Introduction
An isometric RPG released by Troika Games in Aug 2001, a studio which was founded by the creators of the original Fallout, a game that is sometimes overlooked and depending on who you ask, it's either a great game, or an average game with great potential. One thing is for sure, the setting of a sword and sorcery universe that entered the industrial era is something that can keep you busy. |
| Yay... I crashed and survived, again the lonely survivor! |
Gameplay
So this is your classic Isometric RPG that tried following in the footsteps of games like Baldur's Gate, Icewind Dale and Fallout. While being an interesting concept, the gameplay part of the game is very messy. While walking around is done through the usual clicking, dialogues are quite developed, typically for a RPG, the game world you explore is partly handcrafted and partly randomly generated when you travel between certain locations which helps make the world seem bigger than in some open world games where the world seems compressed so it can fit everything. |
| The first town to visit... I don't know why, but it reminds me of Tristam(Diablo). |
Buut I'm getting ahead of myself. A very fun part of the game is creating your character, a thing which is a little adventure in itself. Since the main theme of the game is Magic vs Technology, if you design your character to be a magic user he won't be effective at using technological stuff and vice-versa. Other than that, spending points in your character's traits, choosing his race, spending time picking from plenty of the available handcrafted potraits and choosing the background which affects the character can be quite fun. Or you can pick one of the pre-made ones. Each to his own I guess...
Now for the main game, you start on a zeppelin which is shot down and, being the hero, you are the only survivor of that crash. Before dying, an old gnome gives you a ring asking you to find "the boy" and from there on you start going into a plot which will keep you quite busy. You can solve your situations or quests either through violence or talking, plenty of things you will say can affect the evolution of the story.
The combat on the other hand, which you will have to resort to quite often, tends to be tedious, unbalanced and boring even though you can choose between real time and turn based. It's pretty much a game of dice and a bit of using the right gear and stats. While dexterity is the God-Stat in this game and magic the easy way out, going all technological can be interesting as you can craft some interesting weapons just by combining, mostly common stuff. Though ammo can be expensive and usually non-tech weapons can be just as good or better.
Graphics and Audio
Now being an isometric game, and an old one, you can't really expect too many fancy things. The world is nicely designed so it doesn't really show the age, textures remaining quite sharp, but only from the clunky and aged design UI you can tell the real age of the game. Otherwise it's quite relaxing to explore the world. The music on the other hand gets repetitive quite fast and voice acting is quite limited, which is pretty common for isometric games of that period, which forces you to rely on reading a lot of text. Ambient sounds sometimes fit the games but more often a slight delay can be felt. |
| The inventory is quite clean.. not too many slots but enough to keep you busy. |
Compatibility
If you are content with 800x600 then the game is pretty much into a situation of being installed and played, seemingly working quite well. However, installing the Unnoficial patch can improve the game and you can play it at up to 1920x1080 if you install the high resolution patch. Going above 1080p will force to you take a magnifying glass. |
| Combat in a dungeon. Click and use spells and hope for the best while the AI hopes for the best |
Wrap-up
This game is quite special in it's own way, while I still hope to see a remake or enhancement to the game to make it actually shine, the game can still provide lots of fun but only if you're feeling like committing to it. I gave up quite a few times before I managed to actually play it and I regretted not doing that sooner.
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