The Untold Legends series has a fairly middling reputation on the PSP. Dark Kingdom does nothing to alter that.
The Untold Legends series has a fairly middling reputation on the PSP, and that mediocrity is translated directly to this release. As an Action-RPG, character classes are limited to a choice of three at the outset of the game (Warrior, Scout, Mage), all of which utilise a similar moveset. There are the usual raft of enhanced or limited attributes on offer depending on your class selection, and a choice of nine unique spells to level up during the campaign. There is no further customisability on offer, although some limited armour alterations provide a small amount of visual distinction. Granted some of the upgrades to look very pretty and/or menacing depending on your tastes.
Given the lack of personalisation options then, you'd think that Untold Legends would focus on creating a strong linear storyline around the pre-created avatars on offer; but this direction feels half-baked at best, and limps along weakly throughout the single-player. Don't expect a God of War or even a Titan Quest, and you won't be disappointed.
The basic premise casts your character as part of a group of three supreme warriors under the collective name of 'Dragon's Shade'. Set in the fictional land of 'Dureth', the Shade act as an elite splinter cell, separate from the main Kingdom. During a routine mission against the barbarian hordes that plague the land, your band of warriors discovers an evil corruption running to the heart of the empire, right up to the King himself. No prizes for guessing where the story leads, and over the course of the 15-18 hour journey you'll be treated with several bland in-engine cutscenes to dictate the tale, complimented by some pretty poor voicework.
Role-playing elements are surprisingly lightweight even by action-rpg standards, and although you can upgrade statistics and spells in the normal manner, there isn't enough compelling depth to make this a real drive to continue working on your character. The game scales enemies well to your character level, providing a decent challenge, but with the side effect of hampering any real sense of progress or achievement. Of course part of the problem is the linearity of the levels, but every now and then it would have been nice for the designers to provide some lower-level enemies for you to simply decimate.
Given that the story and RPG elements are not enough to carry the experience alone, it's left to the core action to spur the player along and unfortunately this also falls short of excelling in any particular field.
Basic and heavy attacks are mapped to the face buttons, and the usual raft of blocks and magic attacks can be performed with combinations of the shoulder triggers. Combat is generally well-designed, with some decent animation, and there are a good variety of attacks on offer without ever becoming overly-complex. The sense of fluidity is perhaps Dark Kingdom's best achievement. Taking out a group of enemies with a combination of weapon-based attacks and magic support can be extremely satisfying, with a similar orb-collecting system to the God of War series boosting along your health and mana meters in the process.
But it's just all a bit too routine. Nothing particularly stands out about the combat and the developers seem to have hit the halfway house between focussed action game and a traditional point-click RPG style, without the out-and-out benefits of either system. Monotony soon sets in, and an over-reliance of simple hack and slash tactics rules the day.
It doesn't help that the game feels dated from the outset also. Graphical quality is clean and precise, but contains an undeniably clinical and almost PC-like feel at times. Some of the magic effects look good, but lets face it, streaking primary colours across the screen is one of the easiest things to get right, and the lack of subtlety in the environmental and character design shows through in the end. Audio quality is a similar story, with some decent effects and music, but generally terrible voice-acting.
Dark Kingdom is as basic an Action-RPG as you'll likely find on any generation of console hardware, as mired in tradition as any to come before it. No doubt for some people that will sound enticing, but this is a genre crying out for a dose of originality and a shove forward into a new era. Unfortunately with every subsequent release of this stature we appear to be no closer to reaching that goal, and whilst Untold Legends is by no means a bad game, it doesn't do enough right or provide a compelling enough experience to recommend as full-price purchase on a brand-new console.
Note: This text was originally written by myself and published over at strategyinformer.com