Customer Reviews

Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance

5 star:		(16)
4 star:		(16)
3 star:		(8)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is one rental that actually turned into a purchase. I'm usually not a fan of hack and slash type games, but this one has turned out to be quite entertaining.

Like other games in this genre, Dark Alliance is a third person perspective game (kinda 2.5D) in which you venture through cellars, mines, dungeons and even outdoor environments like mountain and villages. Levels typically end with a "boss" of varying difficulty and combat style. Gameplay is mixed with first person cut scenes in which you converse with other characters in a multi-choice format.

Interestingly, you can only save your game at certain points. At first this seems annoying, but there are enough save points around the game so it isn't too bad. Another big plus is that saving is really quick. If you've played games like Morrowind, where saving and loading are good opportunites to grab a drink, then you're in for a treat. Unfortunately you can only save about 25 games at once and there is no way to describe the saved game. A bit annoying, but oh well.

I'm not too much of a D&D fan, so I can't comment on how true this game is to the ruleset. However, as you move through the game you'll acquire better goods and have to manage your inventory and make decisions about how to develop your powers as you advance levels. Who knows if these mechanisms are authentic enough, but they are fun.. :)

Finally, one of the best aspects of the game (and why I ended up purchasing it) is the two player option. This put two players on the screen at the same time, working together to battle through the game. I find this style of multiplayer play to be much more enjoyable than split screen, and this is one of the few games that offers it.

Despite the game's title, this game is not at all in the same vein as the wonderful Baldur's Gate PC RPGs. It's a hack-and-slash dungeon crawler, and in terms of gameplay it is nearly identical to Diablo II, but with better graphics. If this type of game appeals to you, great! If you're looking for your RPG fix though, you'll have to get it somewhere else.

Let's start with the good points. The game is pretty fun if you're into hack-and-slash types, especially with two players. Any game with a two-player cooperative mode always scores points with me. The graphics and sound are very good, and the game is easy to learn and easy to control.

There is some replay value to it, as there are some new modes you can unlock by finishing the game. Beat the game once and you'll be able to play a special game mode that puts you in a tough dungeon on a short time limit, playing as none other than Drizzt Do'Urden. Beat that mode, and you unlock Extreme difficulty in the normal game, which is several times more difficult than usual. If you manage to beat Extreme, you can play as Drizzt in the normal game.

There are some bad points to the game, however. It's extremely short; you can beat it in under 10 hours. It's really a shame that the game is not more extensive. Also, as with any game of this type, it can get quite repetitive after awhile. The game is very easy as well. The Gauntlet is really the only difficult part of it. Even on Extreme, I had no problems completing the game quickly.

And finally, although I knew this wasn't really an RPG when I bought it, I still couldn't help feeling disappointed at the great lack of depth compared to many other games that have been set in the Forgotten Realms. I would have liked to see a wider variety of D&D skills and spells brought in, as well. For instance, the Sorceress (and all spell-casting enemies) doesn't have any spell effects aside from direct damage. It would be cool to have things like Entangle and Charm Person available, to have a thief class with all their many skills, and so on. I realize why many of these things were left out, but a little more work on the design could have added a welcome element of strategy to what it is essentially little more than a slugfest.

My list of complaints may be long, but don't get me wrong; for what it is, this game was executed extremely well. If you're looking for a game like Diablo, you will enjoy this. If you want an RPG, you're better off with Morrowind, or waiting until Bioware rolls out their Star Wars RPG this summer. It's better with a friend, so BG:DA scores a few points there. Still, rent before you buy. You could easily beat this game in a weekend, and you might never play it again after that.

Baldur's Gate is a hugely popular RPG series for the PC. With Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance, console gamers get a taste for what makes this game so much fun.

First, remember that this is a console port of a very rich PC game. That means that instead of having lots of choices of male/female or human/elf/dwarf or fighter/thief/mage/cleric, you have three. You can be a male archer, a dwarf fighter, or a female sorceress.

The graphics are really quite good. There are numerous pools of water for you to run around in, to watch the ripples and wakes shimmer and merge. The lighting is lovely, the detail in the buildings and towns and dungeons look great on even large TVs. The sound is good too, and sitting in your living room with friends while the stereo sound surrounds you is tons of fun.

