![]() The plot follows you as a member of the Order of the Burning Dawn who is mysteriously attacked by another group of knights who believe that you're in league with demons. Click here for larger image.īut if you can move past the marketed description of Sword Coast Legends, the story-based campaign is serviceable with solid voice-acting, satisfactory dialogue, and an adequate amount of lore. My Level 20 Ranger, Anguy, dual-wielding force-damage weapons. Overall, combat is more tactical than the likes of Diablo and much faster than classic Baldur's Gate. Enemy mobs are leveled to your group's overall level, which keeps battles challenging but at the cost of being yet another aspect that isn't Dungeons & Dragons. Your party will need to communicate about who should pull enemies, how fighters should arrange themselves for threat, and where the wizard might use a sleep spell to knock some enemies unconscious. Strategic thought does occur on occasion, particularly if you're in a group of three other non-AI players in a challenging dungeon. ![]() All it takes is some careful management of health by using skills and potions, and you'll be fine. The vast majority of battles are won simply by clicking on enemies and hacking them to death. The game doesn't even have dragons, so theoretically, half of its apparent inspiration is nowhere to be found. For some reason, you can't navigate the map either when you open it up either. The spellbook for the wizard is woefully lacking, and dying has no penalty apart from having to respawn at the beginning of the dungeon floor. Abilities are arranged in a set of rather short skill trees and regenerate by cooldowns instead of the usual resting mechanic. Standard classes like the Druid, Monk, and Barbarian (just to name a few) and standard races like half-orcs and gnomes are absent, and characters you create can't multi-class, though they can sometimes acquire skills typical of another class. Unless you have a DM (more on that later), all skill checks are made in the background. Clicking on an enemy will have your chosen character launch attacks continuously, interrupted only by activating spells and special attacks hotkeyed on your quickbar.īy that definition, Sword Coast Legends won't be the direct D&D adaptation you might be expecting. ![]() You control a party of four class-based adventurers of various familiar races, alignment, and deity of choice who must spelunk through dungeons, defeat bandits, goblins, and the undead, and do pretty much what you expect out of a standard D&D campaign set in world of Forgotten Realms. ![]() But before we delve into the number of ways it differs from classic D&D, let's get our bearings straight first.Īs a fantasy RPG with active round-based combat, Sword Coast Legends actually fits somewhere in the spectrum between Dragon Age: Origins and Neverwinter Nights. ![]() However, since the game boasts in its official description that it attempts to recapture “the time-tested magic of playing Dungeons & Dragons as a shared storytelling experience,” it somewhat shoots itself in the foot when it comes to expectations. Much of your opinion on Sword Coast Legends will rely on how literal you believe the game should translate the rules of the traditional pen-and-paper Dungeons & Dragons (namely 5th Edition rules) into the equally traditional mechanics of a fantasy-based video game. I'm tempted to give multiple grades here, but I won't out of principle. The Sword Coast Legends by n-Space and Digital Extremes begs for the same treatment, as it can be either massively disappointing or surprisingly appealing depending on which parts of the game you care about. Granted, this method of “different strokes for different folks” approach goes against the common conventions of reviewing-readers are mainly looking for one grade from one person, not three. Veteran readers of GameRevolution may remember our review for LittleBigPlanet 2, for which writer Josh Laddin provided three separated report cards dependent on what type of player the reader subscribed to the most. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |