Dark Disciples 2 - Review

Game reviewed: Dark Disciples

Designed by: DodgySoft
Created by: Laurens Lafebre
Released: 2008

Formats: Pc

Difficulty: 7/10

Est. Playing time: 40 hours
Freeware

Gameworld & Story

The story begins with you on your way to visit your brother in the capital Durwich. During the voyage you are captured by pirates and put on an island to work as a slave in a salt mine. From there you have to escape and the rest of the game is a long challenge to try to find your brother. In order to succeed you have to overcome a lot of obstacles and do a lot of favours to allow you to progress towards your goal.

The gameworld is much bigger than in the previous game. There are at least 3 major cities and a lot of smaller settlements, villages and areas to explore. There are a lot of sidequests and minor tasks that could be undertaken to get gold and experience points. Something which is necessary in order to get powerful enough to take on your major opponents along the way.

There are also more variety in both the regions and in the lands you will have to traverse with more detailed graphics. It is as populated as in the first game so there are not huge empty lands to traverse through. You have deserts, swamps, dense forests, underground lakes, mountains, caves and rivers to just name a few typical areas where your adventures will take you.

Even though the mainstory might not be very original, the major subquests and modules mostly are. Or at least very varied. But I have to admit that it is not easy to foresee how the mainstory will evolve either.

Rating: 2.5

Economy
Economy is relatively well balanced in the game. Note that these words are written with consideration. The first installment had more balanced economy. I think that since the first third of this game I was never worried about economy. Perhaps it was because I was not a magician that had to buy stones or scrolls to use. I don´t know. But as warrior you pretty early in the game find that there is no better armour or weapons to buy than what you can find during your adventure even if you have a lot of money. The only exception is the smith that requires gold scales. But you could be as rich as you want and still have no means to buy better protection in any town. That is a problem I think and does degrade the rating.

It is true that the towns you visit will have a little better equipment than the first ones but only slightly and after awhile you can travel by portal to any city anyway so what does it matter ? To the plus side must be mentioned that there are a lot more different weapons, armours and other types of equipment found than in the first game.

You are still given only a 10th of the value when selling something but an improvement from the first game is that you can sell any item in any shop. You don´t need to find a weapon smith to sell your weapons for example.

Rating: 2.5

NPC & Interactions
All NPCs are stationary. They never walk around like monsters do for example. You initiate dialogue by going into them. You mostly have several dialogue options and the scripts are well written and mostly logial and realistic. What and how you say something could either be solved by reinitiating dialouge or does not have any longrun effect.

It is said however that some decisions affect the outcome later on. I can only remember a very few places where this might be true but they are of the types like choosing side rather than anything more subtle. All dialogues and NPCs are as well scripted and written as ever. With many clever dialogues to choose from.

Rating: 2

Monster, tactics & combat system

There are quite a number of different monsters and foes in this game. Each region has its own fauna. Most monsters take up one square just as yourself but there are some that are 2, 4  squares or bigger as well. You could use that to your advantage by fleeing through small corridors or using the furniture to navigate away from them. When they spot you (as soon as you spot them) they will move towards you in the shortest possible way. It is possible to run from them even  if they are only one square from you if you navigate around some objects. The pathfinding is said to have improved and I can agree that it is noticeable but it is good you still could outrun them if you are patient.

Monsters don´t have any morale and so fights to the death. This time around however there is support for ranged weapons. The game supports different types of bows and crossbows. Even some monsters have ranged attacks but they are very few and most with ranged attacks are mages.

Monsters still have special attacks that could cause fire, acid, cold or electical damage though, as well as poisoning and disease.

The combat system is simple but effective and rather fun. Your attributes and weapons totally decides your chances to hit and what damage are inflicted. During fights you could always use items like potions from your pack without loosing your turn. That is very important to make use of since you can only rest and heal yourself back in a town or in a safe haven - oftan far away from where you are.

A change from the first game apart from ranged attacks is that monsters regain their health if you reenter the complex. The hit-and-run tactics don´t work as well anymore.

