This game had a 3 year delay. Everyone has moved on.
This news was told by a gentleman who tells the story to Hiro and is told to goto Kage's headquarters to rescue his daughter Mikiko. Along the way, he meets a ex-commander 'Superfly Johnson' and then after rescuing Mikiko, they both becomes your sidekick and travel though time to stop Kage.
Having mentioned the story, I have difficulty thinking if the story is sci-fi or fantasy, however I'm left confused.
As it's a first person shooter, it has got RPG elements, as you can level up Hiro and raises his stats in the game to improve his performance.
Considering this game was delay for 3 years, the graphics are dated a lot, by the time this game got released, the whole world had already experienced the new Quake 3 engine. Daikatana used 'Quake 2' engine and just came too late.
Another criticism are the sidekicks, despite being the major selling point of the game, they behave poorly throughout the game, also there are bugs in the game, when you save and reload the save state, they disappear and this leaves the game broken. This bug has been fixed by installing the latest patch of the game.
Games which were release around 2000, had far superior AI, good examples being Quake 3 and Unreal Tournament.
The gameplay is running around, shooting everything and get to the end and with your sidekicks on later levels, there are secret areas, just like what Quake 2 and Doom had, also power-up items are lying around, however they vaguely help you.
The weapons are good, however some do a lot of waste of ammo, the shotgun simply have trouble control itself as fires 4 shots with a mouse click. It was useless.
Adding insult to the game are the Save Gems, you need one Gem to save your game, I'm pretty sure when buying the game, everyone has a luxury of saving their game anytime. Again, the patch gives you the freedom of saving.
The sounds in the game are good, however in some areas are grade-A annoying and considering there are some Japanese characters in the game. The voice acting is terrible.
Finally if you do play the game, and complete it from curiously, you wouldn't want to play the game again. Same for Multiplayer.
Story 4/10 – Fantasy or Sci Fi? I'm confused… however some of the elements are good, especiality the ending.
Graphics 3/10 – Dated, Quake 2 engine type of game released in 2000 when Quake 3 came out.
Gameplay 6/10 – Secret Areas, lengthy single player, Dumb AI, annoying sidekicks
Sound 5/10 – Bad voice acting, annoying sounds sometimes, it's good in some areas.
Value 2/10 – once you're done, move on, I know I did, Multiplayer offers something, however it lasts a day.