[Roper Klacks]

Originally Posted by Gazzoid

I never really thought that much of the way the story was told either. But for me, the strongest point of the original Half-Life will always be the gameplay and not the story. If I'd've played this game at the time of its release then I'd probably think differently.

At that time, FPS's were all using the same storytelling technics, invented by id. A series of levels with a bunch of enemies, and the story was told by rudimentar cutscenes or more commonly with text, most of them didn't even have a narrative and plot.

Half-Life was one of the first FPS to use environmental storytelling and a non stop direct narrative. The plot was not described to you, but rather lived by you. Well you played it so you know what i'm talking about. That was so new and so bold at that time.

Then similar games started to do the same (Deus ex, System Shock 2 and more recently Valve's Portal and Left 4 Dead, Bioshock). I think its hard to acomplish this kind of technique thats why so few managed to successfully recreate that.

Originally Posted by Gazzoid

EDIT: On another note, when is Half-Life: Black Mesa gonna be released? I can't wait to try that out.

I've been waiting for sooo looong. I guess they plan to release it before the summer, but we never know.

[DustyShinigami]

The Beast Within - A Gabriel Knight Mystery

Positives:

+ Another fantastic, engrossing and well written mystery story that's been thoroughly researched by Jane Jenson. This story grabbed me from the get-go when I first played it. Werewolves appeal to me more than a Voodoo cult anyway. That, and the fact it's sort of an interactive movie, immersed me that much more. But the mystery, and how it's tied in to the Werewolf plot, of King Ludwig II made/makes the story even more deeper and interesting to follow. Another great example of a story that mixes fact and fiction seamlessly together to great effect.
+ Great, interesting, memorable, likeable (and sometimes even unlikeable) characters. Each have their own background, personality and inner struggles/demons to overcome. The main characters develop further as the game progresses.
+ Acting is generally well done considering the game stars a lot of 'unknown' actors/actresses. Peter Lucas in particular gives the most memorable performance as the mysterious Von Glower.
+ The game is accompanied with a fantastic, gothic, haunting, memorable and beautiful music score, which again, is masterfully composed by Robert Holmes. If not for the soundtrack, this game's atmosphere would surely be lacking.
+ Although the graphics are pixelated and dated, I liked when I first played the game (and still like) how photographs of places in Germany are used in the game. This was also the first FMV game I played, and again, although the quality is dated, I still like how the green screen the actors performed in front of were filled in with these photographic images and props. The FMV, photographic images and music give this game an appropriate 'retro' feeling that gives me a cozy feeling.
+ All the puzzles are pretty logical with only the exception of a few minor ones.
+ Gameplay is solid and fun. As already mentioned, thanks to it being an FMV game it's almost like an interactive movie. Each action you take progresses the 'movie' and story further. And on the one hand, you'll be investigating, collecting clues/evidence, interrogating characters/suspects... and on the other, you'll be conducting a lot of research.

Negatives:

- The acting can be pretty weak at times and can occasionally be overdone or underdone. And with the exception of some actors/actresses, the German accents tend to be stereotypical and poorly done.
- Due to technology limitations, the quality of the FMV sequences can be poor. This is mainly thanks to compression. Some sequences are either plagued with artefacts, or the audio quality has problems. This can either be things like actor's lines sounding quieter than usual, lines sounding a bit garbled, or even worse, loud hissing noises when actors say any words with an 's'.
- The 'one click' interface tends to make gameplay a bit too simplistic.

Overall:

[DustyShinigami]

Originally Posted by Roper Klacks

At that time, FPS's were all using the same storytelling technics, invented by id. A series of levels with a bunch of enemies, and the story was told by rudimentar cutscenes or more commonly with text, most of them didn't even have a narrative and plot.

Half-Life was one of the first FPS to use environmental storytelling and a non stop direct narrative. The plot was not described to you, but rather lived by you. Well you played it so you know what i'm talking about. That was so new and so bold at that time.

