Sudeki

by Microsoft

Product Features

• Battle against 80 enemies in a world with eye-popping graphics -- from Accursed Undead to massive battle fortresses
• Cinematic in-game combat - Dozens of wild moves, slow-motion bullet time, earthshaking spells and hundreds of destructive melees
• Conduct massive cooperative Spirit Strikes -- players ill unite their energies to take out legions of enemies
• Your heroes will build up their strengths as they fight - Manage their skills, weapons and spells as they build a legend
• Unique commerce system based on killing furry animals and selling their pelts(it's more fun than it sounds)

Product Details

• Shipping: This item is also available for shipping to select countries outside the U.S.
• ASIN: B0000AOE9K
• Product Dimensions: 7.7 x 5.5 x 0.8 inches ; 5.4 ounces
• Media: Video Game
• Release Date: July 21, 2004
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (80 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #10,458 in Video Games (See Top 100 in Video Games)
• Discontinued by manufacturer: Yes

Product Description

From the Manufacturer

Four heroes: a sultry wizardress, a soaring gunslinger, a powerful swordsman, and a dark huntressÑare about to be hurtled over the edge in a flight into darkness. Sudeki pushes the limits of what a roleplaying game (RPG) can be by providing bigger worlds, more powerful heroes, and sexier heroines, all set in the context of fantastical real-time action. In a world ripped apart by deceit, Sudeki players become heroes on a twisting path of betrayal, real-time combat, and unbelievable magic.

Features:

• Bone-crunching combat: Sudeki features intense combat with dozens of moves, slow-motion bullet time, earth-shaking spells, hundreds of destructive melees and ranged weapons, and group-based magical attacks known as spirit strikes.
• Hordes of enemies: Battle more than 65 enemies, ranging from Accursed Undead to a 90-foot Serpentine Siren.
• Unique and powerful allies: Play a team of four fierce heroes: a beautiful and deadly sorceress, a steam-punk gunslinger, a powerful man-at-arms, and a dark huntress. Conduct massive cooperative spirit strikes to devastate legions of foes.
• Heroes that build and grow: Choose how to develop your characters' skills, spell arsenal, weapons cache, and powers.
• Immense worlds to explore and tame: Sudeki is filled with hundreds of nonplayer characters and cunning enemies, as well as plot twists and turns fraught with danger.
• Jaw-dropping graphics: A custom, next-generation graphic engine built from the ground up for Xbox features detailed facial animation, bump-mapping, fully dynamic shadows, and awesome scale.

Product Description

Product InformationFour heroes: a sultry wizardress a soaring gunslinger a powerful swordsmanand a dark huntress?are about to be hurtled over the edge in a flight intodarkness. Sudeki pushes the limits of what a roleplaying game (RPG) canbe by providing bigger worlds more powerful heroes and sexier heroines allset in the context of fantastical real-time action. In a world ripped apart bydeceit Sudeki players become heroes on a twisting path of betrayal real-timecombat and unbelievable magic.Product Features Bone-crunching combat: Sudeki features intense combat with dozens of moves slow-motion bullet time earth-shaking spells hundreds of destructive melees and ranged weapons and group-based magical attacks known as spirit strikes. Hordes of enemies: Battle more than 65 enemies ranging from Accursed Undead to a 90-foot Serpentine Siren. Unique and powerful allies: Play a team of four fierce heroes: a beautiful and deadly sorceress a steam-punk gunslinger a powerful man-at-arms and a dark huntress. Conduct massive cooperative spirit strikes to devastate legions of foes. Heroes that build and grow: Choose how to develop your characters' skills spell arsenal weapons cache and powers. Immense worlds to explore and tame: Sudeki is filled with hundreds of nonplayer characters and cunning enemies as well as plot twists and turns fraught with danger. Jaw-dropping graphics: A custom next-generation graphic engine built from the ground up for Xbox features detailed facial animation bump-mapping fully dynamic shadows and awesome scale.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

20 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A look at Sudeki, July 25, 2004

By 

Old Jack - See all my reviews

= Fun:5.0 out of 5 stars 

This review is from: Sudeki (Video Game)

At present I am almost finished with the game (at only 17 or so hours into it, mind you). So, I thought it an apt time to voice my opinions on the game.

Gameplay: The place where this game truly shines is its real-time combat system, which is quite unique to a RPG. Depending on which character you use, the game is played as a FPS (first person shooter) or as third person action game. The FPS mode is fairly traditional, but the melee combat is unique. It is comprised of a combo system in which the player must enter in three button combos to complete attacks. Each combo is unique and may yield an interesting effect on your opponent (such as stunning or double damage). Here's the catch. The combos have to be inputted in a particular beat. If you mash the buttons, your character will still attack, but you won't get the desired combo. The system takes a few battles to get used to, but once you do it functions well and is enjoyable.

There are several attempts at puzzles in this game. Most of them are far too simple to be interesting, although a few block pushing puzzles at the end are rather interesting. For the most part, though, the puzzles fall rather flat and seem to be used only as a way to break up combat (something which wasn't necessary in the first place).

The level up system borrows a bit from titles like Arcanum. Each level, you receive a few points (one or two) which can be used to increase stats, hit points, spell points, or grant your character new spells. The system offers an interesting amount of customization not usually afforded in linear RPG's. Also, a bit of exploration will unearth items which permanently increase specific stats, thus allowing even more customization on the player's part.

