the intern as well as Nathaniel did a poor-ass job telling what the third installment of Dungeon Siege is all about and what conflicts are in the Kingdom of Ehb this time. But from what I gathered, they must stop the unionizing of some robots, Ayn Rand style and kill goblins. That's pretty much what I gathered from the demo/playthrough and is disappointed that the intern constantly rushes on things that are integral to the game, making it some sort of speed-run and not selling the game for people. There are also side-quests in this game having people exclaim with a WoW-quest icon and it's apparently non-linear though rushing through the fucking demo is what makes me confuse of it feeling linear.
How the dialogue works is like the dialogue-tree from Mass Effect 2/Dragon Age II having the same icon-looking thing. But what's new about this feature is that if you are playing co-op, you can vote on what choices you want to choose in the dialogue tree and maybe in online-play it's what the most votes can decide what dialogue you have been chosen. To make it more like Mass Effect 2 in similarity, there's also some "interaction" with your companions/character throughout the game - there's seems to be some sort of banter when you do specific things or go to different places. Right now as the demo shows, only Katrina had a word with the banter and not Reinhart who is probably shy or something.
Voice acting wise, it wasn't a disappointment. Sure Katrina may have a sort of a fake british accent but I'm getting to like the character. The other NPCs are good not great as well from that huge robot/golem boss that you have to fight at the end to some of the NPCs that they are featuring.
The gameplay however is the main selling point of the game, with it being somewhat like "God of War/Devil May Cry" in top-view being as it for a hack-and-slash game that requires dodging and trying to survive from the enemies' attacks. Or Dragon Age 2 from which it utilizes tactics that you and you're companion had to have to defeat a opponent through a rigorous task of dodging their attacks and hitting them when they least expected it. They are playing the game on casual and from the looks of it, it isn't a game to be trifle with seeing that they have to use teamwork to be able to kill some hard opponents.
The enemies ranged from goblins, fire-wolves which seems like a pain to kill seeing how they can do burn you overtime to ogres that you really have to look out for as well as bosses with a life bar that need to use teamwork to kill them. There are potions in this game that doesn't fully heal you rather than heal you over time which is bullshit in situations like getting your ass kicked by some ogre and your health being low. Oh there's also a bread-crumb trail like in Fable III which you can follow to your destination quest and perhaps this bread-crumb trail can track other quests as well.
Ryan played as Katrina, the featured character shown currently who is a ranged/sharp-shooter who can switch from shotgun/rifle to duel pistols and the intern played as Reinhart, a mage who can cast slow-time, heal and other things that mages use.
There's also a co-op mode that they are showing off - having two player off-line and four player online - and it seems more co-operative of not being a one-man army and you really have to work together to defeat some of the difficult enemies shown in the demo. And the fact that the key to survival is to dodge quickly like God of War and you and your companion must work together. This feature is what I liked in this game, having a sort of a Dragon Age II experience of managing your companions to utilize different tactics or constantly heaping off enemies to defeat a difficult boss or a hard enemy is fun.
The abilities interface seems console-friendly as it doesn't go into a complicated techtree with tiers rather having one tier for each ability, further upgrading what you use in the battlefield. For instance, healing is essential for this game with challenging opponents and there's a passive ability for Katrina gain health over time as well as there's a blood-sucking ability which everytime you hit a enemy, you gain health back. Also for the abilities menu, you can either choose what sort of preference you like; higher damage for the ability or can to able to knock-back the opponent. There are passive spells and abilities that are essential for survival. Furthermore, they utilize the perks from New Vegas and implemented into this game and I like that idea already.
The environments and graphical details looked between Magicka and Two Worlds II especially this game. From what characters look like when talking to, the graphic texture on the NPC looks oddly shaped like someone in Two Worlds II of not making it look realistic but that kind of detail. It's quite disappointing that the graphics doesn't look impressive but the environments really complimented looking like Magicka but with more glimmer and colour. The detail environment from the dungeon that they are showing isn't really impressive adding a huge dungeon filled with fire traps, goblins and lava that you can shake your severed head with.
I'm not really impressed from how the Obsidian guys are showing this game - from constantly rushing through the storyline and just completely following the bread-crumb trail and the fact that they are demoing it for a hour-long makes me feel why didn't they fire the both of them for not even selling the game for the people who actually want to play the game. It's frustrating to even see how Nathaniel stumble nervousness in talking to how the intern neglects the fact that they are showing the game and not speed-running through the entire demo and not stopping for anything interesting. Disappointing as it may be, I'm still considering purchasing this game and see how the PC version is entirely different than the console version or maybe not.