Is nothing sacred?One of the great traditions of pop-culture journalism is the need to waffle on for several hundred words about something only vaguely related to the product being reviewed. It would be rude to break this tradition so here goes...
Back in the mists of time, when Vista was a pipe dream and people still happily ran games using Windows 98 and 32MB of video ram we had two competing styles of RPG. There was Baldur's Gate, Bioware's D&D magnum opus, a long and extremely deep game that was light years ahead of anything that had come before it. And long before Blizzard decided that Warcraft was the perfect concept for an RPG it published Diablo. This was a frantic hack and slash dungeon slogger with an addictive, yet frustrating multiplayer mode that is still played by gamers all over the world today. Both titles are now legendary and still influence today's RPGs in droves.
The sad thing is that most games that have tried to emulate the success of these two giants of the genre have fallen flat on their faces. Diablo's legacy has been particularly badly represented most recently by the depressingly repetitive Too Human - a game that was thoroughly squashed by its own hype.
But now, in the lead up to Christmas there is one title buried deep in amongst the copious amounts of sequels beginning with 'F' that shows the potential to rival the quality of Diablos one and two.
Sacred 2: Fallen Angel, to give it its full name, is positively dripping with influences from both Baldur's Gate and Diablo and yet dares to be an exciting title in its own right.
What Sacred 2 does so effectively is combine the storytelling and humour of Baldur's Gate with the action and item collection of Diablo. This is a major achievement and it elevates Sacred 2 from just another hack 'n' slash to one of the must-have titles on the PC this Christmas.
The control system is fantastically simple. The interface is a selection of carefully positioned icons allowing access to everything from maps, to inventory to class abilities. Left click on an opponent inflicts a standard attack and right click engages your chosen class ability. The wheel allows you to zoom in and you from your character and holding it down and moving the mouse left or right will rotate the camera around the character.
Along the bottom of the screen is a quick bar with your compass in the middle. On the left are your quick slots for weapons and on the right is your quick slots for class abilities. You start with one slot each for weapons and class abilities but this number increases as you level up. It allows a lot of options to be immediately to you without cumbersome menu and is clean and unobtrusive.
One of the most interesting features of the game is the chance to create combos from your class abilities. There are five slots for combos in which you can chain up to five of your class abilities together to create unique attacks. It makes for a very flexible and deeply customisable selection of attacks.
Sacred 2 is a massive game and there is a lot of travelling and exploring required. In order to try and make this a little more interesting, developer Ascaron has introduced unique steeds for each of the six characters. And it has very much designed the steeds to complement each character perfectly. The steeds certainly help speed up some of the longer journeys and are also very useful in combat.
The sheer size and scope of Sacred 2 can be overwhelming but the game is so well crafted that it is hard to get bored. In fact it is all to easy to get side-tracked with exploring the game world that you forget about the quests in your log book.
In a season where the choice of games is so good it is difficult to choose where to invest your hard-earned cash. Sacred 2 is definitely a title that stands head and shoulders above the plethora of AAA titles out this Christmas. Whether you are waiting for Diablo 3 of you are just dying for a new RPG to get your teeth into Sacred 2 will not disappoint.
Pssst! Wanna know what made the most money on the Xbox Live Arcade in 2009?
(1) (08/02) 
iTunes question...
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peej - on 13/11/2008 at 14:03 wrote:
This is still scheduled for 360 too innit?
HairyArse - on 13/11/2008 at 15:52 wrote:
I believe so. Can't say there's room on the current release schedule for a title like this but then again, 9/10 means it must be bloody good.
peej - on 13/11/2008 at 16:19 wrote:
Always thought something diablo-esque would work well on consoles. I spose you've got Dungeon Siege on PSP but that's a bit of a crappy example.
TarantulaBoy52 - on 13/11/2008 at 22:15 wrote:
The 360 and PS3 versions are due Q1 2009. If the Pc version is anything to go by they will be pretty damn good.
strangeed - on 17/11/2008 at 14:12 wrote:
Argh, was hoping I could safely ignore this. Hmmm might have to take the plunge in that case though.
billdoor - on 20/11/2008 at 11:30 wrote:
A six from the EG review roulette gun, I know which I'd rather believe. Roll on the console versions :D