Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance

"Baldurs Gate=A fun experience"

I found Baldurs Gate $20 new and thought ''What the heck. I could play this with my friend. I think I'll buy it.'' I am glad that thought ran through my mind. Baldurs Gate: Dark Alliance is a lot of fun for anybody who appreciates action, adventure, or RPG types of games. It is also two player co-op which is good because that means it can be enjoyed by two instead of just one.

Graphics(9): The game looks very good. The background, dungeons, characters, and combat all runs very smooth. Given that the graphics probably could have been better (this being on XBox), they still look very nice. Even certain magical weapons and armor will glow when your character equips them.

Sound(10): The sound rocks. The characters speak when they do magic or get a critical hit. The enemies make cool sounds too, and there are lots of different enemies, so there are a variety of sounds in the game. I don't think I found any annoying sounds in the game, and the characters talking at markets or for the missions are very well done.

Gameplay(9): This game having RPG elements (not turn base combat, but very fast pace, hack and slash type combat) makes the gameplay pretty fun. You gain experience with every kill, and you will pick up money also to buy items. This makes the gameplay expand because you can gain certian features every time you level up, and you can replay the game using new features every time. There are also a wide variety of weapons you can use, and you can upgrade to have faster attacks and longer combo's. You can also use shields and block, and there are a good variety of enemies. Enemies will use magic attacks, ranged attacks, or melee attacks. Some enemies use smart tactics too (some are also stupid so they even out). However, there are some set backs. While co-op offers fun for two, it often creates competition among players when I think there should be more of a team oriented type of play. Money isn't divided evenly, so you will often race each other for gold. I think that is the biggest problem because while experience isn't distributed equally, it is fairly distributed. The game is hard enough too (a good ting).

Control(10): Baldurs Gate: Dark Alliance has very good and responsive controls. The button scheme is set up nice, but you can change it if you aren't happy with the current one. The camera is easy to control too, giving you very few problems with it (if any).

Replay Value(10): Baldurs Gate offers a lot to do after you beat the game. As I said earlier, since it's an RPG you can use different abilities and play with the same character, and it will be a pretty different experience. There are also 3 characters (and 1 secret character) to play as (all with a good variety of different types of abilities). There are lots of weapons to use, so it offers a variety of different weapons you could fight with. In the game there are difficulties to choose from, and when you beat the game they give you ''The Gauntlet,'' and if you beat that you get the ''Extreme'' difficulty setting. So there is a lot to do after you beat it.

In conclusion, the game looks very good. It also offers a pretty deep gameplay (even though the game itself is pretty linear), good controls, and a high replay value. For $20, this game is really worth getting.

8/10

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 03/09/04