Then similar games started to do the same (Deus ex, System Shock 2 and more recently Valve's Portal and Left 4 Dead, Bioshock). I think its hard to acomplish this kind of technique thats why so few managed to successfully recreate that.

I completely get and understand what you mean and where you're coming from. I wouldn't worry too much as my feelings towards the game's story/narrative aren't really fiery or anything. I appreciate and understand that this was pretty much the norm for FPS back then. And at least Half-Life has more of a plot than the original DOOM.

I've been waiting for sooo looong. I guess they plan to release it before the summer, but we never know.

God, I sure hope so. That, as well as Gray Matter, Monkey Island 2: SE, and Alan Wake would sure make my year.

[JemyM]

Lands of Lore: Throne of Chaos
I always were a fan of the Eye of the Beholder series. Unfortunately only the first two were ever released on Amiga and I didn't have a PC until much much later. Both Eye of the Beholder III and Lands of Lore (that was going to be EotB3) were released on PC but it took many years until I got to finish EotB3 on my own. And it would take yet many years before I could finish Lands of Lore on my own, so I did tonight.

Story
Scotia, the witch, controls the dark army that threatens the kingdom.
King Richard (voiced by Patrick Stewart) send out the player to find the Ruby of Truth. Right outside King Richard keeps you encounter Scotia herself but she doesn't attack, instead right when you get back into the keep Scotia attacks and poisons King Richard. The rest of the game is spent searching for a way to cure him.

The storytelling is a step above for the time. It plays out partially by comments made by your characters and partially in cutscenes. The events unfold one by one taking new twists and turns just when you thought you done it all.

Graphics & Sound
For it's time, Lands of Lore is a beautiful game. If one appreciate "handpainted" pixeled artwork, this one is really well made. It doesn't have the ugly FMV or 3d Graphics that would be mainstream right after Lands of Lore was released. The sound is well done with some great music (sounds especially good with a good soundfont) and the voice acting is great, including Patrick Stewart.
Unlike Eye of the Beholder, Lands of Lore uses some pseudo-3d engine that appears 3d when turning around and when you move, but behaves just like a static 2d dungeon crawler. The character portraits are animated and behave according to whatever happens to them (take damage etc).

Engine & Gameplay
The 6-character party of the Eye of the Beholder series is now only 3 and you only have 3 classes to level. Each character can level all three classes by using the primary weapon of choice for the class. A Fighter strikes better and level up by using melee weapons. A Rogue is used for ranged combat and lockpicks and is ofcourse boosted by using ranged weapons or throwing. The mage have several spells in his arsenal but must use offensive spells to gain levels. At the end of the game you most likely have leveled all your characters to at least some levels in each class.

The game is really hardcore. There's one particular item that makes an almost impossible level just hard and for story reasons it seems intuitive to waste it before you even get there. There are monsters that earthquake and make you drop all your weapons on the ground, leaving you to figure out how to beat them without weapons. There are monster that eat your armor from you, monsters that take no damage from anything but a level 4 spark etc. Just figuring out how to beat the monsters is quite nasty. Still, it brings a challenge and variated maps. Each new level means new content, new music, new puzzles, new monsters and new loot. It's really what's fun in a game, I think.

Final Conclusions
This is one of those middle-90'ies gems that still today is worthy of a playthrough. The story is well written and storytelling have taken a great step forward compared to Eye of the Beholder. Gameplay is unfortunately a step down to Eye of the Beholder I think. Only 3 characters and no Dungeons & Dragons mechanics.

I do not plan to play Lands of Lore 2 anytime soon. I have watched bits of a playthrough on youtube and while that is somewhat enjoyable, I prefer partybased RPG's.

[JemyM]

Originally Posted by Gazzoid

I know DOOM 3 is a remake of the original. And yes, Valve were inspired by the original DOOM's gameplay more than the actual story (I'm pretty sure I read/heard it somewhere but I can't remember where). But you can't deny that the story of DOOM 3 is a bit similar to Half-Life's:

I say DOOM 3 have more in common with System Shock (that also came prior Bioshock and Dead Space). That said, DOOM 3 is one creepy game.

