The Temple of Elemental Evil

"Should be recalled faster than Gray Davis"

When something goes wrong with your car, you take it to a mechanic. When a (PC) game goes wrong, you can almost always patch it as soon as you get it. But in ''The Temple of Elemental Evil'', the bugs are many - and Atari looks at us like we're the cast of Gigli and simply says, ''Forget you, dude!'' If I knew better, it was 1985 all over again. Until they soon realize that it is terrible PR and decided to have Troika patch the game...

But even if the patches are coming soon, it does little to fix this slipshod, hurried mess. O Bioware, where art thou? While there were major breakthroughs in computer RPGs (CRPGs) with games like Baldur's Gate and Neverwinter Nights, the latest game, ''Temple of Elemental Evil'', looks more like the ''updated'' Pool of Radiance: Ruins of Myth Drannor than true ''RPG heaven'' (quoting PC Gamer)

(Note: D&D 3.5 edition does not deviate much from 3.0. All it really has is a much better ranger and weaker sorcerers and wizards. If you have not yet played 3.0 on the PC, just get Neverwinter Nights or Icewind Dale II. You will like them better.)

First of all, my biggest pet peeve. The game suffers greatly from random slowdowns. Apparently, the pathfinding takes a load out of the processor (Then again, my computer is only a P3 700 MHZ, but I'm not interested in spending four hundred bucks to upgrade on one game. I still have my XBox and PS2, thank you very much.) Several times, especially after a long game, the game freezes and I have to hit the reset button on my PC.

Then there's the gameplay. Unless you have Strength or Dexterity maxed out and have all of your foci on specific weapons including enhancements, you are gonna whiff more than the 2003 Detroit Tigers. Worst of all, the enemies act as if they have Garry Kasparov as their tactician, using sleek efficiency and positioning (as well as much tripping, which could mean instant death if you are surrounded by half a dozen bugbears) to hand your ass to you - repeatedly. The only way to get past most is to ''cheat'' using spectral weapons (which the enemies blindingly attack, oddly enough) and use your NPCs (don't worry, they are all bland) and animal companions as sacrificial shmoos while your main party fires away. The fact that the levels cap at 10 doesn't help a whole lot, either.

Oh yeah: Unless you are in an inn, it is nearly impossible to actually rest and recover HP in this game. You sleep, monsters attack. Nice for extra experience and gold, but very annoying, especially when you could get killed in a single blow via critical hit.

And, the most ridiculous: you have to spend five thousand gold just to revive a character, even if you have a spell. (And to add insult to injury, that character loses a LOT of experience.) Ouch! Apparently, the technology does not warrant a Phoenix Down quite yet.

The story is boring and all of the 50+ quests that Atari and Troika boast are little more than fetch quests that require a lot of moving around. The only real NPCs include drunks, con men, a vain and arrogant drow (dark elf), an annoying wife, and a girl you can tote around as a slave - and most have no backstory. Most even require a share of the loot. What are they, the rejects from past RPGs? And you can control them however you want, including having an NPC take one for the team. Real nice.

The graphics are okay. Nothing too great, but nothing too bad either. Some animations, like the Fire Temple, however, reduce my computer to a slooooow crawl. The premade characters are derived from the D&D 3rd edition book, and provides a nice touch. Even the portraits are pretty good. Too bad you can't import images, like the Bioware/Black Isle games. Which means if you want your elf chick to look like Deedlit from Record of Lodoss War, you can't import her cute blonde super-long-eared image. Bummer!

The sound and music are actually pretty good. I enjoyed the battle theme in the Temple of Elemental Evil itself, and the voiceovers never get annoying.

But there's one unique feature of Temple of Elemental Evil: the ''Ironman'' challenge.

The ''Ironman'' difficulty more or less pays homage to the classic CRPGs of the 80s like Wizardry: it makes it harder to ''reroll'' stats; and best (or worst) of all, the Ironman difficulty actually DELETES your party - saved games and all - if they all die.

But, in the end, it's too unforgiving. I tried twice with a party of five with very high stats (with a bit of luck). They couldn't even get past the moat house in the early bits. And the ''quests'' necessary to raise levels to get just a bit further just became plain old tedious.

Like a sane Dungeon Master in the pencil-and-paper version of D&D, Ironman should have allowed some sort of ''redemption quest'' should the entire party die. I mean, St. Cuthburt can't just let ol' Iuz wreck havoc with dead, promising adventurers, am I right?

The reason for the title was that I was playing this game during the waning weeks of the California recall election. Anyone or anything that fails to live up to its promise should be recalled. With promises and potential of RPG goodness shattered in a million pieces, The Temple of Elemental Evil is no exception.

The Good:
Excellent challenge for the hard-to-annoy (including Ironman)
3.5 edition rules are set quite well
Decent, if processor-consuming, graphics and sound

The Bad:
Slow on most PCs
Many bugs yet to be fixed
Annoying hit-and-miss with more of the latter
Touchy interface
Dull story, dull characters, dull, well, everything that could be made the game fun
DO NOT play ''Ironman'' if you have a short attention span! Just take my word for it!

The Most Ridiculous:
5,000 gold for a simple Raise Dead? Ironman should have been called ''Platinum Man''...

Reviewer's Score: 3/10, Originally Posted: 11/16/03