Once upon a time there was a game. This game was called Dungeon Siege 2, and it was pronounced good by most who played it. Then the incredible happened. There was an expansion, also pronounced good by many who played it. Unfortunately, I was not one of those.I have possibly coined a new term here, but I call games such as DS 2 “click and slash”. And there was a point in time that I couldn't get enough of this type of game. I LOVED Diablo, Diablo 2, the expansions for both, the original Dungeon Siege and its expansion, Sacred, the Baldur's Gate series, most of the other dungeons and dragons themed clickfests, Dungeon Siege 2, and Titan Quest. I'm sure I missed a few in there, but you get the idea. The point is this- I have reached a point in my gaming life that I am becoming sick of “Diablo style” games. Titan Quest apparently sapped so much of my residual mouse finger energy that while I was excited by the prospect of an expansion to DS 2, there was a little part of me that was saying “Please, don't make me do this again! Its too soon!”. Well, I am going to do my best not to totally hammer the game for what I expect is just a personal prejudice towards this particular genre.
The graphics still look very nice and the cut scenes are very well done. The sound and music are also good, but they tend to feel very repetitive when you sit and play for a long period. Also, DS2 has no resolution option for a wide screen monitor. I could be wrong, but aren't there a lot of people out there that use wide screen monitors now? I know I'm not the only one who has one, so what's the deal? This soured me on the expansion right out of the box, since I had to look at my little fat warrior now, instead of a normal sized character.
The game has added a couple new classes. Well, in reality they didn't add new classes, they added some abilities to the old classes. So don't expect to play the new classes straight out of the box. Anyway, the two new “classes” are the Blood Assassin and the Fist of Stone. Blood Assassin gives you several new abilities for ranged attacks, and allows you to increase you damage at the cost of your own health. Fist of Stone is a more defensive class, although there are several abilities that are all about damage here also. They also added about ten to twelve hours of new game play, which is either too short or way too long, depending on how much you enjoy the game.
And, unfortunately, I did not enjoy the game at all. As I mentioned earlier, I enjoyed the original DS2, but Broken World apparently was too much, too soon after I finished the original. The game is repetitive! The combat system is the worst of it, although I don't know who they could make it more fun, other then give me some controllable skills, instead of massive kill abilities that are on a long recharge timer. Mostly the combat consisted of click the button as fast as you can, then loot, then go find another group of mobs to click to death. This is the same system that Diablo used clear back in the mid 90s. There has to be a way to make this more involved! The blood splatters, while entertaining at first, also got annoying towards the end of my play with this one. When I kill a midget with a spear, I don't expect to see an entire blood bank go flying into the air.
Something that really bothered me was the game felt completely linear. You had a path you followed, and there was no way to deviate. Where many of the other games of this type that give you a decent amount of area to explore, DS2 dumps you in what feels like a small alleyway much of the time, and compensates for this by throwing hordes of monsters at you, over and over again. I can't think of another game of this type that was this closed in, and it really took away a lot of the fun for me. I love finding new stuff (as I mention below about the loot) and when I don't have the option to wander around, I get bored very quickly. One of the saving features of the game is still the loot system. Similar to the Diablo model, it offers a huge array of different types of weapons and armor. The variety is incredible! This is one of the few things about Dungeon Siege 2 that still appeals to me. I guess I'm a bit of a loot whore at heart, but I love finding items I've never seen before. Even if they are just to sell, I love having 20 completely unique items in my inventory (ok, maybe that is a bit of an exaggeration, but that is how it felt sometimes). Since there is very little character customization during creation, the vast array of loot offers you a way to make your character unique visually also, since there are many different types of armor, and all of them do have a unique appearance.
Overall, I can't honestly recommend the Dungeon Siege 2 expansion to anyone who is not a die hard fan of the series, or possibly someone who has never played a click and slash game before. In that case, give it a try and see what you think. In my case, I am going go find something to play that doesn't make me “click and slash”.