[DustyShinigami]

Originally Posted by JemyM

I say DOOM 3 have more in common with System Shock (that also came prior Bioshock and Dead Space). That said, DOOM 3 is one creepy game.

I still haven't played the System Shock games yet so I can't really comment.

And I'll never forget the first time I played DOOM 3 - I was literally trembling at the keyboard when all hell broke loose.

[SharonB]

Originally Posted by JemyM

Lands of Lore: Throne of Chaos
I always were a fan of the Eye of the Beholder series. Unfortunately only the first two were ever released on Amiga and I didn't have a PC until much much later. Both Eye of the Beholder III and Lands of Lore (that was going to be EotB3) were released on PC but it took many years until I got to finish EotB3 on my own. And it would take yet many years before I could finish Lands of Lore on my own, so I did tonight.

Story
Scotia, the witch, controls the dark army that threatens the kingdom.
King Richard (voiced by Patrick Stewart) send out the player to find the Ruby of Truth. Right outside King Richard keeps you encounter Scotia herself but she doesn't attack, instead right when you get back into the keep Scotia attacks and poisons King Richard. The rest of the game is spent searching for a way to cure him.

The storytelling is a step above for the time. It plays out partially by comments made by your characters and partially in cutscenes. The events unfold one by one taking new twists and turns just when you thought you done it all.

Graphics & Sound
For it's time, Lands of Lore is a beautiful game. If one appreciate "handpainted" pixeled artwork, this one is really well made. It doesn't have the ugly FMV or 3d Graphics that would be mainstream right after Lands of Lore was released. The sound is well done with some great music (sounds especially good with a good soundfont) and the voice acting is great, including Patrick Stewart.
Unlike Eye of the Beholder, Lands of Lore uses some pseudo-3d engine that appears 3d when turning around and when you move, but behaves just like a static 2d dungeon crawler. The character portraits are animated and behave according to whatever happens to them (take damage etc).

Engine & Gameplay
The 6-character party of the Eye of the Beholder series is now only 3 and you only have 3 classes to level. Each character can level all three classes by using the primary weapon of choice for the class. A Fighter strikes better and level up by using melee weapons. A Rogue is used for ranged combat and lockpicks and is ofcourse boosted by using ranged weapons or throwing. The mage have several spells in his arsenal but must use offensive spells to gain levels. At the end of the game you most likely have leveled all your characters to at least some levels in each class.

The game is really hardcore. There's one particular item that makes an almost impossible level just hard and for story reasons it seems intuitive to waste it before you even get there. There are monsters that earthquake and make you drop all your weapons on the ground, leaving you to figure out how to beat them without weapons. There are monster that eat your armor from you, monsters that take no damage from anything but a level 4 spark etc. Just figuring out how to beat the monsters is quite nasty. Still, it brings a challenge and variated maps. Each new level means new content, new music, new puzzles, new monsters and new loot. It's really what's fun in a game, I think.

Final Conclusions
This is one of those middle-90'ies gems that still today is worthy of a playthrough. The story is well written and storytelling have taken a great step forward compared to Eye of the Beholder. Gameplay is unfortunately a step down to Eye of the Beholder I think. Only 3 characters and no Dungeons & Dragons mechanics.

I do not plan to play Lands of Lore 2 anytime soon. I have watched bits of a playthrough on youtube and while that is somewhat enjoyable, I prefer partybased RPG's.

I remember playing this game. I loved it. The only part I didn't enjoy was near the end when you had to get across this area that had hidden holes in the floor. I threw the game away many years ago, because I couldn't play it on my system at the time and I didn't know any better. I lost a lot of good games that way and had to rebuy them later. Now if there's a good game that I can't play, I just hold on to it.

I also played Lands of Lore 3 and really liked that game. I played it through several times.

