dungeons, dragons, heroes

costing me only AUD$25 roughly eight months ago, dungeons and dragons heroes has become one of my favourite games, mainly because Laura has taken an absolutel obsession to it.  i was pleasantly surprised.  not because she can grasp it, i know that Laura can understand anything no matter how complicated it is, even say neverwinter nights that uses pretty much the full (un-bastardised) version 3.5 d&d ruleset. 

heroes is just a hack’n’slash fest with a few little v3.5 rules in it.  there are proficiencies (weapon), capabilites (passive, such as improved criticals etc), and spells, but they’re all classed under one level up system where a number of pick-points is allocated to gaining one level in any of these elements.  i know what you’re thinking – oreh?!?  that’s crazy, which it is.  it means there are nowhere near the same quantity of spells, weapons and armour types, but that’s the tradeoff with having instant action with an eight-way joystick and four action buttons.  pointing and clicking is all very well, and in reality is much closer a gameplay dynamic to true pen and paper d&d than button mashing,

but the gameplay of heroes certainly is rewarding in other ways.  it’s a bit of a fun joke for some of us old-timers in respects to the hey-days of pen and paper d&d, and even those of us who played some of the first d&d pc games, including what is now becoming the ancient baldur’s gate (not dark alliance or dark alliance 2 for console).  but it is great to be able to cast roughly four different spells in three seconds while throwing potions and hitting people with your stick.  that’s the other thing – because it’s a console action game, it means all classes (though there are only four available) no matter what you choose, still has a boom-stick which you regularly use.  enemies swarm at you and the game intends you to alternate between casting spells and bashing them with your melee weapon.  the disappointing thing about that being that many of your level-up picks are allocated to melee moves and things that improve your melee capabilities, which for spell-casters really is a waste of time.  but you can always leave them until last – because if you play it as much as Laura and i have been, you end up being an incincible  level 41 champion with all spells and abilities maxed out.

it really is very very simplified d&d – to the point where it’s almost not d&d at all.  spell names have changed, and there is a lot of character customisation that is unavailable.  but Laura and i playing wizard and cleric respectively, it’s great to se her pull of six magic missile casts in a row (don’t worry, they stop you at five missiles per cast for this very reasons – no more baldur’s gate/neverwinter nights 10 missile casts), and myself calling down fire from heaven to roast enemies in what chibi-r has come to call the ‘fire shower’.

heroes strangely enough (especially being an xbox title) is alligned quite well with my gaming wants.  my first console was the cube because of Nintendo’s attitude toward multiplayer gaming, which i have  been rewarded many times over in the form of games such as kirby’s air-ride, mario party, mario kart, smash brothers and of-course donkey konga.  there is more to multiplayer gaming than pc lanning (what a nightmare), deathmatch fps and driving games.  nintendo has an atitude that brings people together and helps them have fun.  d&d heroes is actually capable of having four players onscreen at once, playing co-operatively through the entire story-arc.  the story’s fairly weak, but who cares.  the most i’ve had going at once so far is three players, myself, my brother and chibi-r, but now that Laura has raised a wizard, and now we’re both raising a rogue and fighter (useless) each, we have four players in our party.  the reason i raised a cleric, other than everyone else rasing freakin wizards, was to have a support character that can cast bless (called ‘holy aura’ in this incarnation) and heal party.  it’s a multiplayer support character.  just like co-op in halo, there’s nothing like seeing your companions doing well and saving and being saved by them, getting excited when they pull-off really good moves.

the gameplay might be cerebral, but it’s a whole lot of fun.