You can play single player or two-person cooperative, which makes couch-play even more fun. With a large bowl of popcorn and your favorite drinks, you can hack and slash your way through numerous hours or a weekend of play.

Now, the down side. Again, console port. Really, you're playing Gauntlet. You run around hacking up barrels and crates in your friend's cellar. Is this exactly the nicest thing to do? You hack at rats and enemies, look for things in barrels. Yes, you get into lever-pulling and puzzles. But in the end the game is pretty linear and the monsters don't regenerate. So whatever level you're at when you get to a certain point, you can't build yourself up more strongly.

This can get to be a real pain when you hit a strong boss. You can't go buy more gear, because there's no way to make more money. You can't get stronger or more skillful, because there's nobody else to kill "behind you" and you can't go "ahead" until you kill the boss. So you're doomed to keep trying to hack at him until you get past him ... somehow.

Another big complaint I have is that the gamemakers seem obsessed with the female form. The guys in the game are all pudgy and uninteresting. But the girls! The first woman you meet, the bartender, has jiggly, wiggly breasts and she shakes them around non-stop during her long, long discussions with you. Everyone I showed the game to was mesmerized by them.

And playing the female sorceress character, I found that no matter how hard I tried, I could NOT get her clothed well. Every outfit involved a cut-off top, skimpy leather boots and not much else. Ahem, she's going into a deep, dark dungeon to face dire enemies? And she's doing this in beach-wear??

Still, the game was campy fun, and definitely draws you in. A fun weekend-play game for real RPGers, and an easy way for those new to the genre to learn what it's about and to get a taste for the fun.

I saw Baldur's Gate for the PC but never liked the feel and control of the gate. I was a little hesitant to buy it for the Xbox but it was one of the few RPG games out for XBox and RPGs are my ideal type of game.

To my surprise I really enjoyed it.

The game is somewhat linear in the sense that you alway know what to do next as opposed to a open concept were there is no real order of objectives (such a Morrowind). Although this may not appeal to all players I prefer such games because I don't spend all my time gaming and in open concept games I tend to make a lot less progress.

Playing on the Normal difficulty setting the enemies present a challenger without being too extremely difficult to result in massive frustration.

The game is, for the most part, a hack and slash game but does have a small element of Roleplaying to it with interactive character dialogues.

There is a very limited selection of character classes (Fighter, Archer and Mage) but the classes are nicely worked out with ifferent benefits and abilities for each class.

The equipment available in the game is not as extensive as other games (such as Diablo II for the PC) but is still fairly extensive and the game provides good scaling of equipment availability making the characters progress from poor equipment to better equipment.

Best of all, for all you mage lovers, this is one of the first games that I have seen where the magic user can, for the most part, fight by using spells and rely on a weapon as a secondary backup. I love the mage class and in most games the mages are still too dependant on fighting with weapons and only using magic to supplement their attack. Well not in this game, sure you need weapons when you start out but with a little patience you can quickly make a mage that can predominantly fight with spells only.

In my opinion the only thing missing in this game is an way to swap cash between players and the ability to play the game over XBox Live.

All in all I really enjoyed this game and would recommend it to any who likes RPG games.

Having played Baldur's Gate for the PC, when I picked up this game, I was anticipating the D&D experience -- many character races, tons of spells, highly configurable, optional quests, that kind of thing. When I got into it, still anticipating this would come along even with the limited character choice, I got into the graphics and the easy controls, the interaction with the environment, the jaw-dropping water effects. Finally it dawned on me that this isn't supposed to be a hard-core-gaming RPG, it's a console game. I've had my xbox six months and played a lot of crap -- the xbox is starting to come into its own, but you're really kinda limited when it comes to pc-style games (as opposed to the sports/driving/1st person shooter/stupid game-show parody) that seem to dominate the console). This game is a spectacular, simple, rpg. It's a bit short, but the experience is different with the different characters you can play, so there's some replay value. That's an argument for buying it used, but don't miss one of the good ones for the xbox.