There are no random encounters at all in the game but some areas do repopulate foes if you reenter them for another cause or trigger some event. Once you´ve cleared an area it is cleared. That is mostly a good  thing but it also means you don´t have any place in which you can grind and get more experience. And when talking about experience points.

There is one major drawback with the second installment. The ranged attacks are way too powerful. There are no monsters that are immune to ranged attacks but vulnerable to melee attacks so there is really no reason no to go for a bow the full game. I did that and almost never had any hard combats. There is also a bug that lets you shoot through closed doors, gratings etc and you never need line of sight. Also, some bigger foes could be shot at from afar and not react to it so you could take them down easily.

Combat is turn based. Tougher opponents could easily be taken out by standing beside them and save the game and reload every time they hit and save when you hit. In that way you don´t need the tiresome retreats back to heal yourself up which is always possible but only costs time.

Overall, I like the combat system but the first game was harder in a positive sense. My suggestion is let the bow do lesser damage because now there is not much difference from melee damage.

Rating: 2.5

Magic System

The magic system has been improved. Like before, you don´t actually choose any class in the beginning. What specialization you go for depends on where you put your skill points and the proficiency in these are capped by your attribute limits in that field. That means you could cast both mage and priest spells but you would probably never be able to use the most powerful spells of either class.

You do have mana but in order to cast a mage spell you need different kind of stones. They are often found and don´t take up valuable inventory but are added to a certain pouch. They could also be bought in magical shops. That is mainly the limiting factor of using magic apart from the mana points.

The most powerful spells are teleport (within your line of sight), water walking and beacon. The last one allows you to quickly between regions but I have never used it. If you don´t put any points in magic at all you could still use scrolls and wands. That is very good.

There are some obstacles in the game which could only be solved using wands or magic.

Rating: 2.5

Character generation & development
When you first create your character you have a pool of attribute points you can distribute as you wish. You also pick your alignment but I have never found any use of it.

In this sequel you don´t have to go to a trainer to increase a level. You gain levels anywhere and could immediately level up (your decision) and increase one attribute of your selection. You need trainers to increase the different kind of skills in the game though. And these trainers are only capable of taking you to a certain level before you have to find another one. I have never found a trainer that could increase a skill to above 15.

As in the first game it could be wise to save your level upgrades until you either need to increase a certain attribute to solve a problem (strength for bashing for example) or until you have found a trainer that could increase your skills. You are given skillpoints at every level upgrade and I had a lot of unused points at the end of the game because I didn´t found trainers to increase my critical hits skill above 15.

The skill system in the game works very well. I really like them and many of the skills are essential for different stages of the game. There are a few skill that I found was mandatory to solve certain quests (or even main quests) and theese are gemlore (for magic) and stealth (certain places require you to get pass guards unseen),

Perception is still a good skill but it is limited in the way that there are certain hidden doors that won´t show up regardless of your skill but on the other hand you get automatically monster info which means that you can rightclick on an enemy and get a popup with detailed monster information including hitpoints, resilience statistics etc. That is gradually more detailed the higher perception you have. I like this feature even though I have never had any use of it.

Rating: 3

Map design

The maps are all very well drawn and implemented. Now there are labyrinths and mazes and the size of the maps are not so easily detected as in the first game where you could sense if you have missed something because there was still large black areas on the automap. Here maps could be small without you having to worry about missing a secret door.

Dark Disciples have never dissappointed me in map design. There are no dead space or vast areas that must be traversed just to slow your progress. Everything is there for a purpose and hidden items and stash could be find almost anywhere.

Rating: 3.5

Manual

The manual is not one large document but several smaller detailing different parts of the game like character generation, afflictions etc. It is as well written as in the first game.

Rating: 3

Graphics, sound and interface
The graphics are almost identical to the first game. The first thing you notice is that there are more details in it in the environements both outdoor and indoor. Pools of blood are left after you have slain enemies and so forth. Monster have facings in both directions now and not only in one as before. Small things overall. It is very functional and clear in what it shows even though the graphics reminds me of Ultima V.

There are more soundeffects than before. The music are still done by Bjorn Lynne. I think the first game had more catchy tunes but I have at least found one favourite (in the pyramids) in this game also. Different maps and modules have different soundtracks.

