Champions of Norrath

"Should be called "2004 Demo of the Year""

Many companies ''frontload'' their games and throw in the best for first. This is because the reviewers generally never spoil the games and with so many games to review, they can't play them for so long. In the end, they don't know or care if people spend so much for so little. They give it ''two thumbs up'' while allowing the gamer to eventually give it the ''two thumbs down''. Buyer beware, I guess.

Snowblind Studios is the master of this dark art, putting in really good ideas, in-game cinematics, and a sense of feel and danger worth perhaps a day's worth of gaming. Then, either on purpose or to meet a publisher's deadline, they hurry the game to market. Heck, the game still has a couple minor bugs, like long delays before characters speak. Thankfully, that doesn't affect gameplay much.

So what would've been a potential Secret of Mana has become a Secret of Evermore. Without Jeremy Soule's music. For fifty bucks, you'd probably be better off buying something for the long haul.

Snowblind Studios's big problem is that while they have all of the quality, the talent, and the aesthetics that fit together when you play the game, it just plain lacks gravitas. I mean, the game has some of the best graphics and animation (for an American-made game), extremely good (if easy) multiplayer with network support, and Hollywood voice talent. But after about three days of playing, I am stuck thinking, ''Now what?'' and now it's sitting on my DVD rack collecting dust.

The gameplay's fun... but only for a couple of hours. You ''dungeon crawl'' from point A to point B to point C (and so on) with no side quest in between. Along the way, you beat up cheesy little enemies with repetitive tactics and once you meet the Big Cheese, just run around and shoot until it's dead. Only challenge is forgetting to bring enough arrows or mana potions for the task. Full inventory? Use a Gate Scroll and cash in your excess loot. Save and repeat. Yawn. Double yawn. At least some dungeons are randomized (though the enemies aren't).

There are skills including customizing your own weapons/armor. Some of the fun in that includes the ''prisoner's dilemma'' in figuring out when you should use that bonus item to boost your equipment lest you have to trade it in for something better in the near future. But, alas, it doesn't make that much difference. Neither is the use of skill points - you'd probably always max out a couple of skills (rather than be the jack-of-all-trades but master of none) to make the game easier, if you didn't see the patterns already.

You most likely can't play for the story, which has clichéd snooty elves hanging on by a single thread against the clichéd green-'n-mean orcs, with some clichéd ''dark power'' ready to consume... the WHOLE WORLD! You mean all the other countries in Norrath are doing jack squat? Baloney...

The main characters, unfortunately, take their acting from the Chrono Trigger School of Adventuring and end up just standing there silent while the NPCs give tedious monologues that's enough to make you change the channel. Or, at least, hit the ''Start'' button. Occasionally, your heroes throw a couple wisecracks over the scenery/situation, but don't go expecting anything else fun from them in the story. Worse, a lot of the women act and dress like the two-bit hookers seen on late-night Cinemax. A vampire vixen even wears garb similar to that of Aaliyah in Queen of the Damned. No wonder you got a free ''Babes of Norrath'' calendar if you pre-order the game. One wonders if any of the staff has ever been on a date.

That said, the graphics are wonderful. For example, destroy a barrel and its debris just ''stays there''. The detail on each character, and their weapons and armor makes you think it came from one of Square's studios. The armor fits the male characters perfectly fine, as always, but it can also fit on the women without being too ''masculine'' or scantily-clad. (Giving a woman full plate, for example, gives her formfitting, feminine-looking full-plate, not regular medieval armor or a chainmail bikini. Kudos to the graphics department.) The diversity of all the environments are amazing - the forests of the elves, the caves of the orcs, and so on. If only there was more of a game attached.

I mean, there is soooooooo much that Snowblind could've done if they just added one or two more programmers to the staff. Side quests. A bigger world to explore. More NPCs. Better PC-to-NPC interaction. More character/skill customization. More Easter Eggs (okay, that's just me). Why? With the hard part - the graphics and animation - out of the way, they are so close to making the game a memorable hit. But in the end, it feels more like those shareware games I might download or get for free in my gaming magazines. A great ''demo'', but still a ''demo'', nonetheless.

In the end, this is something better as a good rental, like Snowblind's two other dungeon crawls (Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance I and II). You won't feel as guilty after you return it for the next gamer, and you've got some money left over for an action/RPG game that you really like.

The Good:
Possibly the best graphics in an American-made game
Four-player multiplayer (though you need a multitap or broadband network access)
What other game can you have three strong and tough elf chicks kick so much ass?

The Bad:
Too short
Too repetitive
Few features
Next to no music (and a lot of it forgettable)
Clumsy inventory
Contains sound bugs (though not as annoying as you think)

The Most Ridiculous:
To those who are actually hanging that ''Babes of Norrath'' calendar in their room: Get a life. :) And why is the calendar's ''Miss July'' (Tamara) stuck on that spider web in a semi-misogynist flair?

Reviewer's Score: 5/10, Originally Posted: 02/22/04