Graphics: The game looks quite good. It is very stylized and cartoonish. The game does occasionally suffer from slow frame rates, particularly just before reaching a new area. Thankfully this slow down never happened during combat and it never hampered the gameplay. The camera could occasionally be tricky, but it was usually quickly resolved by moving the right thumbstick.

Sound: Here is where most people will probably be split. The voice acting is Sudeki is campy, and by campy I mean full blown campy. I must admit that when I first turned on the game and watched the opening sequence, I grit my teeth when I heard the voice acting. However, as time went on, and I got a better feel for the game, I began to realize that the campy voices really did fit with the game. For the most part, Sudeki is a fairly comedic and cartoonish game. The campy voice acting does seem to help bring out these qualities. The voice makes the game feel like an anime, like those old translated episodes of Dragon Ball.

The soundtrack for the game is quite good. It's an interesting mix of New Age acoustic guitars, heavy techno, with a little bit of roadhouse twang thrown into the mix. The theme from New Brightwater is certainly one of the standout songs in the game.

Story: The story in Sudeki is rather a mixed blessing, probably because it is so end loaded. The beginning of the game eases you into the world, giving you just the slightest tidbits of information about the bigger story. You explore the entirety of the first and second world, as well as part of the third, before the plot finally starts moving. Then, it seems like too much information is being thrown at you at one time. There are a few major plot twists, but the story itself is not intracately layered. It seems to be delivered bluntly.

The characters are alright, if a bit two dimensional. Tal, your main character, is a soldier how constantly feels the need to prove himself to his father. Allish is a princess mage who wants to do what she wants when she wants to. Buki is your typical tribal warrior, cold and impersonal with a distrust of human society. My favorite character, Elco, is a steam-punk scientist who's given his life and his hand for the kingdom of Illumina. The game actually seems to take a bit of advice from Classical Theater by using the original meaning of Deus ex Machina. The gods literally appear before the heroes and tell them what to do. Although it may come off as trite, it is an interesting choice, especially given that the pantheon of this world seems quite classical.

The world of Sudeki is fairly interesting. It is a combination of pretty much every RPG world concept ever used (save for Fallout's post nuclear apocalypse). Illumina is a sort of a steam-punk city, large gears coinciding with parapets and high castle towers. Brightwater is your classic medieval town by the bay. Shadani-Mo is a tribal city out in the desert. Transentia is a cyber punk city with ray guns and clockwork robots. The only complaint I have about the world is that I want to see more. What is already there is interesting, but it does seem as though some aspect could have been flesh out a bit more.

Closing comments: Sudeki is a very fun game with an interesting combat system. The world is vibrant and interesting, although I do wish it had been fleshed out a bit more. The story is alright, but the combat really is where this game shines.
4.5

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Underrated by many, better then i expected, October 20, 2004

By 

Isackson "Reader/Gamer" (WA) - See all my reviews

= Fun:4.0 out of 5 stars 

This review is from: Sudeki (Video Game)

When i first heard about the upcoming release of Sudeki i was pretty stoked. The XBox has been lacking exclusive RPGs and Sudeki (along with Fable) looked like it might fill in some gapping holes. However after picking up a demo of the game at Gamestop prior to it's release my entire opinion flipped. The demo was plain awful, the combat seemed to be lacking and to put it lightly i wasn't at all impressed. So what did i do? I cancelled my reservation.

Several months latter (after watching Sudeki pretty much bomb sales wise) i decided to pick up a copy because of the price drop and i have to say that my opinion completly changed. Hidden behind all of the hype (both negative and positive) i found Sudeki suprisingly addictive and enjoyable.

Graphically the game is beutiful and despite the simplicity of the combat it's enjoyable (not bad hack and slash at all) - the boss fights are also alot of fun. The story has depth and despite the annoying voice acting (and it is very annoying) i can't say anything other then i enjoyed the game.

I guess i leaned my lesson - don't trust a demo to give you an honest accesment of a game and don't believe the hype. There are quite a few games that were overlooked and have become classics. (especially RPGs)

Give Sudeki a shot.

11 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Fun linear RPG, August 6, 2004

By 

Dan Crevier (Bellevue, WA United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

= Fun:4.0 out of 5 stars 

This review is from: Sudeki (Video Game)

I just finished playing Sudeki, and overall I found it to be quite enjoyable. It's an RPG game with a anime look and feel. It features a real time battle system. Some characters are melee characters where battle is like a fighting game where there are various combos. Some characters have ranged weapons where it's like a first person shooter. It can sometimes be a bit frustrating to try to manage all 4 characters in real time, but a 'QuickMenu' helps you quickly execute actions for each character and then cycle to others.

The game is quite linear, and it does a good job keeping you on track. You really need to complete side quests you get when you get them, otherwise, who knows when you'll get the chance to get back to do them. It can actually be frustrating at times to not be able to get back to the right place with the right character to finish a side quest. The story line of the game puts you in control of different sets of characters over time, which keeps things interesting. Each characters have their strengths and weaknesses, so you have to learn to make the best of each character. I found the storyline to be fairly interesting, although it's not very original.

The graphics are very good, although I wish it had support for a higher HDTV resolution. The sound effects make good use of surround sound. I ended up spending a couple hours a day on the game over a couple weeks.

If you are looking for an open ended in depth RPG, this isn't the game for you. If you are looking for a fun linear RPG game to entertain you for 30 hours or so of game play, I think Sudeki is a good buy.