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Dungeon Lords on April 20th worldwide
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Garrett
 
 




Joined: 13 Jul 2001
Posts: 74
Location: Munich, Germany
Dungeon Lords on April 20th worldwide
   

We just received official word from Dreamcatcher announcing the new worldwide release date for D.W. Bradley's highly anticipated RPG Dungeon Lords. Here's the full PR:<blockquote><em>DREAMCATCHER GAMES ANNOUNCES NEW RELEASE DATE FOR DUNGEON LORDS
<br>
<br>The First Combat RPG Will Be Available April 2005
<br>
<br>
<br>DreamCatcher Games today announced that Dungeon Lords, the world's first combat role-playing game, will ship worldwide for Windows® on 20th April 2005.
<br>
<br>Gamers have much to look forward to in the coming months as DreamCatcher releases all-new gameplay footage, screenshots and a new trailer, offering an up-close look at a truly unique role-playing experience. Official single and multiplayer demos will also be available around launch.
<br>
<br>Dungeon Lords blends the depth of an epic fantasy RPG with the flexibility of an FPS-style control system. Gamers journey through a land of ancient castles and dungeon lairs to engage in real-time tactical combat with a variety of deadly foes. It's not just about the battles though, as magic spells and hundreds of powerful weapons and artefacts play a huge role in the game.
<br>
<br>The game features an abundance of personal missions and quests along with numerous characters to interact with. Players can customize an extensive variety of skills and special abilities for the hero, including race and class specializations. The simple and intuitive design will suit RPG and action fans alike and supports cooperative multiplayer for up to eight players.
<br>
<br>Dungeon Lords is being designed, written and developed by award-winning computer game author, D.W. Bradley (Wizards & Warriors and three of the legendary Wizardry titles) and Heuristic Park, Inc. and has an anticipated ESRB Rating of 'T' for Teen in North America and '12+' in Europe.</em></blockquote>
Post Wed Jan 26, 2005 12:23 am
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Marney
Village Dweller
Village Dweller




Joined: 26 Jan 2005
Posts: 9
   

"Dungeon Lords is being designed, written and developed by award-winning computer game author, D.W. Bradley (Wizards & Warriors"

You'd think he'd want to cover that up. Or at the very least, avoid advertising the fact that he was responsible for such an unbalanced, untested, obnoxious, backward, puerile piece of irredeemable trash.

I still haven't forgiven him for that atrocious travesty of a "game." DL sounds like everything I'd like in a game, but from now on, if Bradley's name is on anything, I'll wait for a review - no, several reviews - and a playable demo before I buy it. And even then it'll be from a shop with an ironclad no-questions-asked refund policy.

Feh. When I remember the rhythmically heaving pixellated cleavage of that watermill woman and her nauseatingly miserable (and unskippable, natch) voice "acting" I feel like putting my fist through the screen. Bad memories, bad memories.
Post Wed Jan 26, 2005 12:38 am
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Guest







Frank
   

Be frank Marney. Are you saying you did not like Wizards and Warriors?
Post Wed Jan 26, 2005 3:01 am
 
Marney
Village Dweller
Village Dweller




Joined: 26 Jan 2005
Posts: 9
   

However did you get that impression?
Post Wed Jan 26, 2005 3:31 am
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RetoS
Village Dweller
Village Dweller




Joined: 03 Feb 2003
Posts: 3
Flawed but fun
   

For me, Wizards and Warriors was a perfect example how a game can be plagued by terrible game balance, an extremely clumsy interface, numerous glaring bugs... --- and still be FUN!
I'm not exactly sure why I liked the game in spite of all this shortcomings, but I really enjoyed most of it.

So I'm willing to forgive DWB, but I certainly hope Heuristic Park have improved their QA processes in the meantime!

P.S.: Oh yes, I think the dungeon design was very good and probably saved the game for me.
Post Wed Jan 26, 2005 7:58 am
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Marney
Village Dweller
Village Dweller




Joined: 26 Jan 2005
Posts: 9
   

I have to admit that I put up with that dreck myself for far longer than I feel, in hindsight, it warranted. Before the more mindbogglingly stupid bugs showed up I was sort of enjoying myself. Sort of.