[HaroldO]

Metal Gear Solid 3: Subsistence
My favorite game in the series so far (I played MGS, MGS2 and MGS3 now). The beginning was tough as I was very sure of how to deal with so much gameplay changes. But a few hours in and I mastered CQC and some infiltration techniques and everything was just fine. I loved the characters, specially Naked Snake, The Boss, The End and Ocelot. Damn, young Ocelot is so awesome. The game was a bit too long, but that was mostly because of my sluggish style. It took me 30 hours to finish it. The last 5 hours were one of the most touching and exciting I've ever spend with a controller on my hands. In a time when there are some many great games and barely time to play a fraction of them, MGS 3 is one of the few I'd feel happy to replay multiple times.

[nonax]

Nancy Drew: The Final Scene

I just love Nancy Drew!

[Denaron]

Originally Posted by HaroldO

Metal Gear Solid 3: Subsistence
My favorite game in the series so far (I played MGS, MGS2 and MGS3 now).

Apart from MGS4, the third one is my favorite too. I loved the characters, specially Naked Snake, The Boss, The End and Ocelot. Damn, young Ocelot is so awesome.

Apart from MGS 4, the third one is my favorite too.

The characters you quoted are indeed awesome, but in my opinion The Sorrow was the most interesting char in MGS3. This scene is just unforgettable.

Do you know the difference between the "Snake Eater" and "Subsistence" releases? I think I've already asked it to someone here but I don't remember the answer.

[HaroldO]

Originally Posted by Denaron

Do you know the difference between the "Snake Eater" and "Subsistence" releases? I think I've already asked it to someone here but I don't remember the answer.

If you only take into account the main disc (Subsistence), the only major difference between that and Snake Eater is the camera. While Snake eater had a fixed camera that could be slightly adjusted with the right analog stick, Subsistence had a fully 3D camera that you could manually operate with the stick. That is, except with the final battle in which you had to use the Snake Eater camera scheme. The new camera made the game a little easier in my opinion.

[Denaron]

Originally Posted by HaroldO

If you only take into account the main disc (Subsistence), the only major difference between that and Snake Eater is the camera. While Snake eater had a fixed camera that could be slightly adjusted with the right analog stick, Subsistence had a fully 3D camera that you could manually operate with the stick. That is, except with the final battle in which you had to use the Snake Eater camera scheme. The new camera made the game a little easier in my opinion.

Ohh, I see. Same camera used in MGS4 then. Awesome!

Just finished The Black Mirror

Interesting game despite the fact that was easy to predict who was the murderer. Now, I'm looking forward to Black Mirror 2.

3.5/5

[Blackheart]

Battlefield: Bad Company 2

Nice war game and if you've played the first one the sequel is a step up.

Story
The events pick up after the first game with the memorable and personable squad we remember from Bad Company as they are called into action on a new mission on the day the sarge is supposed to retire. What ensues turns out to be a complex multi-layered dilemma which turns into a global catastrophe and along the way we see espionage, betrayal, high octane action, and some of the most ridiculous conversation exchanges between your teammates that will leave you in stitches at times. Full of adrenaline and personality Bad Company 2 is a solid shooter game despite some serious flaws and still manages to deliver a nice war scenario. Recommended for FPS veterans and is not for the casual gamer.

The Good

- Impressive graphics which convincingly convey the combat tension when needed as well as portray the look of urban war zones consumed by chaos. The visuals as well as the nice lighting and shadow rendering really set the mood and tone for the game.

- Nice arsenal of satisfying weapons that really do the damage when needed and are fun to use. The default weapon, the XM8 assault rifle [a real gun btw], is by far the most versatile weapon which shoots fairly accurately in short and mid ranges with minimal recoil, has a scope for long range, and comes equipped with the XM320 grenade launcher attachment for taking out large groups of enemies. Shotguns really pack a punch and there's a diverse selection of sniper rifles all with their respective benefits.

- Solid shooting mechanics and bloody combat sure to satisfy action fans.

