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Dhruin
Stranger In A Strange Land
Joined: 20 May 2002
Posts: 1825
Location: Sydney, Australia |
Dungeon Lords: Review @ GameSpot |
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The first of the 'Dungeon Lords' reviews from the big sites comes courtesy of GameSpot, with their <a href="http://www.gamespot.com/pc/rpg/dungeonlords/review.html" target="_blank">critique</a> awarding 6.8/10:<blockquote><em>Though today's role-playing games are often expected to be sweeping, story-driven epics, it used to be that most such games were pure dungeon crawls. You'd guide a band of adventurers through increasingly dangerous mazes filled with more and more, bigger and bigger monsters, while finding treasure, solving the occasional puzzle, and gaining experience levels. Dungeon Lords is a throwback to this style of gaming, with its emphasis on hack-and-slash combat and corridor crawls. As such, it's consistent with designer D.W. Bradley's previous works, which include some of the later titles in the classic Wizardry series. Dungeon Lords is a lengthy game that can offer a lot of the basic thrills that make role-playing games fun to play. Unfortunately, a slew of noticeably missing features and other problems may well end up drawing too much of your attention away from the game's good parts.</em></blockquote> |
Sat May 14, 2005 8:54 am |
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Priest4hire
Head Merchant
Joined: 08 May 2002
Posts: 52
Location: Slocan, BC |
Well, that's certainly the most balanced review thus far. The first review was oddly disconnected from the actual game and the second too bitter and vitriolic. It's nice to see a review that balances both the positive qualities and the problems. _________________ Watch your back. Shoot straight. Conserve ammo. And never, ever, cut a deal with a dragon.
Grammaton Dragon
-==(UDIC)==- |
Sat May 14, 2005 8:57 am |
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Amparo
Guest
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Yes, an objective, journalistic quality review. Gamespot's reputation precedes them. In fact, they used to have RPG reviews contributed by (may still do) the legendary Desslock. |
Sat May 14, 2005 12:06 pm |
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Guest
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I agree that some thought went into it but it also contains a lot of nonsense.
"Dungeon Lords is a throwback to this style of gaming, with its emphasis on hack-and-slash combat and corridor crawls."
Is Diablo a throw back? Is Elderscrolls? Is IWD? There is no throw back. Its the same crap in a different package. What he states is a throw back is actually the way it is today and will be tomorrow with few exceptions. Way too few to say dungeon-crawls are now not the norm and are a throw back to some distant historic old-school way of doing it. Unless we throw back to the present, but thats not much of a throw back. Hellgate London won't be a dungeon crawl? I don't get it and would like it explained. |
Sat May 14, 2005 9:44 pm |
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Guest
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quote: Originally posted by Anonymous
I agree that some thought went into it but it also contains a lot of nonsense.
"Dungeon Lords is a throwback to this style of gaming, with its emphasis on hack-and-slash combat and corridor crawls."
Is Diablo a throw back? Is Elderscrolls? Is IWD? There is no throw back. Its the same crap in a different package. What he states is a throw back is actually the way it is today and will be tomorrow with few exceptions. Way too few to say dungeon-crawls are now not the norm and are a throw back to some distant historic old-school way of doing it. Unless we throw back to the present, but thats not much of a throw back. Hellgate London won't be a dungeon crawl? I don't get it and would like it explained.
I bet you fall down a lot. |
Sat May 14, 2005 10:10 pm |
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Rendelius
Critical Error
Joined: 06 Jul 2001
Posts: 16
Location: Austria |
Just a quick note: I bought this game yesterday - despite the negative postings and despite my own low expectations (which were VERY low indeed).
So far, I think the game isn't too bad. Actually, I am having fun with it for now. No big hit, but well - as I said, I am having fun.
Rend _________________ Rendelius
former Senior Editor RPGDot
now at http://www.theastronomers.com |
Sun May 15, 2005 8:26 am |
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Wolfgarou
Guards Lieutenant
Joined: 29 May 2003
Posts: 163
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quote: Originally posted by Anonymous
I agree that some thought went into it but it also contains a lot of nonsense.
"Dungeon Lords is a throwback to this style of gaming, with its emphasis on hack-and-slash combat and corridor crawls."
Is Diablo a throw back? Is Elderscrolls? Is IWD? There is no throw back. Its the same crap in a different package. What he states is a throw back is actually the way it is today and will be tomorrow with few exceptions. Way too few to say dungeon-crawls are now not the norm and are a throw back to some distant historic old-school way of doing it. Unless we throw back to the present, but thats not much of a throw back. Hellgate London won't be a dungeon crawl? I don't get it and would like it explained.
Throwback or no, dungeon crawls are here to stay (and on contrary to leet RPG-ers, they're fun to play). The only difference between DL and games like Diablo2/Dark Alliance is DL got it all wrong by being an unpolished incomplete buggy mess. I might still get it, but I'm willing to bet Hellgate: London will beat the crap out of DL. _________________ The world is small, nasty and complicated, and everybody dies alone... - Sam Fisher |
Sun May 15, 2005 4:58 pm |
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yeesh
Keeper of the Gates
Joined: 03 May 2002
Posts: 113
Location: Unofficially representing Queens |
I have bought this as well, and patched it immediately. It's a good time, but there are definitely some issues worth complaining about. A lack of character customization means absolutely nothing to me; you're going to be wearing armor anyway, so does it really matter what color your hair is?
On the other hand, the rich multiclass system is sort of cheapened by the fact that although each class has stated, specific skill and stat reqs to join, the trainers tell you you've met the reqs and let you join even if you haven't. Bug or feature? You decide. In addition, you seem to have to either hit the forums or puzzle out for yourself exactly how the multiclass system works. There are different "tiers" of classes, and you can have 2 first-tier, 2 second-tier, and one third-tier class, but this is not explained anywhere.
The lack of an automap in such a big, empty wilderness is pretty painful. One of the pleasures about wondering around in W&W was that you could look at your map and see the big swaths that you'd colored in; at least you were sort of accomplishing something. And of course there was less getting lost.
I'll tell you this: Action RPGs are the inheritors of CRPGs. Combat in the olden days was really less of an RPG facet and more of a Strategy facet, and time has proven that strategic combat is popular only with demographically insignificant people like myself and of course the Japanese. You're not going to see the old kind of combat any more, and that's pretty much ok with me. You want to talk about playing a role? Swing that sword yourself, dodge that magic missile, and run from that giant gibbering whatzit. There was nothing inherently RPG about the way combat used to be, and there's nothing inherently unRPG about action games. |
Sun May 15, 2005 5:23 pm |
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Garrett
Joined: 13 Jul 2001
Posts: 74
Location: Munich, Germany |
quote: Originally posted by Rendelius
Just a quick note: I bought this game yesterday - despite the negative postings and despite my own low expectations (which were VERY low indeed).
So far, I think the game isn't too bad. Actually, I am having fun with it for now. No big hit, but well - as I said, I am having fun.
Rend
see? I told you it's not that band and can be fun. Just don't expect something like Gothic, consider it to be something like Underworld or Arx with an upper world! |
Mon May 16, 2005 5:11 pm |
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