Dark Messiah of Might and Magic is an action orientated, first-person RPG which unfolds in a dark fantasy setting. As Sareth, you must fight, fireball, and stealth your way through eleven levels, unveiling your lineage and deciding the fate of the realm. Click here to read more.

It's evident that plot and character development were fairly unimportant to the game's developers, Arkane Studios. The elements which make up the plot are executed with little gusto and are utterly conventional: the quest for powerful artefacts, the hero's gradual discovery of his true nature, the guy who you thought was evil but really isn't, the obligatory love interest (interests in this case). The plot could as well have been to find a giant leprauchaun's magic hat. Another downside is the extensive use of foreshadow, which tends to dull the potential impact of plot twists. Though I normally like a bit more story with my games, I found Dark Messiah to be quite refreshing. No working though reams of dialogue for a bit of extra gold or xp. No vague anxiety over missing the best items because you didn't look in every obscure corner. Just pure and unadulterated rock and roll.

Without the RPG elements, Dark Messiah would quickly lose its appeal. There are a decent amount of skills to choose from which hail from three staple classes of the RPG genre: warrior, rogue, and mage. Warrior abilities include new and more powerful attacks; rogues will want to improve their stealth to make back-stabbing easier. Mages have a medley of elemental projectiles, telekinesis, healing, and the ability to charm enemies. Fortunately, Arkane Studios made the judicious decision to allow players to choose abilities from more than one class, so you can mix as match as you please.

Vampire knights are one of the tougher standard enemies.

Let's get on to what Dark Messiah does best. From all the games I am aware of, Dark Messiah offers one of the best implementation of first-person melee combat; it's intense yet intuitive, varied and highly kinetic. A decent selection of swords, staves, daggers, and bows make up your arsenal, and many different types of attacks can employed in close combat. An adrenaline bar fills as you dish out damage; when it reaches maximum it is possible to perform an instant death attack. Shields can be used to deflect enemy attacks, and there are around ten suits of armour in the game to bolster your resistance to damage. There's something very satisfying about advancing on a group of archers, and watching your shield buck as it absorbs their futile attacks.

Gruesome - if you knock an enemy down you quickly finish it off.

In Dark Messiah, environment plays a major role in combat. Enemies can be kicked off ledges, or into the unusually omnipresent spikes and fires. Barrels and boxes can be thrown and support struts can be knocked down raining tumbling death onto unsuspecting foes. One of the missions involves navigating through a series of forts built into cliffs, deep in orc territory. It's especially funny to get the orcs' attention and cast ice on the edge of a walkway, then just wait and watch as they plummet helplessly off the cliff.

Although the missions are linear and tend towards the 'go to point A and kill enemy x,y, and z', some are quite fun. One of the more memorable missions has you sneaking on to a boat and commandeering it, and then preventing the enemy from re-capturing it. I played on normal difficulty and found the game was too easy; by the time I had finished my inventory had at least a hundred unused potions and scrolls. The developers failed to capitalise on the battles with the more epic creatures. Usually when a cyclops or poo-kai (degenerate dragon) appears, there's a ballista to shoot them with, or a heavy object which can be dropped on them. It's a shame, because neither following this route, or fighting them head on happens to be very satisfying. Worse still, the final battle is painfully anti-climactic.

Undead giving you hassle? Trying kicking them in the ghoulies!

Movement, especially of the more active variety, is something which Dark Messiah handles well. There are a couple of sections in the game which force you to run, jump, and climb under duress; these parts are fun and well implemented. There's also a a lot of occasions when falling to your doom becomes a strong possibility, and Dark Messiah does a credible job of instilling a sense of vertigo in the player.

There are a few light puzzles scattered throughout the game; usually these involve finding an object or using your rope bow to reach an otherwise inaccessible area. There is also a multi-player mode, developed by Kuju; the most interesting thing about multi-player being the addition of new classes and the crusade mode, which pits two teams head to head in a race to capture the opposing team's stronghold. The single player campaign lasts between 10-15 hours, and since combat is well executed and satisfying, the game could feasibly be played through a second time. With the addition of multi-player, Dark Messiah should keep you entertained for a reasonable period of time.

Dark Messiah doesn't look half-bad even today!

Dark Messiah's graphics were pretty hot back in the day, and are by no means an eyesore by today's standards. The landscape generally looks quite good, as do the enemies. There are some nice touches like slo-mo sequences whenever you perform a particularly grizzly attack on an opponent. If you have ever wanted to watch a decapitated head tumble in mid-air, here might be a good place to do it. It is worth mentioning that I experienced considerable technical difficulties while playing Dark Messiah; I found that the game crashed roughly every 45 minutes or so, particularly when a new level was being loaded.

Dark Messiah tends to crash every once in while; better get used to this screen.

If you are looking for a deep and story-driven action RPG with lots of character development, Dark Messiah probably isn't for you. On the other hand, if you haven't picked it up first time round and enjoy fast paced melee combat (in computer games of course), Dark Messiah might well be worth a look.