Consider the computer role-playing game's most exciting components -- killing monsters, getting new equipment, increasing in power and going out to kill more monsters. These are the "ding" moments, the gaming equivalent to the sugar rush that comes when we eat a piece of junk food. Now, everyone binges on junk food once in a while. Who hasn't sat in front of the tube watching a really bad movie with friends chomping down buffalo wings and drinking beer? It's only a problem when you try to build a lifestyle around it. Welcome to Hellgate: London, the gaming equivalent of a junk food diet. There's a lot of fun to be had in its quick-hit combination of fast action, endless demons to slaughter and a constant parade of new weapons and armor to play with. Over the long haul, though, the game starts to feel like a diet of non-stop Doritos and
soda -- a lot of empty calories.
The back story of Hellgate: London is actually rather good. It seems the Knights Templar, an ancient order of Christian Crusaders thought destroyed in the 14th century, actually went underground, taking a terrible secret with them. The forces of Hell were planning an invasion of the Earth and the Templar were the only ones who knew about it. Fast forward to 2038 and the Hellish invasion of Earth has been a complete success for the forces of darkness. The last remnants of humanity, consisting of the Templars, the Cabalists (magicians who also went underground during the age of science) and the Hunters (the remnants of Earth's elite military forces) are huddling in the London Underground. The Tubes are a mystical fortress against the demons prepared by the Freemasons and are the base from which humanity is planning to take back the Earth from the minions of the Prime Evil.
That back story is really all most players will ever really understand of the motivations of the two parties to Hellgate: London's central conflict. It's part and parcel of the game's design that nothing should get in the way of the fast action, especially things like storyline and character development. As a result, Hellgate: London creates quest-givers, quest designs and dialogue that make the average RPG story structure look like a masterpiece of exposition and story structure. Characters in the human resistance are ciphers distinguished only by sex and the armor they're wearing, the missions they give out are the generic "kill eight foozles and bring back their heads" design and the actual plot -- what there is of it anyway -- is thinner than the mystical border between Hades and London is supposed to be.
The place where the creativity is concentrated is on the randomized fast-action portion of the game. As a result, it's the actual monster-fighting that's the game's strongest feature. Each of the three different factions offers a choice of two classes and all of them, without exception, offer incredibly varied and enjoyable experiences. Play as an Evoker, the game's caster-style class, for example, and be prepared for a cautious life consisting of sneaking forward and sniping from the shadows. The Guardian, on the other hand, offers third-person melee combat similar to an arcade-style beat-em-up while the Marksman comes as close as Hellgate: London gets to a first-person shooter.
The variation in classes is matched by the incredible variety of the player's opposition. From a design standpoint, the demons of Hellgate: London aren't the most original depiction of Hellspawn ever created, but they get the job done with a nicely variegated zoology ranging from impish flyers to floating half-women trailing glowing tentacles, skulls plopped onto gorilla-like bodies that shoot explosive spiked balls, razor-backed beasts that leap into combat, a few very impressive boss monsters and much more. Their combat capabilities are equally varied. Demons will crawl at the player and then leap at his or her face, others charge straight into melee combat while still others stand back and snipe or offer protections and buffs to other monsters. True, their AI is mostly of the "run at the player and hit until one of us is dead" variety, but that doesn't really matter with this many creatures flying, flopping and shooting at the player. Their randomized composition makes every battle a new challenge.
Indeed, if there's one aspect of the game that guarantees that a player will keep coming back for more, it's the incredible way the Flagship team has set up the game's randomization system so that every new area of the game presents its own unique challenge. Enter the evaporated riverbed of the Lower Thames, for example, and the player might be faced with Darkspawn snipers who do fire damage at range and stealthy Pain Leeches and Doom Husks who inflict spiritual damage and flying Howlers who do area-of-effect physical damage. Players often have to switch between three or four different types of weapons and/or armor load-outs they'll need to haul around to be prepared for different conditions. All this needs to be done on the fly, often in the middle of combat and in coordination with the use of special powers. Once the player gets the hang of the system, it makes each combat a unique thrill, a puzzle to be solved while the hordes of Hell are pounding the streets looking to remove their character's head.
That back story is really all most players will ever really understand of the motivations of the two parties to Hellgate: London's central conflict. It's part and parcel of the game's design that nothing should get in the way of the fast action, especially things like storyline and character development. As a result, Hellgate: London creates quest-givers, quest designs and dialogue that make the average RPG story structure look like a masterpiece of exposition and story structure. Characters in the human resistance are ciphers distinguished only by sex and the armor they're wearing, the missions they give out are the generic "kill eight foozles and bring back their heads" design and the actual plot -- what there is of it anyway -- is thinner than the mystical border between Hades and London is supposed to be.