I bought this game because I was looking for another two-player cooperative game after having played Halo for months, which is an amazing coop game as well as single player. This game allows you to play the entire adventure with two people. The graphics and music are superb. You are allowed to assign the controls any way you like which is a great feature not many games have.

I feel sorry for anyone who has spent more than ten dollars on this game. I purchased it for [...] at Toys 'R' Us. Basically a dollar for every hour of campaign time I got out of it.

I'm a huge rpg, particularly forgotten realms fantasy fan, and I was sorely dissapointed in this game. While, the story is missing in detail, the adventuring is fun, heavy hack n slash type, very little to no RP at all. The ending was just that, an ending, a real let down. We went through this game tooth and nail, making sure to uncover every stone, secret and bad guy and it still only took me 8 and a half hours to beat. I was really dissapointed. Just when we thought there was going to be a spectacular plot twist and the game was really going to start kicking, it just ended, promising yet 'another installment' in the Baldurs Gate series. Honestly, instead of purchasing the next game, I'll just pass. I just can't justify paying new game prices for what amounts to the time you would get out of a free community expansion.

If you want to purchase an RPG, save your money and put it towards the NWN platinum pack for the PC. Now there you can waste the hours away!!!

Okay heres the deal.. if your looking for regular pc baldur gate type game.. then this might not be what your looking for. But its still tons and tons of fun. Just finished playing it 2 player style with my roomate, and with all the fighting over the gold and weapons that drop, and allies dying, I had never laughed so much in my life. You might think that the graphics are terrible, but that will suprise you, when you have a fire sword that mysteriously turns into fire whenever a monster appears, or many other items that are just cool. Give it a chance, you will like it. It might not be what you expect, but still loads of fun.

Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance has already been released for the PS2 months earlier, but this doesn't mean that the newly, ported version to the Xbox video game console should be ignored. Developer Snowblind Studios has seemlessly ported the PS2 version over to the Xbox and, using the Xbox's higher graphical processing power, made the game look even better. But graphics alone doesn't make a great a fun and great time for a gamer. This Xbox port also includes the great gameplay of the original PS2 version. The intuitive and easy-to-use control scheme remains intact.

Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance still allows a player to choose between three different types of player characters. One can either choose to be a dwarf warrior, a human ranger, or an elfin sorceress. Each type of character has their own advantages and disadvantages and all three could be used to go through the game and finish it. Though I learned after doing so that the best class to pick would be the elfin sorceress. Her high level of magic spells available to her in addition to being able to have some success using a melee weapon makes her slightly better overall. And for the prurient minded gamers out there, the elfin sorceress could be seen in all her near-nakedness glory in the menu-system.

The 3/4 top down viewpoint of the fight makes it easy for th eplayer not to be surprised by enemies and traps as he goes from one dungeon, cave system and, at time, overland area to the next. Similar to Blizzard's Diablo, BG:DA is pretty much the same game as that hack and slash, but using the 3rd edition rules of Advanced Dungeons and Dragons and its world of the Forgotten Realms. The city of Baldur's Gate and the surrounding region of the Sword Coast are done beautifully by the Snowblind developers. From the deep, underground mine tunnel complexes of the dwarves to the festering, swamp area of Chelimber.

The enemies are designed well and pretty much follows the description of the creatures in the many Forgotten Realms game books and novels. Whether its Umber Hulks, beholders, giants, displacer beasts, etc...the developers did their job well in bringing these varied and dangerous creatures of Faerun to life in BG:DA. Even the many different races introduced and used in the game follows their description in the FR books and guides. The dwarves speak with a heavy Scottish brogue, while elves, both high and dark speak in a high and might English-manner. The voice-acting in this game is also top-notch and I would say some of the best video game VA ever. There's not a false note with any of the spoken dialogue and that just makes the game much more immersive.

Overall, Interplay and Snowblind Studios' Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance is a great looking and very fun game to play. It's not as deep and rich as the straight-up rpg that the PC games int he series were well-known for. What Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance does bring is the themes and storytelling of the PC games but in a much more simple, hack and slash dungeon-crawl a la Diablo and Dungeon Siege. For those with an Xbox, but not a PS2 then I suggest they go out and get this game. They won't be disappointed.