- The GeoMod engine for destructible environments, first introduced in Red Faction, is faithfully recreated here. Virtually every building in the game can be laid to waste. Having issues with some problematic sniper or a group of enemies camping out inside of a building? Instead of trying to snipe them through a window or doorway, why not just level the whole building around them? Nice.

- Impressive sound design. Everything is well done in terms of sound from the diverse gunshots for each respective weapon to the explosions to the ambient sounds. Enemies sneaking around you sound just as effective as their screams when you blow them away .

The Bad

- Lots of weapons enemies use have unrealistic shot ranges, such as shotguns, which are supposed to be close quarter combat weapons, can hit and heavily damage you more than 10 meters away .

- Too many combat scenarios which can be a little too reminiscent of Modern Warfare 2. There are quite a few situations such as: using a UAV satellite to take out targets, shooting down helicopters, pulling out binoculars and marking targets for air strikes, LZ helicopter combat, tank combat, and more which I felt were simply cloned scenarios from MW2. I was wanting a little more diversity in the combat.

- In a need to build up intense action the game throws a multitude of different combat scenarios at you all at once which can be a little overwhelming, more brutal than MW2, and unrealistic. Taking out an enemy outpost littered with infantry, soldiers on machine gun turrets, snipers, other enemies with RPGs is one thing, but when you have to confront all that as well as fight off two havoc helicopters at the same time then it gets a little ridiculous. Hope you're good at fast weapon switching on the fly.

- Can only carry two weapons at a time. I mean, seriously, WTF?!? For some of the downright hardcore combat situations you find yourself in it would have been nice to have a larger selection of weapons at your disposal.

- No cooperative LAN play on single player campaign. Would be nice if a friend could jump in and take control of one of your squad mates, but it just isn't so...

The downright Ugly

- Regenerative health system can take a little too long to heal at times.

- Unforgiving difficulty setting on "normal" and "hardcore" will either have you crying or screaming and cursing at your monitor as you pound the life out of your keyboard . What is supposed to be the game designers' idea of "challenging" can at times be more like having teeth pulled than an enjoyable gaming experience. The damage system is relentless even on normal and the normal difficulty setting can be comparable to other games' hard setting. Two shots and you're critical at near death. MW2 and Gears of War aren't even that crucial in their damage systems. Sometimes it only takes one shot. I remember in one of my normal games running from one cover to another and an enemy who was half a screen away in the distance killed me with a single shotgun blast. BAM! Dead just like that. Compound this with guns that have an unrealistic range, overwhelming combat scenarios of fighting off too much crap at once, and a slowly regenerating health system and there's an equation for a lot of dying. Watch out for flying keys. Thankfully, all of this offset by the "easy" difficulty setting which is more tolerable and with a little skill is manageable enough to beat.

- Poor driving mechanics. Every vehicle regardless of type, even ATVs, handle like water boats or tugboat barges.

Conclusion

Where the game fails with its flaws it can be brutal, yet, if you can get past this then you might find a rewarding shooting experience. This is because where the game succeeds it does these elements really well. Well done technical audio and video production values as well as solid shooting mechanics, destructible environments and some really nice weapons can make for a really fun shooter. Not to mention some of the combat scenarios when the game isn't being merciless can be really fun. So, in the end it's up to you if you can make it past the bad to enjoy the good in the game all the more.

[TiAgUh]

Originally Posted by HaroldO

Metal Gear Solid 3: Subsistence

I got a special thing for the 2nd one but the 'dream' from the prison scene was simply epiiic!!

[Denaron]

I've just finished the main story of Just Cause 2, 20 hours of gameplay and 30% completion.

It's very fun to screw around in this game but the missions are very boring and the story is mediocre. The physics and the graphics are outstanding though. I got involved in serious accidents because of the gorgeous landscape around, that kept distracting me every time.

