Die by the Sword seemed like your typical third-person action game, but its unique play mechanics allowed for a flexibility of control that few games can match. You didn't just hit a button to slash the enemy, but could move the hero's sword arm in any direction, thereby allowing you to invent your own moves on the fly. The game modeled damage according to the momentum of your swing and let you dismember your foes, so with practice you could behead your enemies with a couple of well-placed strikes. It wasn't easy to get used to the control, but most of those who did found Die by the Sword to be rewarding and enjoyable as long as it lasted.
Unfortunately, though the original Die by the Sword campaign was pretty sweet, it was very short. Some of the more memorable moments had the loudmouthed hero Enric quaffing a shrinking potion to navigate through Kobold tunnels, fighting while dangling from a rope trap, sabotaging a Dwarven mining laser, and leaping across giant clockwork gears. The new Limb from Limb quest, which stars Enric's aptly loudmouthed mate Maya, offers no such excitement, comprising nothing more than long stretches of cavern and dungeon interspersed with the rare but always banal block puzzle. To make matters worse, the quest isn't even any longer than the original, there are no cinematics, no ending, and really just a lot of repetitive combat that seemed much more contextual in the original game. Sure, you'll fight a few new enemies including a minotaur and a big beetle, and you can play the campaign as several different characters, but so what? The Limb from Limb campaign feels like it was hacked together, with no new texture maps and no new architecture. Maya's got about a half a dozen speaking lines, and you'll hear them all a thousand times if you don't turn the sound off. It's just sad that the best part of this campaign is what made the original one disappointing: its brevity.
Limb from Limb isn't all bad. Most of Die by the Sword's lasting value came from its arena combat, where you could pit yourself against one or several opponents of your choice and duel to the death. Limb from Limb expands the arena with several new battlefields and lets you play as the new monsters in addition to multiple versions of returning characters (with different skins and weapons). There's a new king-of-the-hill mode, as well as the fairly amusing ogre hockey, in which you try to smack a subservient kobold into the enemy player's goal. Now that there are more scenarios and characters to choose from, arena battles in Die by the Sword can be especially fun.
But improved arena play hardly justifies the clumsy quest, which will make this add-on intolerable for all but the most die-hard Die by the Sword fans. An ideal add-on makes a good game bigger and better, smoothing out rough edges, adding complexity, and enhancing graphics, sound, and overall presentation. Die by the Sword may be bigger with the Limb from Limb add-on, but rest assured that this supplement only dilutes the original, creating the illusion of volume at the cost of quality.