The interface is clear, fast, functional and more user friendly now. You could rightclick to get popup help for the buttons for example.

Rating: 2

Gameplay

Even though I had just finished Dark Disciple 1, I was eager to try out the sequel. It is so simple to get into and with no fuss or anything. This is accessibility is perhaps its strongest area. You never feel lost. Most things are straightforward and you don´t have to keep track of things that have happened long ago in the game in order to succeed now. There is no grinding or boring midgame phases either. Each part feels fresh and stands on its own merits.

So while the game is very good there is of course rooms for improvements. The difficulty balance is set off when you are using ranged weapons. There are few places in the game where you must rely on melee combat since you can shoot without line-of-sight and many monsters do not attack if being shot from long range. Apart from that all challenges in this sequel was from the puzzles. There are a lot of minor puzzles and obstacles I have left behind. Fortunately there are often several ways in overcoming them.

The game is almost a little too big. The problem is that the feeling is that it starts over on each part. Each of the major cities doesn´t offer anything new or special if comparing them from the first town. Equipment are not more advanced even though they have more culture context weapons like katana etc. It would be nice if things got more expensive but also better since you find equipment which is much better than any town could offer for any money. This reason alone is one that tells me the game is too long.

The first game offered more even balance in difficulty, even though it was much more simpler. In the first game I really had to hit-and-run enemies in melee and then walk through several maps only to find a place to heal myself for free since gold was sparse. Here it is easier and you can always save in the middle of a fight. That is a thing that could be removed also. As long as you are detected by enemies you should not be allowed to save.

The replayability is much better in this sequel since you could build several different charactes. I chan think of at least three distinct types which are the warrior, the thief and a spellcaster. Each would have its own problems during the adventure but at different places. I think the warrior has it easier though.

My greatest fear playing this game is the lack of information about the game. The included walkthrough which is not complete is the only source to any solution except a very rarely visited forum at dodgysoft.com. At least three times I thought I was stuck forever. At one place I used the editor to summon the item I had to get in order to progress and in the other two I finally found a way to continue after much struggle.

But that is also one of its strongpoints because without these obstacles it would be a hack´n slash game. The world in this sequel is more open. You can practically return to any previously visited place in the game. Perhaps not immediately but you will get access later on. That is good. The variety of missions is perfectly executed and you could take on major modules in any order even though they have recommended levels for you. Some of them are optional but some are mandatory in order to complet your main goal of finding your brother.

Lastly, I can really recommend this game to veterans of CRPGs. Personally I was more hooked with this than with spidersofts Avadon - the black fortress even though the last game is much more advanced. If you read this and know of other similar games you could always drop a line in the comments window.

Rating: 4

Section	Rating
Gameworld & Story	2.5
Economy	2.5
NPC & Interactions	2
Monsters, tactics & combat system	2.5
Magic system	2.5
Character generation & development	3
Map design	3.5
Manual	2.5
Graphics, Sound and Interface	2
Summary CRPG value	23
Gameplay	4

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....

Dark Disciples 2 - Huge gameworld

If anyone thought I was on the lazy side regarding Dark Disciples 2, you might reconsider. I have played for many more hours and dwelved deep into the game. Or at least, that is what it has felt. In the city I completed all four modules - each of them different scenarios spanning many maps, dungeons and puzzles to solve and they where all very well scripted. I really liked them.

To cross this chasm I had to put seeds in the bowl to grow out the bridge

Any of the four modules could be taken on in any order but there where recommended levels for each one. I took them in order. The second order was about the corruption of the westwood. An evil prescence had turned the once peaceful forest into a dangerous place. Now I had the chance to find the roots to this evil and restore the forest to its former state. I travelled to a remote village to help the mayor get rid of the evil that was about to surround the village totally. The setting was perfect. It was rather heavy on puzzles and I did not solve all of them but enough to complete it.

The last module was about to get rid of the pirates that blockade Durwich but also to stop an inquisition force of their witchhunt which had gone well over board. When the pirate threat finally was removed I could continue in my search for my brother by going to the Frontier Lands.

Unfortunately we never got there. The destination port was destroyed by invading huge creatures destroying the lands. It was like armageddon let loose. I had to go for a smaller fishing settlement instead and there my adventures continued. I had to retrieve old relics amongst the ruins now hold by orcs and I had to visit a port infested with dark shadows and rescue the few inhabitants still alive, hiding as they where in the sewers. All this and more eventually led me to the Enda people. A sage from them had visited me in a dream long ago and told that I had to look up the sage to be able to look for my brother and all that he had now awaken with his endeavours.

I was told that I had to look up another sage hidden deep down a long valley to get information about my brother. The valley was a maze but rather quickly I found a way to travel to another part of the valley that was inhabited by dinosaurs and a cannibal village. I found the sage´s village there but the sage had been captured by the cannibals so not only did I have to rescue him and do some smaller tasks for the friendly tribe but I also was given the task to blow up the whole cannibal camp.

Solving this pirate puzzle was one of the hardest parts and didn´t give me anything

When I was finally able to talk with the sage about my lost brother he gave me a map and an orb and said I had to travel to a certain region. I entered the Giant´s Halls in search of my brother. The game is hard. At several places my progress are hindered, often by passages I cannot enter but which obviously could be opened one way or another. I had to turn to the walkthrough to figure out how to light up orbs that would open passageway for me and also at one place I had to eat a crazy mushroom I´ve found to see a hidden exit. Things which I would never figure out on my own.

Anyway, deep down I finally found my brother. Beside him was a lone meditating man that prayed for my brother so that he would still be himself. He and his friends had been searching for a long lost treausure and when touching it where slowly possessed by other entities. Now his friends had dispersed for other lands to destroy just for lust and himself was contained only because of the meditating man. The only chance to free them from their possession and save the land was to gather the soul essence from his friends and bring them back to his brother. I would have to kill them. Each of them seems to be living in different parts of the world which I believe is separated scenarios.

These are really hard to kill until I found out that
you could bypass them with Enda´s amulet

I headed for the Kintara region and embarked in a city with an architecture much like medieval japan. Now I have to find one of my brothers friend...

Regarding the combat system, I can now say that ranged weapons are overpowered. As long as you have enough stock of arrows/bolts you can take out any enemies from a distance and when they get close you could run away. Sooner or later you have outrunned them and can begin to shoot again. This makes combat in this sequel much easier than in the first.

Arrows can only be bought in Durwhich and you have to have enough inventory space for them (the magic bag is a must). Certain enemies like shadows and other ghostlike creatures can only be hurt from special weapons which are hard to find. They cannot be shot at. 

The challenge instead is to solve the puzzles or find specific items. The included walkthrough is very general for the later stages of the game and does not have solutions for all problems. Fortunately there is a built in items editor to be used in emergency if you want to summon an item you lack. I had to use it once since I couldn´t solve the chess puzzle below the cannibals village. I am pretty sure that puzzle would reveal stairs leading further down where I was hopint to find another vampire skull. I already had one and needed two since they seemed to be used like keys for some pillars. Instead of getting totally stuck in this game and leave it be, I had to cheat this item and be able to progress.

According to a fortune teller, I have completed around 25 % of the game right now even though I had played for over 20 hours and crossed dozens of maps and dungeons. This game really is huge and it is still as fun. I now know I prefer this bird-perspective instead of the classical Bard´s Tale view when playing. Or it might just be because there are no random encounters in this game...

To be continued...

Dark Disciples 2 - Revisited

Game revisited: Dark Disciples 2

Designed by: DodgySoft
Released: 2008

Formats: Pc

Availability: Freeware

Admittedly, this is not the perfect way of using my sparse gaming time. But I couldn´t resist starting up on Dark Disciples 2 while still playing Sword and Sorcery Underworld. This is what happens when I have a chore consisting of boring grinding in Sword and Sorcery. Anyway, careful readers will already know that I played through the first game just one month ago. I won´t go into the same detail of the gaming system here but highlight more the differences and what areas has been improved upon.

The game is still freeware and was developed several years after the first one but they are very much alike. You play in the same game world but with no connections at all back to what has happened previously. You start out by creating your character and get 10 attribute points to spend on the same attributes as before.

