Well the demo came out a week ago and I got the privilege to play it (and be subjected to a crappy network that resulted in a SIX HOUR LONG DOWNLOAD) and I'll say right now that I enjoyed it, though it definitely feels like a game I'll need to play for a longer time to get the meat of it.
But what was there was, for the most part, quite promising. So let's jump into it now.
STORY
The demo (and by extension, the game) begins with a bit of backstory. An evil force, known as the Tuatha, are attempting to eradicate all mortals. If the Tuatha, obviously being immortal, are "killed" they're reborn a little later. This has made the war go very badly for the mortals. And it's been foretold by "Fateweavers" that no one is ever fated to stop the Tuatha. In Amalur, everyone is ruled completely by their fate, which means that this fate reading essentially says that mortals are screwed.
However, your character is killed before the game even begins, and placed in what's called "The Well of Souls" in an attempt to bring him/her back to life. The mortals are attempting to unlock immortality for both usage in the war and afterwards. The good news: it works on your character. The bad news: it gets destroyed and you're the only one who has ever been successfully brought back.
However, there's a bright side. Because of your character's resurrection, s/he is now immune to fate and has many possible destinies based on his/her choices rather than one destiny based on fate.
The story is written by the first our three big-name creators, R.A. Salvatore who wrote the well-done Dark Elf Trilogy for the Forgotten Realms. The story itself, from what I've seen so far, has some good ideas and interesting concepts that make me want to see more.
That said, there were some problems. Some of the dialogue just doesn't seem to match up and creates continuity errors. Obviously, they're small given how little of the game I've seen but still enough to make me scratch my head a bit. I hope it remains a minor issue that only happens a few times and in that case it's forgivable. I'm still curious to see where it goes.
GAMEPLAY AND DESIGN
The second name in our trinity is Ken Rolston, the man behind The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind which I really liked, and The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion which I really did NOT like. However, what I played of Amalur was really enjoyable, fast-paced and well-rounded.
The game is a combination of a stat-based RPG mixed with traditional hack-n-slash gameplay, sort of like Fable or Dragon Age II, though I had more fun with this than either of those. The combat was more frantic than Fable which was definitely a plus and there's no class system to restrict you like in Dragon Age II. In fact the game encourages you to switch between using traditional weapons and magic on the fly as a nice combo.
To further the hack-n-slash idea, each kind of weapon also has their own techniques that can be learned as you level up and you can also further your skill in the different traditional avenues. So if you want to be a powerful mage, put focus on magic abilities. Or you can go for a combination of all three (warrior, mage, thief). And that's not counting the different sub-categories of them such as the different magic types and weapon types to wield.
If there's one complaint that can be made against the gameplay in Kingdoms of Amalur, it's that it might lack an identity of it's own, at least in terms of gameplay. It plays like Fable, has the flexibility and versatility of The Elder Scrolls and Demon's Souls/Dark Souls, the dialogue wheel of Mass Effect mixed with an old-school dialogue scrolling list for questions about specific things, etc.
At the same time, one could also say that a strength it's the ability to combine established gameplay and design really well. It looks like they've done a nice job of that and I'm looking forward to see how far they went from what I saw.
If there was one thing that did not impress me here it was the design. The world felt WAY too linear and the game too railroaded. This was would be a big problem for THIS game in particular given that the story is about shaping your own destiny. I really hope the world becomes more open as the game goes on, otherwise this game will become a very bitter irony.
When all is said and done the gameplay of Kingdoms of Amalur was really fun even if none of it was particularly original. The linear and railroaded feel did not impress me and I'm hoping that this was just the beginning.
GRAPHICS AND SOUND
Closing off our trinity of names, we have Todd McFarlane doing the art. Some have criticized the art but I thought it was pretty good. I'm waiting to see what the rest of the art the game has before I make a big critique. Technically the graphics are lacking and definitely don't stand up to many other RPGs out there.
A big annoyance here was the fact that the main character does NOT talk. After Mass Effect, it just feels like something is missing when the main character doesn't talk. For the most part, the voice acting was good but that just didn't feel right.
CONCLUSION
Kingdoms of Amalur showed a few kinks in the armor, some of them may only appear to be kinks at this stage. However, the demo was fun and enjoyable time with solid gameplay and nice character progression. The story had interesting ideas and cool concepts and I'm still very excited to see where else the game goes.
Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning gets released on February 7th and I will definitely be picking up a copy.
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