3.5

[DustyShinigami]

Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell

Positives:

+ The graphics are still pretty good considering it was done back in 2004. Environments are detailed, character models are good, levels and designs are good, and lighting and shadow effects are nicely done.
+ Solid voice acting from the main cast - Michael Ironside as Sam Fisher being the main standout - and even the NPCs with their comments.
+ Good use of 'stealthy' ambient music and sound effects.
+ Action/stealth gameplay is the most strongest, entertaining and fun component of the game (along with the whole Splinter Cell series, of course). It's also great that you have some sense of freedom to tackle your targets/opponents/objectives. Of course, it does depend on what Sam's superior, Lambert, allows you to do - exercising Fifth Freedom or not - but you can use Sam's weapons and gadgets, along with the environment, to help out. It's fun to sneak up on unsuspecting guards in the dark, grab them from behind, and either interrogate them or drag them away to knock them out. Toying with your opponents and playing cat and mouse with them is sweet. It's also good fun playing as a secret agent/spy as you infiltrate secret facilities, hack turrets, security cameras and computers etc.
+ Each level unlocks as you progress through the game enabling you to tackle them again.

Negatives:

- Quality of PC cutscenes aren't up to the same standards as the in-game graphics. The news report scenes are perfectly fine, but the rest seem to look quite blurry in comparison. Also, I find the cutscenes for the PS2 version to be much more superior compared to PC and XBOX versions. This also applies to the credits at the start and end of the game.
- The story does appsolutely nothing for me. When the likes of politics, governments, war and terrorists (the latter not so much) come up, my mind just switches off. It's the same with maths. There's not really that much in the way of a 'story' anyway, as far as I'm concerned.
- A lot of trial-and-error is involved.

The first Splinter Cell/stealth game I ever played. I got this game for free with the very first graphics card I bought - a shitty GeForce 5200 FX. Thinking back now, I'm quite surprised it let me play the game to be honest. I was a bit skeptical about the game at first as I didn't think it'd be my kind of game. But, I ended up really enjoying it.

Overall:

[Fantasysci5]

I've finished the good campaign on "Battle for Middle Earth 2".

I really liked it, how it didn't follow the main heroes everyone knows. That woulds be boring, at least to me. I loved how we saw what the elves and dwarves were doing when the men, Gondor and Rohan, are fighting.

The only thing I really disliked about the game was how the "in-place throwers", like the ents and the catupaults, will just sit there and get hit in the back from other throwers on the same team. *eye roll* And they can't follow a target, so when they throw the rock, it hits where the enemy was, but it doesn't work if they're running. Obviously that's true to life, though, and they do wonders against buildings, but oddly have no effect on the Worm that comes out of the ground. Oh well. lol I really liked the powers you could buy, and it was really fun. The countdown to the next wave always gave me a heart attack, though, from anticipation.

[JemyM]

Evil's Doom (Amiga, 1996)
This extremely rare Amiga-exclusive dungeon master clone had a troubled past. The original beta version was done but never published. Instead a "special edition" was planned, but this was never finished. The final edition of the game had bugs that made the game impossible to finish. Still, the beta have been floating around on the web since 1996 along with those dreadful bugs.

But then some fan begun working on it and managed to fix the bugs. The edition I have played is known as "1.8" from Mars 2010, which have the major bugs fixed and can thus be played until the ending.

More info:
http://hol.abime.net/3953
http://morphos.blog.com.es/2010/03/0...-vitux-8117566




Story
Horrible killings have struck the peaceful and everyone is scared for the unknown attackers. Vantan, who looks exactly like Conan, is sitting alone in the wilderness when he gets a vision of Death himself in the sky. The skeletal face calls out to him; "come to the Lost Legions".
Back to civilization, Vantan study old books and find an old legend about "lost legions", as well as references to a ruin on the Island of Noya. When the game begin, Vantan and a travel friend, Bamboola, have just traveled to Noya. Now they are standing in the Town Pier of Titangel. First task is to find the ruins so a visit to the tavern is in order...

