A fantastic Single Player melee/magic FPS with a great multiplayer to back it up. Best game of 2006...
http://media.putfile.com/DMM
http://media.putfile.com/DMMM
Now i never even heard of this game until the demo was released and i played abit of it and didn't think it was so good so i quickly forgot about it. Then the game was released and there was just a real lack of games in 2005 and 2006 so i thought i'd buy it anyways and give it a shot, am i glad i did now! Maybe i just really like it because i wasn't hyped about it so no real room for disappointment or maybe it's because the gameplay is unique, fun and innovative!
So i think many people came into the game expecting to see Elder Scrolls: Might and Magic but when they saw it was a more linear styled FPS with smaller amounts of customization they were turned off. I however loved the fact that they done a proper fantasy styled FPS with real interactive and fun melee/magic combat. The story could be better and i'm not going to lie there because it is your standard cheesey FPS storyline thats just to move you along but it still works.
The combat is the games strongest point which is really good because you can mix and match skills and do w/e you want without having to restart the game. I myself went the way of being a melee warrior because your strong and usually the easiest thing to do with little micromanagment. I loved how engaging the combat was and the animations of it were fantastic. You could get into grapples and stuff and take them head on or your could use the enviroment or you could sneak up on them or even take them out long range with magic or your bow. I personally loved kicking them off cliffs or into objects and i loved using the magic.
Magic in DMM&M is like (if you played Bioshock) and much better version of Plasmids and they're more interactive and fun to use. I love for example the spell where you could make them super small and stamp on them or spray ice on the floor and have them trip over and fall down stairs into spikes lol. It's just soo fun playing around with all the spells.
The levels are fantastic and designed very well and all in all the game will last you around 10 hours which is longer than i was expecting. Whats good about this is with Dark Messiah it doesn't make you feel bored with being too long or cheated with feeling too short. As i had no expectations i was pleasantly suprised. I really loved the chase level where your chasing a goblin over rooftops of a town/city, it's quite fun and a nice change of pace which it kinda makes it feel like a first person platformer for that level lol.
The music is good but not GREAT and the sound effects were fantastic so that really lifts up the sound side of things. You'll never feel disappointed with any of it and really makes you feel like your fighting with your weapons and just such great effects.
The multiplayer aswel is very great and i loved it to bits because it's different. Basically got 2 modes one where you capture a flag or the other where you capture points similar to BF2. Also you'll gain levels which wont have any effect on speed or health or anything like that but just give you 1 point per level to spend on items that'll enhance you like be able to fire 3 arrows at a time instead of 1 but this makes accuracy worse. Things like more damage or more armor or different spells etc etc. So it's a skill based FPS multiplayer game where these unlocks are to just help you or look kool rather than make you overpowered.
All in all i'd say it's a fantastic game with great graphics and great art direction and just a great overall gaming experience well worth the price of £10 it is now. It's very fun and a real change of pace for recent FPs games so give it a try. Also i don't understand all these tech problems that people are having, because i played form start to finish in with not one crash or problem with all graphics maxed out using only 1 gb ram.