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Its been a month since the GF! editors presented me with
Interplays Soulbringer to review. There was nothing to go on at that
time, no advance hype, no expectation for innovation, nothing. Sometimes, the titles that
come to us under such cryptic circumstances are the ones that surprise us the most. Okay,
Im bluffing. Thats never really been the case in the pc gaming business. We
generally know whats supposed to be hot and whats not long before most games
hit the shops. But Im grabbing for straws here, any straw, that will offer some
handle on this game. Times running out, though, and before another sucker blows
hard-earned sheckels on this dog, Ive got to speak true. First of all, system specifications on the box claim that
players need 500 Mb free to play the game. By the time Id loaded the works though,
my machine had dropped 710 Mb to run the full version of the game. Still, I was
optimistic; excellent graphics and sound have redeemed many a title. So I didnt mind
the massive, time-consuming load. It got me to thinking that, maybe, this game would be
better than I expected. After all, I still didnt know anything about it, and the
supporting materialsthe box, the manual, and the cd jewel casedidnt
reveal much about the games story or graphics.
If it takes this much space, I naively reasoned, then its
GOT to be cool! But Im a seasoned cynic now. When I booted up a new game the graphics were crude and jarring.
The menu-based interfaces were pretty enough and recalled what passed for sophisticated
html graphics three or four years ago. Still, they were only menus. The main gaming
graphics, on the other hand, were grainy and pixilated. Characters looked spindly and the
action was wooden. A caption on the Soulbringer package boasts that the game
features A customizable and very realistic combat system that can be as simple or
complex as you like. Well, I like things simple, especially when there are games to
play, and the combat system of this game is so complicated that it could pass for
kabbalah. In addition, the camera control was awkward (players use the left and right
mouse buttons to manipulate the look of the game) but seemed pretty smooth once I got the
hang of it. The voice acting was okay, but at times it seemed as stilted as the animation.
The box also asserts Soulbringer offers One of
the most involving and epic scenarios ever written for an rpg adventure. I intend to
close with this idea because it suggests some redemption for this game. See, its
pretty clear that whoever developed this game had a lot at stake; theres nothing new
to the story, but it does enthusiastically evoke Tolkien and the best of the AD&D
mythologies. The writers and designers clearly loved the Soulbringer saga and
wanted the rest of us gaming freaks to love it, too. But even the best, most enduring
stories sound flat and tired if the storyteller sucks. Loading the game with
less-demanding specs doesnt improve things, either, because then players have to
sacrifice sound for an improved graphics quality that doesnt carry over to the
quality of the animation. Maybe the best way to think about
Soulbringer is as a game worthy of some appreciation for the enthusiasm that
went into its design and marketing. Then again, maybe its okay to state that Soulbringer
sucks more than memory. It just sucks. End of story. |