The major difference is that this time you have separated skills belonging to a specific attribute. The skill level could never exceed the max value of your attribute. For example, there is a skill called critical hits which relies on strength. If your strength attribute is 4 you will never be allowed to increase your critical hit skill with more than four points.

The interface is more userfriendly with popup boxes available when rightclicking

Another major difference is the implementation of ranged weapons like bows and crossbows. Excellent. I really missed out being a mage last time because of the ranged capabilities those had. But beware, your enemies can also use ranged weapons. The magic system is also different. You will need to put skill points into a skill called gemlore. By using a gemstone you could cast a specific spell. The more points you have in the skill the more effective the spell will be. Gemlore skill relies on your perception skill and for my new character I opted to go for some magic capabilities and put skillpoints into the gemlore skill. 

Other skills worth mentioning are stealth, disarm traps, pick locks, dual weapons, prayer and curse skill. Prayer, Curse and Gemlore allows you to cast spells by different means.

The game starts out with you being captive by pirates and imprisoned on an island to be used as labor in a salt mine. Your first task is to find any means to escape. What strikes me immediately is the more detailed environments compared with the predecessor. The automap is now fullscreen and shows both your coordinates and where any npcs are.

Context popup windows are available with the right mouse button

The game still offers its flexible approach to solving problems. I found several ways to escape and at least two ways of leaving the island. I could either find a way to climb over the fence and then sneak on board a ship and hide until it will leave or I could sneak down into the mines and find an exit. I explored every option before deciding that the mine way would give me more experience points and found equipment.

When I managed to escape I started just outside the city of Durwich. My explorations in the city yielded a lot of sidequests and spanned over the temple district, residential area, academic district, harbour, riverside, merchants area and more. I helped the mages guild to clear out an experimental area where they stuffed beasts from magical experiments and I looked up runaway criminals that had escaped the city jail. I also helped the thieves guild clear out an old smugglers tunnel and other small tasks for different persons. All helped me to eventually raise to level 4. 

My main objective was however to tell the news to my brother. When I found his house he was not there but had left behind a letter stating that he had left for the Frontier Lands. He had found some sort of item and knew he was being tracked down, so he left the city. I have yet to find a way to take me there.

The city council from which you could take on larger quests

Instead I went to the city council. There are four large modules you could apply for with different recommendation of levels. I choosed the first one for level 3 to 5 which was about clearing out a cultist nest below a lighthouse. The story around this cult was very interesting and the map layout and puzzles intriguing. I had a lot of fun with this part and eventually succeeded in hunting down the five renegade wizards.

For me ranged weapons are essential. You could pick off targets at a distance without risk of being hurt. I have only met a few archers so most of the time my enemies are already weakened when they go melee with me if they even survive reaching me. I have therefore spent skill points into the targeteer skill. I suppose this is only valid now in the beginning because it feels very powerful right now. It also seems you could use any wand in this game since intellect is no longer an attribute and the spell system is totally new. 

Since I have found no means by which to travel to the frontier lands by ship I suppose that will be available later on in the game or I have missed something in the city. I know pirates have blocked the trade so they must probably first be dealt with in some way. I therefore have just started on module 2. I know it sounds very game technical but it is in fact major missions commissioned by the city council with great rewards.

This game still gives you some puzzles to solve,
like moving the carts over the preassure plates without getting them stuck

I like this game very much. It is improved on all aspects compared to Dark Disciples 1. Mostly by including ranged combat and allowing any character to use magic wands. Also there are more skills and a new system of handling magic which seems good, although I haven´t used any yet. The graphics are more detailed and the music is still done by Bjorn Lynne.

I must not forget to mention that it is as fast as the previous version. No installation is needed. Movement is extremely quick and the GUI improved. That is one of its strongest but more subtle points of this game. It is so easy to get into and quick and easy to play. You are not hindered by tedious random combats, since that doesn´t exist.

This cave entrance must be explored

Oh, and another thing. I spent a long time looking for a trainer in the city when I thought I ought to raise a level until I found out that you do it by yourself on your character sheet. When you level up you must immediately spend an attribute point but could save skill points since you need to find trainers for them.

