I should start off by saying that I am not generally a big fan of action-RPG games. I have never played Diablo because it never sounded like my kind of game. I am a big fan of adventure-RPGs like Planescape: Torment, Baldur's Gate II and Wizardry 8. That said, Sacred is almost all about hack-and-slash. The game is geared toward fighting through armies of monsters, gaining experience points and acquiring random loot items. The game is even designed so that once you finish the game, you can play it again on increasing levels of difficulty with more powerful items and more experience points for each difficulty level. The graphics in the game are just fine and what one would expect from today's RPGs. One thing that does help the game stand out from other RPGs is that the world is quite large. The entire surface world of the game is one giant map with no loading zones. You are highly unlikely to explore the entire explorable area (I think I was at 30% when I finished the game). In my opinion, the worst part of the game are the quests (both the main quest and the side quests). The story of the main quest is not particularly captivating and I often found myself forgetting (and not caring) what I was trying to do. The side quests are terrible. They are obviously randomly generated and every one of them follows the same boring formula of "go here, get this thing/kill this thing, come back here". If I hear, "Time is running out. Be back in a day or it will be too late" one more time, I'm going to scream. Not only that, but the quests aren't about hunting around trying to find the solution because the map marks the location of all of the quests. When you get a quest to go kill a monster, the map is marked with the exact location of the monster. When you kill the monster, the exact location of where you have to return to claim your prize is then marked. The same is true of the main quest where the exact location you have to go is marked on the map. The items also aren't terribly captivating. Unlike games like Baldur's Gate where as you progress through the game, you acquire more powerful and interesting items, each with individual stories. In this game, all the items you acquire a randomly generated with random stats. No special items to be found. There's also no purpose in opening every barrel and every chest in all the towns and in the wilderness because none of them contain anything special. In fact, there's really no reason to go into any of the buildings in the towns unless the map has a merchant marked you want to visit. The combat is also a little frustrating in that it's repetitive and the game doesn't make it easy for you to use all of your skills. I played as a Warrior Mage and in the game, you get 16 different spells to use, but to actually use them, you have to assign them to one of (up to) five spell slots. The game doesn't make it terribly easy to quickly switch to other spells so you find that you play the game with the five you like the most. The magic system works a little differently than most RPGs I've played. Instead of having a fixed number of spells or mana, each spell has a regeneration period attached to it. Once you cast a spell, all your spells are reduced by the regeneration time of the spell you cast (but not below 0) and once any of them regenerate, you can cast that spell. For some spells, the times are generally sub-second and they don't usually get to more than a few seconds (unless you use combos). This means you basically have an infinite amount of magic to use. I didn't really use weapon combat since I was a mage, but from what I know, it's just a matter of clicking on the enemy you want to attack and holding down the mouse button to continue attacking. Gold is also totally irrelevant in this game as you acquire a large amount early in the game (not there's really anything interesting to buy) and end up with an obscene amount at the end (I had 10 million).
In "Sacred" you assume the role of one out of five pre-created characters and journey through a world that you will ultimately have to save. They would like you to think that each of the five characters has his/her own p... Read Full Review
Diablo is a great game game. It's easily one of the better games to be released and even now i believe it to be a better game than the more recent Titan Quest. However, it is not the greatest Hack n Slash RPG ever mad... Read Full Review
