Monthly Archives: May 2009

What the Game’s About
The console realm hasn’t always been the most welcoming colony to PC-style hack-and-slash RPG games. While a clear cut answer can’t be given on why they don’t feel welcome, this genre has always been better suited for the PC world. Time and time again, though, we are given a new hack-and-slash game that tries to prove that this genre can form a sturdy foundation in the console world. Sacred 2: Fallen Angel is the latest title to battle the good fight.

What’s Hot
Sacared 2: Fallen Angel is quite a large package in terms of content. Like all games in this genre you’ll first be assigned to pick your class and race out of 6 predesignated options. These include the typical High Elf or warrior. After you select and customize your character, you’ll be presented with the choice of choosing a god entity that will assist and watch over you in battle. Each god has its own strength and weakness. For instance, one of the options will destroy all surrounding enemies, but it’ll also turn on you over time. Once you get the character selection out of the way, you’ll be ready to decide which storyline you’ll follow: the hero campaign of the light or the evil campaign of the shadows. Whichever side you decide upon, you’ll find yourself pretty much doing the same essential acts of butchering hundreds of monsters, pillaging goods, and growing more powerful.

One of the strongest aspects to the game are the quests. Even though none of them are truly memorable, they have a certain level of attractiveness to them. Most of the quests you’ll take on will be your run-of-the-mill fetch quests or save the damsel in distress from 10 creatures. Basic stuff. Over time, though, you’ll find yourself wanting to complete just one more after your finish one. While they provide a nice getaway from the story, they also allow you to gain experience for new skills and abilities for your character. Over the course of the quests you’ll quickly notice that the game has a large roster of monsters and enemies for you to ravage. This makes doing the otherwise average quest a little more adventurous because you’ll want to see what new species you’ll meet up with next.

The gameplay is pretty much what you’d expect from your typical hack-and-slash game. Ever since Diablo or the Gauntlet series, we haven’t seen much forward progress in this genre. Sure, Sony has the Untold Legends franchise, but at the end of the day, they all seem to mix into each other. Sacred 2 has everything you’d expect to find in those games in terms of gameplay. You’ll level up and then pick and choose which skills to increase or gain new abilities. The battle system is slash, slash, magic, etc. It’s basic, but there’s a lot of options to choose from in the magic department and the use of god entities that keeps it from feeling too stagnant.

Graphically, the game looks great. The world is massive and quite large. The environments are wonderfully detailed and everything is heavily detailed. Even though the camera is set from a distance, you can swing it into a closer range and really appreciate the level of detail the artist and graphic teams put into the game. This level of commitment is also found in characters’ motions. Everything is fluid and flows together so well.

Sacred 2 also supports a 4-player online multiplayer mode. You and some buddies can hop online and journey together in the world of Ancaria. The few sessions I played online were lag free and quite enjoyable. If you have some friends that are interested in the game, this is a mode that is definitely worth checking out.

What’s Not
The game does feature some truly mesmerizing graphics but there are some glitches here and there. Often you’ll notice graphical pop-ups, slightly jagged edges, and a slow frame-rate. The frame-rate never drops significantly to ruin the game, but it’s very noticeable.

The biggest problem is the lack of guidance found in the game. With a world as massive as Ancaria, you’ll want more guidance than is provided to you. You’ll have to switch to your map continuously during gameplay sessions to make sure you are heading in the proper direction. Also, there’s no way to pause the game. Whether you are looking at your map or equipping a new weapon, the world around you is always living. If you are in a battle and you realize you need to equip a better weapon, you need to do it while you’re getting attacked. If you are online with friends this won’t become a problem because they can protect you, but if you are playing by yourself be prepared for the worst case scenario.

Aside from those faults, the game is still just a hack-and-slash RPG. You’ll either love it or hate it.

Final Word
Sacred 2: Fallen Angel is just your typical everyday hack-and-slash RPG title. You’ll take on a number of quest and slay thousands of monsters during your journey. On that journey you’ll also collect massive amounts of money and become the supreme super being of Ancaria. Even with some technical shortcomings, Sacred 2 is a fun hack-and-slash game for the home console scene. If you have some pals willing to hop online for a few play sessions, this will definitely keep you enthralled into the late hours of the night.

Score: 7.5 out of 10

The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay was one of the best titles on the Xbox. Now after fives years we have the follow up, The Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena. Fresh out of prison, our titular hero finds himself on a Mercenary ship. His next course of action? Kill them and steal their ride, which is easier said than done – but then again, this is Riddick.

This title mixes the gameplay up a lot more than Butcher Bay: in Assault on Dark Athena, Riddick goes from stealth, to fire fights, to mech combat effortlessly. The moment you start getting tired of sneaking around in the darkness, you’ll find a gun to start shooting with or a drone control panel to take a joyride through the ship blasting everyone in sight.

The levels are straight forward: NPCs will direct you to your next destination, tell you how to unlock doors or where to get a new weapon. They are essentially linear, keeping the gameplay flowing smoothly, the action consistent, and most importantly never letting you get lost due to lack of a map while giving the illusion of open-endedness.

One half of Riddick’s arsenal emphasizes the use of stealth, while the other features a selection of guns for those intense fire fights. He has about five different melee weapons including his Ulaks and hairpin, and if you slash at a wall, any scratches made on walls stay there for a long time – the strange thing is, doors don’t scratch. On the ranged weapon front, he has the usual FPS assortment of automatics, shotguns, and the Riddick-exclusive SCAR Gun, which fires a small dart you can detonate with the left trigger. The arsenal is very well balanced, allowing you to go all-out when the game calls for it, while having a decent array of melee weapons.

Visually Riddick is mixed bag. On board the Athena you’ll be treated to a largely drab environment with a few colourfully lit terminals. Once off, you’ll see a lot of ‘next gen brown’ visuals in town – even the plants are brown. The high point of the planetary visuals is definitely the ocean and scale of the environment compared to the ship’s small rooms.

This isn’t the longest game ever; it’ll take you a couple of days to beat on easy. However, the length works to Assault on Dark Athena’s advantage, as there aren’t any filler levels to drag the experience down. On top of that they have included the Xbox classic Escape from Butcher Bay, refurbished for the PS3/Xbox 360 in high definition – and it looks better than ever. Not only has it aged well but it adds a lot of value to the otherwise short sequel.

Once you beat the two single player titles, you can take the action to Xbox Live or PlayStation Network. Multiplayer modes on offer include the usual deathmatch, team deathmatch, and capture the flag modes, on top of Riddick’s most original mode, Pitch Black, in which players are thrown into a pitch black arena, where one player is Riddick and the rest are forced to hunt him in the dark.

As much as I’ve gushed over how the great this title is, there are some notable bugs, including a fight in Village Square where you meet the first alpha drone: it can fire grenades and its machine gun through a solid wall – it would be a huge problem if they weren’t so easy to kill.

Players looking for a pure stealth game will be disappointed, but everyone else will find in Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena a healthy mix of action, stealth and heavy weapon gameplay.

Score: 8.5 out of 10