Dark Messiah of Might and Magic: Elements Reviews

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Written by BuckGB on February 26th, 2008

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The first few levels certainly don't paint a bright future for the whole adventure. The start is peppered with lengthy loading screens (accompanied by some of the worst scripting we've ever seen in a game), poor tutorials and a gauntletful of super-confusing scenarios. Matters are made worse by the fact that compared to the slew of stunning games we were bombarded with at the end of 2007, Dark Messiah is ugly.

Deeper into the game, things start to brighten up, and not just because you escape the dreary dark castle that serves as your surroundings for the introductory stages. Smashing enemies in the face with your weapon of choice is incredibly gratifying, and the variety of attacks and abilities provided by each class means that there's plenty of potential for bashing through the game a second or even third time. The downside to this class system, however, is that you can only use weapons and magic appropriate to your character - so the Assassin for example, can't use the Wizard's staff or even the Archer's bow or Warrior's sword and shield.

All of which soon becomes clear as you make your way through the main campaign. As your chosen warrior, you'll progress through each relatively linear level in a standard manner, dispatching enemies with a variety of different combat mechanics and environmental triggers. In this respect, the level flow is typical of any FPS, with the depth of the RPG elements only skin-deep at best; combat gains the majority of focus here.

Which is a shame, because it really isn't very good. Each class has it's own differing style, with the archer and thief designed to hang back or sneak around for high damage singular attacks, and the mage and warrior fulfilling the tanking quota. The problem here lies purely in the mechanics however, which are unsatisfying at best, and an absolute mess at worst.

The combat is mildly interesting, but it, too has issues. The physics system lets players kick enemies off bridges and into spiked walls, which seems fun until you're forced to do these physics-based activities because of your overly weak normal attacks, or when you're compelled to cut ropes and kick support beams to drop rocks on enemies. At this point, the physics novelty quickly becomes a pain. The rest of the combat doesn't fare well either, as the swordplay is fast and furious but uneven, and trying to land certain blows seem to happen by pure chance. The bow and arrow require no real skill either, and in fact they do so little damage that you'll find yourself forgetting it's even an option. And let's not forget the voice of a Wizard mentor who tells you what to do next if you've taken care of all the enemies, a feature that probably could have been implemented better with a simple text box.

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