A half finished game that could have been great... but it's not.
Story (5):
You play as the son or daughter of the a great hero and you have to save the world from you evil, yet well intentioned brother who has gone insane and started killing random people... just because... Along with your butler, a old mediocre soldier and a dog with major problems in orientation (path finding) you have to win the hearts and minds of various people in order to gain support for a revolution. Armed with a mediocre arsenal of (not) really interesting weapons and some magic spell you have to finish some quest for each character until you are ready to become the king of Albion...and then things get frustrating and lame...
Gameplay (6):
Gameplay is rather complex and can be divided in 3 section: questing, economics and social interaction.
Questing: while areas open as you progress through the story in each city or village there are several secondary quest you can do before moving to the next area. Some quest are easy and require you to find something, kill something or escort someone to a certain location. While most quest give little reward or satisfaction they are still fun to do mostly because of the humor involved. Some quest are truly worth doing as they can lead to new ares to explore where treasures await.
Economics: after you purchase some upgrades you can buy houses and store and make money every 5 minutes and get some discounts. You can also bake pies, play the lute and forge swords in mini games that pay well especially at higher levels.
Social interaction: you can interact with people in good or bad ways and gain they friendship, love or hate. You can get married or divorced and you can make little hero babies.... That about covers it. Note that for each character you interact with you get quest to advance the level of relationship. this quest consist in simple fetch, find or delivery of a certain item.
Good or evil: you can chose to be good or evil with no actual impact on the story or gameplay. You change you appearance and some location might change based on your decision but there is nothing important about it. In fact the game is very easy in the second part of the story if you are evil.
The last aspect related to gameplay is the fact that there are very few quest that can be done which leave the game empty in the second half where there are no more quests to do.
Combat (7):
You have 3 types of attacks: melee , ranged and magic. While there are several weapons of each type to find and upgrade all fights can be won by spasming magic attacks and dodging incoming attacks, especially after you get access to the vortex spell. There are a decent type of enemies o fight but in the end you will mostly fight three type of enemies and this becomes boring rather quickly. Slow motion special moves are probably the best thing about the combat.
Graphics (8): the game looks good. Not all aspects are great but overall the graphics are nice. The models, even if they are goofy looking at time are still great. The animations are good and the special effects look cool.
Sounds: (9): overall the sounds of the game are really good. In fact the sound is the bes thing about the game. Voices, music and environment bring life to the wonderful, yet empty world of Albion.
Final thoughts: the game really feels unfinished. In the beginning there are a lot of things to do and explore. But, as you progress through the story there are no new quests or areas to explore and the game begins to feel empty and unfinished. Some flaws in the the design of the game will leave you wondering that were they thinking when they made this game like this and in the end you will get bored just waiting for something interesting to happen. If you like pointless decision making and repetitive fighting with a bit of good humor this is the game for you.