And while I´m at it. It is not possible to be chased through an area and leave and the return to have the enemies return to their original position. Enemy positions are remembered so it is a little more difficult this time around. 

I will definitely continue playing this game and can warmly recommend it. That this game is freeware is beyond my understanding. 

Dark Disciples 1 - Review

Game reviewed: Dark Disciples

Designed by: DodgySoft
Created by: Laurens Lafebre
Released: 2004

Formats: Pc

Difficulty: 8/10

Est. Playing time: 20 hours
Freeware

This game was really a hidden gem. I have played it every day since I first started at first opportunity. My interest in the game held all the way to the end. Very few games keep my interests all the way through, often becoming a chore to complete.

Gameworld & Story

The gameworld are pretty big with at least 5 major regions, each containing several maps and lots of underground places. The maps are all regular but subterranean levels could be very irregular, although never larger than the standard mapsize. The world is filled a wide a variety of climate regions like forests, swamps, lakes, rivers, snow landscapes, mountains, deserts etc. The gameworld are well populated with interesting places and npcs. You never feel you are travelling vast empty spaces.

I like the mainstory. It is simple, yet quite original. You have a debt to pay for your dead father, otherwise you and your mother will be executed. First you have to build up strength to be able to reach the capital. There you first have gain experience enough to be able to undertake the missions Saradin will send you to. For each mission, your debt will be reduced. There is no other way to complete the game other than complete the missions.

Rating: 2.5

Economy
Economy is very well balanced in the game. At least until the last module. It was there I begun to feel I was slowly becoming rich. But on the other hand I have really tried not to buy a lot of potions which would have drained my economy.

Merchants will gradually improve their stocks depending on where you are in the game. But each and everyone will always have the same amount of stock. Except for the beginning, all good weapons, armours and rings are found in the game rather than bought. It is a little pity you don´t have really expensive items you could long for at the shops.

You mostly increase your money by finding gold but you could also sell off items for 1/10th of its value. That takes valuable inventory space though and for me only a small part of my fortune came from selling items. All the way through I felt I just had enough money to survive but never enough to feel indifferent of it.

There are quite many items in the game. There are easily at least 30 weapons, a few dozen armours and several levels of helms, gauntlets and boots. Add to that a lot of different rings and magical wands.

Rating: 3.5

NPC & Interactions
All NPCs are stationary. They never walk around like monsters do for example. You initiate dialogue by going into them. You mostly have several dialogue options and the scripts are well written and mostly logial and realistic. What and how you say something could either be solved by reinitiating dialouge or does not have any longrun effect.

Rating: 2

Monster, tactics & combat system
There are quite a number of different monsters and foes in this game. Each region has its own fauna. Most monsters take up one square just as yourself but there are some that are 2 or 4 squares as well. You could use that to your advantage by fleeing through small corridors or using the furniture to navigate away from them. When they spot you (as soon as you spot them) they will move towards you in the shortest possible way. It is possible to run from them even  if they are only one square from you if you navigate around some objects.

Monsters don´t have any morale and so fights to the death. Ranged attacks are not supported in the game unless you count using magic and wands. Monsters do have special attacks that could cause fire, acid, cold or electical damage though, as well as poisioning and disease. If you get hurt enough you could also sustain an injury which makes you even more vulnerable and powerless.

The combat system is extremely simple. Your attributes and weapons totally decides your chances to hit and what damage are inflicted. During fights you could always use items like potions from your pack without loosing your turn. That is very important to make use of since you can only rest and heal yourself back in a town or safe have - oftan far away from where you are. Fortunately moving in this game is very quickly and lessens the frustration to get back to heal and then return. Monsters still have their earlier injuries when you return and that is one way of slowly taking down harder enemies. The other way is to buy enough for healing potions but they will be quite expensive for at least the first half of the game when you seldom have more than 2.000 gold to spend.

There are no random encounters at all in the game. Once you´ve cleared an area it is cleared. That is mostly a good  thing but it also means you don´t have any place in which you can grind and get more experience. And when talking about experience points. Weak monsters don´t give you any experience at all if your combat rating is way higher than theirs.

