While not quite the disaster some have said, Dark Messiah simply doesn't offer enough to make it worth recommending.
GAMEPLAY (6) - You start off by choosing from several typical medieval professions, Warrior, Archer, Wizard, or Assassin. Seeing as I prefer straightforward combat I played as a Warrior. The first-person combat can be enjoyable, though there's very little depth. In most cases I could simply button mash the attack button to get through a battle, but fortunately Dark Messiah allows you to take advantage of the environment to keep the combat from becoming too tedious. Spikes protruding from a wall and fireplaces are areas that you can push enemies into, you can kick them off a cliff and even knock over a support to let a roof crash on top of them. Equipment is very restrictive in that you can only use that which is specifically assigned to your class. As you defeat enemies and accomplish missions you will gain experience but you have no control over your bonus from leveling up as it is all predetermined. Therefor you really don't really have anything personal invested in your character, as most RPGs would offer. The game follows a linear path for the most part as it really plays more like a typical FPS than a RPG. The biggest downfall of the gameplay is the platforming, which is almost always a bad idea with a first person view. You're forced to use a Rope Bow to create ropes to climb up, usually getting to a certain point where you shoot off another to continue your progress. The problem is that many times it's very difficult to judge just how much distance there is between jumps, resulting in too many plummets to your death. The idea may have seemed interesting in concept but it just doesn't work well and becomes a major annoyance.
GRAPHICS (5) - Dark Messiah is years behind in terms of graphics. I've never seen how this looked originally on the PC but honestly this looks like you're playing on the PS2. There didn't seem to be any effort to use lighting or texture effects for the environments, and characters and monsters were very flat and lacking much detail. Even with graphics this simple there were still a high amount of glitches, including objects that would float in the air if you took away what they were resting on as well as enemies that would sometimes get stuck in walls and floors. If you manage to pull off a special decapitation you get to see blood represented by huge red pixels that actually looked like something from a NES game.
AUDIO (5) - Unfortunately there's not a whole lot of good things I can say about this audio. Most of the voicework is very amateurish. The voice that most clearly stands out is that of your spirit guide Xana. She's constantly making comments in a tone of voice most readily associated with 1-900 numbers. Sound effects are few and far between, and none of them are exceptional. The same can be said for the soundtrack, which I pretty much forgot as soon as I finished the game.
VALUE (7) - Dark Messiah took me a bit over 14 hours to complete so I have to give it credit for being a bit longer than the typical action game. There is multiplayer available, with five different modes, but not surprisingly there aren't many people out there playing this so unless you know someone that has the game odds are you won't have much luck finding anyone on LIVE.
STORY/SUMMARY - The actual story, while not on the level of the better RPGs, is actually not that bad. You take on the role of Sareth, the young pupil of a mage who embarks on an adventure to save the world from the prophesied coming of the Dark Messiah. Eventually you realize the true depth of your quest as you take on waves of undead a necromantic cult. The narrative is decent and fairly engaging but it loses its appeal through the problems with the presentation and gameplay. When it's all said and done, this not a good game. It's not an outright right failure either, but if you have limited gaming funds and time this has to go towards the back of the line. It feels as if the game is caught between two genres, and neither has been executed very well. It's not straight action/adventure like God of War as the combat is so repetitive and shallow and it also isn't an RPG because there is no character customization or expansive world. Unfortunately, this game suffers from a major identity crisis that keeps it in mediocrity.