The story is delivered in cutscenes and dialog, often told by an old man, known as the Chronicler, who happen to be quite mad. The english is questionable but it can be forgiven considering it's age. They try really hard to make a deep and complex story and it's part funny, part exciting, part silly. The developers have a sense of humor but sometimes they go a bit too far. There are many open direct references to real-world stuff or other franchises. You see references to Silmarilis, Crom and Rome, there are also dialogues in polish. I also found a Nivea Creme which I believe was an easter egg. Also many of the supposed ancient or wise NPC's you meet behave and speak like teenagers...

Graphics & Sound
Art in Evil's Doom is great but diminished somewhat from it's technical limitations. The artist who worked on the project was really good, I have to give them that. Cutscenes have full color artwork with a great amount of colors even though it's not perfect.

Thanks to a technical issue though, there are problems which cause the artwork to suffer. The first edition of the game was probably made with the old Amiga 500 in mind. A500 was capable of displaying high resolution (640x512) but only in 16 color. Even if some textures and artwork were updated with 256 color graphics, the walls and monsters are still presented in grayscale, leaving a rather dull impression to me. The game also suffers from it's interlaced resolution which cause flicker and is corrupted in WinUAE. I found a workaround using a tool known as "ModePro" which forces a screen to open up in the resolution you define. However, this solution added some other wierd artifacts but at least it's was better than it's almost unplayable vanilla mode.

The sound is pretty good. You hear the monsters behind walls ofcourse and there are some really good music too. The SFX adds to the creepiness of the game. The sound effects for sharks was a bit silly though, they sound like lions on crack.

Gameplay
You begin the game in the overworld map where you can talk to people, recruit new characters, buy items and progress your quest. There are no monsters here, just dialogue and the ability to move between static areas. It's from these areas you can enter the dungeons.

As a dungeon master clone you spend most of the game in dungeons that you move through with the help of your NUMPAD 4-9 keys. Beneath the dungeon interface you have your four characters, their portraits, current health, stamina and mana, and their left and right hand. You strike or use spells by rightclicking equipped items and you move them around with the left button, just like any dungeon crawler. Rightclick a portrait and you get to see the inventory and the characters stats.

Fighters will ofcourse deal most of the damage and protect the rear row where you might want a pair of spellcasters. Utilityspells are used quite alot, especially your automap, magic light since most dungeons are pitch black dark, and a feast spell (that recover hunger/thirst) which makes me wonder why they even bothered about implementing food in the game.

Unfortunately I have to say that the game is a bit unbalanced. There are definitely "best items in the game" and you know when you find them. Some items simply have double or triple the stats compared to other similar items. Characters can be a bit unbalanced too, one character I used had double the amount of intelligence/wisdom compared to other characters but only 1/7 the health.

I did miss a way to strike from the keyboard or have an autoattack button. The main fighters right hand are far from eachother and moving back and forth between them felt encumbersome. I played most of the game with a mousepad which made it difficult to move back/forth fast enough.

There are other nuisances such as being forced to work all the back up from a 10 floor dungeon after reaching a cutscene in the end, you do not need to fight monsters again but couldn't they have just moved you back to the first level?

Conclusion
I tried the beta when it began to circulate back in the 90'ies and it's first now that I finally got back to complete it. There are many flaws with Evil's Doom, still I found the overall experience to be enjoyable. I enjoy Dungeon Master clones and I have played lesser ones than this game. Besides some problems with balance, it's sometimes silly story and an interface that could have needed some more polish, the only real issue I had was it's lack of color. If you decide to give it a go, prepare to give it some love first to be able to get something in return. If you enjoy Dungeon Master clones and already played the old classics, definitely have a go at this one.

[D.C.]

I've finished my first playthrough of Sanitarium and loved it. Such an amazingly disturbing and weird game on so many levels. I enjoyed the atmosphere and the mystery of it all, piecing together theories of what was going on and taking in the subtext beneath the surface. Often I'd get a Twilight Zone vibe from the place, particularly the first town you visit -- only with pumpkins instead of cornfields. It'll be interesting to replay the game knowing what's happening the next time through. 9/10

[Hannes]

I played Bioshock and Bioshock 2 and absolutely loved them. Trying to get my hands on Mass Effect next.