harshly underrated and misinterpreted game that underneath a layer of slapdash presentation is a lot of fun.
No, what we have here is a new breed entirely; a genre that has been attempted once or twice before (Hexen being perhaps the closest approximation) but never with quite the success it needed. Dark Messiah of Might & Magic: Elements (or DMMM:E) is a first person hack-em-up. Don't be fooled into thinking it is anything more than this. It might have some roleplay trappings, but at the end of the day, it neither wants to be nor tries to be anything else, and where most people go wrong is in expecting DMMM:E to offer an Oblivion-alike roleplaying experience. It doesn't. It never tried to.
So, with that out of the way, on to the review.
DMMM:E casts you as Sareth, the young apprentice of the wizard Phenrig, who is searching for certain artefacts for an unknown purpose. Sareth himself comes from uncertain origins, having never known his parents and spending his life under Phenrig's tutelage. Without spoiling too much, it's all tied into an item called the Skull of Shadows, and has something to do with Sareth's enigmatic past. Sareth's not alone in his quest, however; he shares his body with a sultry demoness, Xana, who offers snippets of advice as well as some exposition. He'll also meet the niece of another wizard, Leanna, and much of the latter part of the game can change depending on Sareth's relationship with the two women.
The opening section of the game sees the novice recovering an item called the Shantiri crystal, with the disembodied voice of Phenrig offering guidance in a tutorial of sorts which introduces you to the game's various elements. No pun intended.
This basically boils down to a few key abilities that Sareth has, although many of the abilities are restricted until you gain enough experience to unlock them. Before the game begins, you select a character class, which sets a predetermined series of abilities for you to unlock as you progress. It would have been nice to see an option to customise these or have free development as the PC version has, but the choices are sensible and work fairly well without being too intrusive.
Regardless of which class you chose, you'll always have a few common skills. Sareth can strike with his melee weapon of choice (sword for warrior, staff for mage, etc) with the right trigger, or unleash a power strike by holding the button down. You can block with the left trigger, or hold both triggers to lash out with a kick. There's also a familiar radial menu that can hold skills, spells, and inventory items by using the D-pad. Oh, you can also pick up and throw various objects as well, for varying effects.
The real key to understanding the game is in the use of the kick and throw abilities. They might sound like simple, throwaway additions for solving a few puzzles, but actually that's not their intent at all. Rather, they are designed to be used in conjunction with your spells and melee attacks- to give you a host of different ways to take out your opponents. Standing near a cliff edge? Why not kick your opponent off? Picked up a jar of oil? Hurl it at your foe and sling a firebolt to ignite it. The game is riddled with these kind of environmental hazards which you can make use of; heavy crates will damage your foes, shelves can be toppled onto your opponents, and theres always a handy spike wall or smouldering fire that you can use to your advantage. Many of the spells available even encourage you to utilise the environment- the Mage's Freeze spell, for instance, can be used to freeze an enemy in place, or you can use it to smear the floor with slippery ice to make your opponents fall over- absolutely hilarious if used, for example, on a narrow ledge. Many have criticised the game for its limited combat moves, consisting of the same sword swings and power strikes. If you're using the game environment properly, however, you'll find no signs of boredom. Yes, the combat mechanics are a little simplistic, but when fighting your opponents is this much fun, it's easy to overlook.
Talking of looks, though, we ought to mention to game's graphics. Don't get me wrong: DMMM:E is not an ugly game, but it's far from the next-gen splendour we've come to expect. Decent models and textures look serviceable, if not impressive, and the game can be rather overzealous with its implementation of high dynamic range lighting effects. Still, the game world is nicely designed and has its charms, with decent variety in creatures and locales serving to spice up the visuals. The framerate is mostly consistent, but it can nosedive at times.
Audio-wise the game fares better, with a good orchestral soundtrack and some sufficiently meaty sound effects accompanying the action. The voice acting can be a little amateurish, but its rarely bad, although the translation to English could have used a little more work. Sareth himself is voiced well enough, as are cohorts Leanna and Xana, but other characters don't fare so well.
DMMM:E also has a multiplayer component, with basic deathmatch and team modes on offer as well as a more interesting, objective-based Crusade mode where your character gains experience as he or she fights. The multiplayer is actually surprisingly good fun, though the ranked servers at least are fairly sparsely populated and it's not likely to keep you interested longer than it takes to accrue a couple of the achievements.
In terms of achievements, the game is actually pretty well served- each character class has their own set of achievements for killing X enemies with a certain weapon, finding all weapons of a certain kind, and so on. There's also the general ones for going through the game on various difficulty settings, as well as the multiplayer achievements. Overall, they're a good selection, and offer some encouragement to replay the game.
Unfortunately, its encouragement you might need. At 8-10 hours, the single player campaign isn't long, and it isn't of consistently good enough quality to make such a short adventure easy to swallow. For every great set piece and interestingly designed area, there is a corresponding dreary section that can break the enjoyment of the game. The spider cavern and tomb sections are particularly annoying, and really detract from what the game can be when at its best. That said, however, the game does reward perseverance, as the final chapter of the game is quite engrossing, offering some surprising plot developments and choices that belie the rather generic storyline, and give rise to around 6 different endings depending on how you those to resolve matters.
This is a shame, as many people might be put off by the slow start and tepid third quarter of the game and never get to these more interesting parts. Certainly DMMM:E is not a game for everyone; it is an action game primarily, and those after a roleplaying experience will be bitterly disappointed by the linear progression and confined gameplay. For those who can look past these aspects, however, Dark Messiah offers an interesting game that, while far from great, at least offers a good deal of fun for a dozen or so hours.