The combat was only moderately bad and the character development system seemed to have potential. I was looking forward to finding the arena mentioned in the manual (never did) and building up a potential Zen Master. And I really liked the "Reset Adventures" button - I could build up my party as I liked, poke everyone and everything with sharp pointy things, and if I poked someone or something I later decided I wanted something from before I poked him, well, no problem - reset adventures. Cool!

Eventually, of course, the cold hard reality hit me in the face like a .45 clue bullet. I was plodding through some dull new area (not an oxymoron in W&W, unfortunately) when I rounded a 75-degree corner of forest-wall (never knew trees could make such sharp turns before - hey, how's the handling on that beech?) and saw, right in front of my face, what I had learned to fear and dread most - a friendly NPC. Steeling myself for yet another agonizingly bad speech, I closed my eyes and clicked.

And that's when the thought suddenly struck me: DW Bradley is a moron. It is far from a coincidence that the best Wizardry of them all came out only after he left the design team. He honestly doesn't realize that it's DUMB to prevent people from adding points to their skills because the status screen can't display all the information. He thinks calling races "clans" and classes "roles" is a revolutionary step hitherto unimagined in CRPGs. He came up with ridiculous names like "Oomphaz" and "Whiskas" all by himself. He's responsible for making me FedEx the same damn arrows to the same damn person over and over again. And, worst of all, he actually believes there's some girl out there who'll willingly play a bipedal elephant.

Sorry, buddy, but no matter what kind of stat bonuses you dangle in front of me, I'm not going anywhere near that particular "clan." Stuff it in your shoe.

I sighed, listened halfheartedly to the snake-creature blithering about some lamp or gem or statue or whatever the hell it was hidden somewhere in the temple. Reflexively, I tapped the space bar and ESC button alternately to skip its nonsensical rambling, but naturally nothing happened BECAUSE YOU MUST LISTEN TO THE IMPORTANT NPC!

I contemplated another four hours of peering at poorly-textured floors, hoping to spot some miserable McGuffin to advance the farcically generic plot. I wondered why I cared.

And then I realized the truth, the sweet, liberating truth: I didn't.

I Ctrl-Alt-Deleted my way out of the mess and deleted the game from my hard drive. It was done. I was free.

And I'm not even bitter about the fifty bucks I wasted or the hours of tedium I endured, hoping that, experience notwithstanding, things would get better.

No, I'm not bitter. Much.
Post Wed Jan 26, 2005 9:09 am
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InsaneOrc
Eager Tradesman
Eager Tradesman




Joined: 16 Jun 2004
Posts: 27
Location: Germania
   

nice report, marney ! I finally deleted W&W because it didn't like my ATI-card, but i think i'll give DL a try.
Post Wed Jan 26, 2005 1:25 pm
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crpgnut
Captain of the Guard
Captain of the Guard




Joined: 22 May 2002
Posts: 197
Location: St. Louis
   

Just a side note here: There was this insane egotist that claimed he was going to make a Wizardry clone that would be much better than W&W and that he would release it before Bradley released Wizards and Warriors. That game STILL hasn't been released and Bradley is about to release his second crpg. His name was something like Cloven Braincase. The name of his game escapes me at the moment....
_________________
'nut
Post Wed Jan 26, 2005 2:44 pm
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Marney
Village Dweller
Village Dweller




Joined: 26 Jan 2005
Posts: 9
   

Someday, Grimoire will be the punchline to as many nerdy jokes as Daikatana.
Post Wed Jan 26, 2005 8:19 pm
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the mighty stamar
High Emperor
High Emperor




Joined: 01 Feb 2003
Posts: 602
Location: arcata ca, humboldt county
   

I liked wizards and warriors a lot

it shipped with unplayable bugs but it was very interesting. I think it would make my top 10 fav crpgs somewhere near the bottom.

Great plot and story. On the short side to be a real classic. I love all the character development and the party. I expect dungeon lords to have some great writing in it.

I really dug the insane dash trying to get to the castle past the superhuman venus fly trap things. It was tough lol

I liked wizardry 8 a lot more its near my top though.
Post Sat Jan 29, 2005 7:56 am
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