The Darkness Below – A Review
Here’s a simple question for you; did you play and enjoy Might and Magic 3 to 5? If you did then read on. If you didn’t, then unless you wish you had, you might as well go back to whatever boring activity you were doing earlier since this game will likely not appeal to you.
As someone who has played all the M&M games including the current Strings XI iteration, the 3-5 versions stand out as some of the best. Along with games like EOB or even the more recent Legends of Amberland these grid based games are not only fun, but quite addictive, especially for Old Skule gamers like myself, (with the accent on OLD).
You begin by creating your four person party with most of the usual options available. Now, at the time of writing, there is no simple manual to help you with this, but a very long and complicated rule book which covers everything you need to know, but which also includes far more information than you really need, or want early on. The good news is that the developer plans to rectify this in the near future.
You have a choice of 6 races; Giant, Elf, Dwarf, Gnome, Half-Elf, and of course Human, with both male and female options for each. However, you can’t currently choose a personalised name for each, but must select from of list of pre-generated names. Again, the developer hopes to add this feature later. There are both seven professions you can choose (Barbarian, Cleric, Knight, Paladin, Ranger, Thief and Wizard) and seven attributes you can select to improve, (Power, Intelligence, Personality, Toughness, Technique, Quickness, Perception) but here’s where a simple manual would prove more helpful. You do get to re-roll these attribute stats once you’ve selected a profession, but I would have liked more detailed knowledge about them without having to wade through the Rulebook to find the information.
What you don’t realise at character creation your first time through is that there is really no stealing, or even lockpicking in the game so you don’t need a Thief. A Ranger is far more useful. Similarly, while Power is used to determine success with larger weapons, other smaller ones use Technique instead. Being able to wear armour is also based on the Technique skill. Yes, it is all explained in the PDF Rulebook, but most people don’t want to spend time wading through it and it can really mess things up early on when your Paladin can’t wear any armour because he doesn’t have sufficient Technique. There are ways to fix this; you can buy Books which increase your attributes for example, but it can be frustrating in the early stages. Hopefully, the planned manual will address this.
The Wizard is the most powerful of all the characters throughout the game and a ranged bow user (especially with a fire bow) is essential. I found the Paladin a little weak early on, but by mid to late game he became the biggest single damage dealer when properly buffed and he gets some of the best buffs. Unfortunately, I found the Cleric the weakest of all. Her heals were quite weak, she only had one good buff (Bless) and her offensive magic was poor. Her melee skills were totally underwhelming.
The next important area to consider is the ‘skills’ options. You actually get to select three skills during character creation, from a long list of available skills which include weapons, armour and magic. However, the good news is that you can later purchase these skills from a trainer, many of which are available early in the game. You begin at initiate level, but as in the M&M games you can then train up these skills, for a price, if you also meet certain minimum requirements. These more advanced trainers are also scattered through the game much like M&M, but all are found in one, or another, of the many towns you will visit. When you find, or visit a trainer, it will show you which of your characters is able to learn that particular skill. Again, in most cases, certain minimum stats, or attributes are required, but the majority are quite easily reached.
Magic is a skill like any other, but it comes in many forms such as fire, earth, water, air, mental, soul and energy. You can only select three of these at creation and you are given one spell for each type, but all are available to purchase eventually. Spells are learned from spell books which can be bought from Libraries and most of the large towns have one. Their stock is usually limited, but it does change every few days. Most skill books are designated as either Initiate, or Apprentice, though some Adept spells are available in some of the later towns. This is where it can get tricky. While each of the magic using professions can use several of the different schools, each profession can only use certain spells from that school. When you select a spell to buy, the game will tell you which character/s in your party can use that particular spell, if any. Just because it’s a fire spell doesn’t mean that anyone who has fire magic can use it.
One thing to note is that using a skill slowly improves it and you can monitor that improvement in your character sheet. Therefore, using a fire spell improves your fire magic and eventually makes the spell more powerful. My wizard primarily used only 2 or 3 spells for much of the game depending on the circumstances. Fire doesn’t work well against fire is the simplest example.
Enough on the basics; what is the game play like and is there a story? Yes there is, but it is fairly low key for much of the game though it does help to drive forward the exploration at key points. As I said earlier, this is a grid based game and all the towns, wilderness areas and dungeons are all based on a large grid which you can see using the map function. Each press of a movement key (standard WASD) moves you one square on the grid. In each town area, there are people who will offer you quests, people who you can hire to assist your party (maximum of 2) and various houses which may contain a shop, a skill trainer, someone with information, and sometimes another quest giver. Occasionally a quest giver will join your party for a short time, but that is rare. While hirelings are available and sometimes may be helpful if you are struggling with a dungeon for example, you need to remember that they will cost you gold, loot and XP. All XP gained is shared among all party members. I never used any.
I might mention here that after the initial ‘tutorial’ areas (a village, a wilderness and a small dungeon) money was never an issue. By the end of the game I had well over 150k of gold with nothing worthwhile to spend it on. Once you leave a village, or town; all of which are totally safe, you will encounter combat and in some places, lots of it. Combat is turn based, but fairly quick. Unless you are using a two handed weapon such as a bow you normally get two attacks per round, one for each hand. The hands can hold a weapon or a spell casting implement (staff for a wizard, holy symbol for a cleric or Paladin). You can have one of each, or two of each. Once my Wizard got sufficient levels He had 2 staffs and could cast 2 spells each round.
The good news is that you can access the group’s inventory during your turn to take a potion, or use one on someone else. This can be really helpful if someone has been given a negative condition eg petrified and your inventory contains a suitable potion to remove that condition. While there are spells and wands which can do the same thing, not all are always available. I always carried a variety of potions for emergencies.
There are an enormous variety of monsters in the game as one would expect from a game trying to emulate the old M&M series and working out what works best on each is part of the fun. Sometimes you might face just one critter and at other times a room full of them. Since there was no movement possible once combat begins each round went quite quickly. (The rest of this review can be found at RPGWatch, it won't fit here.)