Overall, I like the combat system. It is quick and easy, yet allows for some housekeeping of your resources. 

Rating: 2.5

Magic System

The magic in this game is very simple. You don´t learn or know spells but cast spells from scrolls you find if your intellect is high enough. In the same way you use wands until you run out of charges. There is no way to recharge an item and you will need enough mana potions to be able to use several wands with you. I found that even If I plaed a warrior type I was in the end dependet of having invested at least 15 in intellect to use the weakest wands. Some enemies just don´t take damage from melee and it helped med tremendously to use wands.

Rating: 1.5

Character generation & development
When you first create your character you have a pool of attribute points you can distribute as you wish. You also pick your alignment but I have never found any use of it.

You gain levels in this game by visiting a trainer and paying gradually more and more for each level. Each level then gives you +1 combat skill, + 2 hitpoints, mana and stamina as well as +2 attribute points you could freely choose to spend anytime you want. I found out that it was smart for me to save them until I needed them to solve a certain obstacle (climb/bash).

The effect of gaining a level is really noteworthy. I think that mostly has to do with the increase in the combat skill that are used as a comparator against enemies to determine you hitchance. The rating in which you raise a level is very balanced in the game and works very well. But that is also the only thing that has with character development to do.

I find perception to weak to invest in, even though I have had seen it find secret doors for me. That is because I try going into all walls anyway. I would suggest trying to build up your intellect to at least 15 in the middle game before raising your strengths further. It will become helpful.

The system works very well but since it is so simplistic I cannot give more than 2 out of 5 in rating.

Rating: 2

Map design

I like all maps in the game. They are done with thought and even though you know how large each map potentially is, there are areas that use only a fraction of the potential space (natural caverns for example) which means you don´t really know if you miss out something. By looking at your automap you could figure out potential places for secret doors if you believe the whole map will be used. The maps are also very varied and well thought out.

Rating: 3

Manual

The manual is well written but not very thick. It includes the most important elements of how to  play the game.

Rating: 2.5

Graphics, sound and interface
Graphics in the game is very simple with no animations at all. It reminds me of an early Ultima game. But after a few hours I have forgotten about it and are immersed in the game itself.

Soundeffects are also quite poor but functional. The highlight is the music which do have some nice, catchy tunes and are made by Bjorn Lynne.

The interface is clear, fast and functional and works very well.

Rating: 2

Gameplay

I had a lot of fun with this game. I played this game at every possibility in front of my computer from start to finish without never tire of it. It is a great first game from the developer and the best of all is that it is freeware. The sequel improve on most parts of this game and I plan to play it further on but I think I need something inbetween first.

So what is the hooking points of the game ? It is well balanced with quite tough default difficulty level which means you feel great accomplishments when you do progress. You gradually, but sparsely, get access to better weapons and equipment. You have limited gold which stays that way almost to the end which forces you to household on both your expenditures but also on how much of the potions you find you will use and when. I haven´t found any bugs in the game at all.

The game also includes a lot of puzzles and obstacles. With puzzles I mean things like riddles, secret doors, problem solving mechanisms (light beam puzzle, levers, traps etc). You could often solve problems in more than one way. It could be monsters that are too tough for you which you could lead away, kill under a grate or lock into a room. Or it could be your pure strength that allows you to bypass a puzzle by bashing a weak wall to get around it for example. I love these things.

The world is quite open and you could choose in which order you will do missions in each region but to unlock other regions you normally have to solve the hardest quest which often means you must be powerful enough. I think this system is a good compromise.

I must also say that its simplicity also add to its strength. It is so easy to get into and you never feel overwhelmed with information or boring long texts that could hinder your progress. The length of the game was just enough also. I would probably do less progress if it would be twice as big.

Rating: 4

Section	Rating
Gameworld & Story	2.5
Economy	3.5
NPC & Interactions	2
Monsters, tactics & combat system	2.5
Magic system	1.5
Character generation & development	2
Map design	3
Manual	2.5
Graphics, Sound and Interface	2
Summary CRPG value	21.5
Gameplay	4