Dark Disciples 2 - Won!

I have invested yet another 15 hours into the game. Last time I had just discovered the Kintara Region which resembles old medieval Japan both in architecture and in culture. This new city offered more variety of items and shops but few trainers able to train me above level 10 in my preferred skills. My primary skill have been critical hits and I am capped at level 15 because of the lack of master trainers.

The Kintara region resembled a copy of the capital Durwich in the way that I had the option to do certain mission for the local lord. I could also head straight for one of my brothers friends but in order to gain more experience I begun by doing the Lords missions. They where themselves each and everyone in the size of ordinary modules which means they spanned several maps both underground and above ground and took a few hours each to complete.

I won´t go into detail about the different modules but I can say that the story of them all differs enough to keep my interest. It is either a traitor or defector that has to be tracked down, a secret cult that operates and affects the minds of people and a lot of other themes.

Mounted Ninjas ? It must be the first time in my RPG career.

Fortunately one can always return back to the capital Kintara if one gets stuck and return later on. From Kintara I also found teleporters that could bring me back to my own capital Durwich. That is very important both gamewize and because you could have your vaults separated in different towns. Vaults are extensions to your inventory in which you could store items you don´t necessarily need right now.

Another important reason for going back to the first town is that you have a certain smith there that could forge extremely capable armours and weapons out of gold scales you could find. They are hard to find and you need several pieces and they cost much money. But they are generally well worth it. I ended with a Longsword in pure gold which gave me + 3 in combat skill as well as very good one-handed weapon damage.

Travelling by boat occurs from time to time

Every module generally poses one major puzzle challenge and a few smaller ones. What do I mean with one major ? Well, it could be like answering riddles or turn beams of light in certain way by hints you´ve found. Or by meeting overpowered fiends you cannot defeat but instead has to trap or lure away somehow. Minor puzzles consists of finding secret doors which hides levers, finding and placing items in correct places and so on. Needles to say, I have got stuck several times. Twice I thought this was the end. Even the walkthrough didn´t include them. But twice I finally managed to get past them somehow. 

The game is hard because of the puzzles, not because of its fights. Generally this sequel is much more easy combat wise than the first one. Probably due to the fact that you can take down almost any enemy from a distance. 

Anyway, when I had finished the majority of the quests offered by the lord, I started to look for my brothers friends. Remember, I have to get their souls. All of them had become evil and the first one I was looking for had been seen walking towards the mountain. I eventually managed through many hardships to track him down, trap him and kill him to get his soul. At that point the Kintara Lord removed the blockage of the city because I had also found his lost daughter. In fact she wasn´t kidnapped by the traitor as everyone thought but had willingly left with him. I decided to still be loyal to my lord though and killed the traitor and the lords daughter that attacked me. It seemed it was the easiest way at the time to move ahead in the story.

After that the Kintara Lord removed the order for any ship to not leave the port and I was able to buy a ticket to a desertlike city much in resemblance to the last module in Dark Disciples 1. Here most things repeated itself although it was shorter. I was tracking down another brother that was seen leaving the city for the ruins in the desert. After having done several small missions in the city and gathered more experience, I decided to follow.

I´ve already from the beginning decided to built my character with focus on strength and combat but also with the ability to use magic. I turned out I almost never used magic in combat since the ranged weapons is so powerful. I don´t see any advantage in spreading attribute points amongst several attributes. You will not be good enough in any. For example, if I am not focusing on increasing my strength I won´t be able to bash doors which means I either had to cast a Knock spell (or scroll) requiring either much skill in magic or spending much money on expensive scrolls. Or I could use pick lock by spending many upgrades into dexterity and pick locks. To spread them out would be devastating in my opinion. This means there is room for several character builds and there are many places which I have not entered because lacks in skills. Like climbing places for instance. Still, most important challenges could be overcome in at least two different ways.

Ok, back to my story. I was chasing my brothers last friend into the desert ruins. It eventually turned out he had become a huge monster deep down a great pyramid which I had to enter. This presented me with some real problems. I had to destroy the pyramid from within but without letting the monster escape with me. And also there where some difficult hieroglyph challenges down there which I thought I would finally be permanently stuck in since the forum is not very active for this game. Fortunately after several tries I found a way forward and managed to not only destroy the Pyramid but also to lock the monster in to be destroyed with it.

After escaping I was told the last of my brothers' friend was wreaking havoc in another city, having killed most of its inhabitants. I travelled there, entered the main temple and confronted him after having received several clues of how to defeat him. By using a magical horn I opened up the inner sanctum, lured the beast into this place and was finally able to injure him there. By shooting arrows at him (he didn´t even attack me!) I finally killed him and that was the last soul I needed before returning to my brother. 

These golems could be controlled to follow me.
I used them to block entrances of dangerous monsters.

Sometimes when you rest, you might have disturbing dreams.

There is a reason I keep my distance from this demon

When I returned to my brother, he thanked me for destroying all the evil he and his friends had unleashed and told me goodbye. He was to leave and said I should not follow him. I did for a while just to see that he was about to throw himself down the bottomless well of souls. He believed it was the only way to get rid of the evil that had possessed him. It was tragic to see my own brother volunteering to throw himself away. He sternly said I should not follow him. I had the opportunity to do so and fell down into the deep abyss of hell where skeleton remains where everywhere. My brother screamed "what have you done!?". Now we both where condemned forever down here until we would die. A tragical ending. 

However, I did reload of course and decided not to follow my brother. Instead I could return to the city or anywhere I choosed to go. The game would continue on with all sidequests. The mainquest however ended here together with the game. I found out I got a score of 65%.

Now this game is at an end and I feel both relieved but also an emptiness about it. It was a very good adventure and a game I strongly would suggest you try out. Not the least because it is totally free.

Next post will be my review....