I picked up a copy of Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance not too long ago (yah, I know it has been out for a while). Anyway, found the game surprisingly good and much better than expected.

In case you haven't read any of the other reviews or are completely confused, this game is typical hack-and-slash. You guide your charachter from an overhead perspective and control their attacks, blocks and magics. There is little in the way of skill needed here, which is refreshing in its own right. You have only three charachters to select from (Elven Sorceress, Human Archer and Dwarven Rogue), which was my first complaint. Each plays roughly the same, though they have slightly different starting stats and their list of spells/feats (which can be purchased when you level up) are different.

The game uses the Dungeons and Dragons roleplaying game ruleset, but takes a lot of liberties with it. But for fans of DnD you will see spells, feats and classes you recognize. The use of the DnD rules is not without its flaws though, and of most note is the flaw in the way armor works in this game (or doesn't work). As you improve your armor don't expect to take any less damage when you get hit, it doesn't work that way and armor doesn't absorb any damage. What the armor does is make it harder (supposedly) for enemies to hit you in the first place (yah, you will see them swing at you and have it deal no damage, or you swing at them and see your weapon slice them but don't deal any damage). While this sounds good, the problem is that the enemies you are going up against in the early stages of the game can hit you 99% of the time even with the best armor you could find at that point. In the later stages, the enemies will hit you no matter what, you simply can't get your armor high enough to cause them any concern - the developers of the game actually released a statement acknowledging this. Oh well, you do have a manual block (provided you are using melee weapons) and it works pretty well against most attacks except those of bosses. All armor does is make you look cool and take up a huge chunk of your limited carrying capacity.

Graphically the game looks really good, the colors are clear and vibrant and your charachter model looks good and usually stands out nicely from the surroundings. As you change your equipment you will notice that it reflects on your charachter. Magical weapons also have a nice blue shine and as enemies near some will burst into flame or something similar. The enemies as well look really, really well done, and again, if you are familiar with DnD you will recognize them. The visual representation of your spells is also very well done with bright colors, dancing flames and showers of magical energy - nice! When you strike an opponents you will be rewarded with blood spatter, and smaller enemies like rats can be cut clean in half. Spiders also goo nicely (and can be pretty creepy to anyone who happens to not like spiders).

The gameplay is smooth, no glitches, and the controls are easy. Spell management is a little cumbersome as you have to use the direction pad to scroll through your list of spells/feats to find the one you want to use for the current situation, but simply pressing the B button uses the selected spell, and A delivers your attack. Switching between close and ranged weapons is very simple (press a direction on the D-pad) and pressing the other direction turns the automap on and off. As far as the map is concerned you don't really need it because the game pretty much uses invisible barriers, stones, walls, green foilage, ravines and what have you to keep your from exploring out of the desired area. In all respects the game is extrememly linear, but as you are basically playing for the hack-and-slash aspect, that is not too bad. And you can also have a friend control a second charachter on the screen, which adds to the fun.

As far as sound, that is never too much of a big deal for me, but the voice acting in this game is fine, the spells, blows and weapon effects sound great for the most part, and I didn't really notice the background music, so obviously it isn't a probem either.

I did give the game 5 stars, but it does have some flaws. The graphics are nice and the levels are laid out ok, but not great. And they re-use a lot of the texture tiles and what have you, so in that respect some of the areas have similiar appearance to what you would expect to see on the super nintendo with the same brick tile pattern repated every so many inches (most annoying when you are outdoors and they reuse trees and rock formations). Also, as I mentioned, there are only 3 classes to play as, and each one is somewhat limited in their spells and feats. For example, as the Sorceress I found only a few of the spells to be worth investing in and none of them did more damage than a fine sword and a lot of them take a pretty good amount of magical energy to cast for only a limited effect. Using ranged weapons and spells can also be aggravating as it is not always easy to tell exactly where your character is facing, so they will miss a few times while you try and line them up. This gets harder when you are farther away from your target, or trying to fire diagnally.

Overall I really enjoyed this game. There are a few aggravating spots (like jumping across tiles that fall out from under you) but overall very fun and a great way to burn away the time. If you overlooked it before, give it a try.