The place where the creativity is concentrated is on the randomized fast-action portion of the game. As a result, it's the actual monster-fighting that's the game's strongest feature. Each of the three different factions offers a choice of two classes and all of them, without exception, offer incredibly varied and enjoyable experiences. Play as an Evoker, the game's caster-style class, for example, and be prepared for a cautious life consisting of sneaking forward and sniping from the shadows. The Guardian, on the other hand, offers third-person melee combat similar to an arcade-style beat-em-up while the Marksman comes as close as Hellgate: London gets to a first-person shooter.
The variation in classes is matched by the incredible variety of the player's opposition. From a design standpoint, the demons of Hellgate: London aren't the most original depiction of Hellspawn ever created, but they get the job done with a nicely variegated zoology ranging from impish flyers to floating half-women trailing glowing tentacles, skulls plopped onto gorilla-like bodies that shoot explosive spiked balls, razor-backed beasts that leap into combat, a few very impressive boss monsters and much more. Their combat capabilities are equally varied. Demons will crawl at the player and then leap at his or her face, others charge straight into melee combat while still others stand back and snipe or offer protections and buffs to other monsters. True, their AI is mostly of the "run at the player and hit until one of us is dead" variety, but that doesn't really matter with this many creatures flying, flopping and shooting at the player. Their randomized composition makes every battle a new challenge.
Indeed, if there's one aspect of the game that guarantees that a player will keep coming back for more, it's the incredible way the Flagship team has set up the game's randomization system so that every new area of the game presents its own unique challenge. Enter the evaporated riverbed of the Lower Thames, for example, and the player might be faced with Darkspawn snipers who do fire damage at range and stealthy Pain Leeches and Doom Husks who inflict spiritual damage and flying Howlers who do area-of-effect physical damage. Players often have to switch between three or four different types of weapons and/or armor load-outs they'll need to haul around to be prepared for different conditions. All this needs to be done on the fly, often in the middle of combat and in coordination with the use of special powers. Once the player gets the hang of the system, it makes each combat a unique thrill, a puzzle to be solved while the hordes of Hell are pounding the streets looking to remove their character's head.
This randomizing system is also applied to zone layout and itemization. The floor plan of almost every zone in Hellgate: London is only established when the player enters it. This makes even repeat runs through an area a new experience as special surprises, hidden tunnels, Hellrifts, and even the locations of streets, corridors, treasure chests and entrances and exits will be different every time. Dynamically generated loot also keeps the game exciting. There's an undeniable thrill that comes from the continual hope that at any moment something really awesome will drop to the ground to replace a weapon or piece of armor the player's been lugging around for two levels. There's also a great system of equipment upgrades and enhancements that ensures that futzing with inventory as new stuff is acquired -- always one of the most fun parts of an RPG -- is almost constant.
The more we play the game, however, the more it begins to feel like the very randomness that makes the game compelling and addictive also adds to the aforementioned empty-calories analogy. Randomized loot robs the game of some of its personality because there's no "uber-loot" to quest for or an orderly progression of powerful equipment that keeps pace with the player's development. As a result, there's a lot less satisfaction with killing big bosses or getting each individual loot drop when most of it will be garbage. The randomized floor plans preclude a real sense of "place." The player travels through London districts with fascinating names like "Cheapside" and "Mansion House," but upon entering them find yet another collection of generic sewers, maintenance tunnels or randomized streets with eight different copies of the same roofless English pub. The difference is even starker during the far more enjoyable set-piece story battles that take place in places like Piccadilly Circus or the Tower of London. Since they never change, the designers went all out and create a real feeling that, yes, the player is fighting in the ruins of London.
There's more to explore in Hellgate: London, of course -- we've only been able to play the single-player campaign so far -- but with each level we pass through and every identical demon battle, the constant diet of Doritos is starting to wear thin. Perhaps multiplayer will offer more charms, but as of this writing, the servers just went online. Based on our experience in the beta, multiplayer looks like more of the same because the nature of the combat doesn't seem to be conducive to the kind of fun teamwork to be found in a standard MMO or even a team-based shooter. The developers are promising to add all kinds of new content to the game for subscribers, but at launch, subscription benefits are restricted to a few minor things like additional item storage and a hardcore mode that restricts a character to one life. It's roughly the gaming equivalent of going from nacho cheese to spicy nacho cheese. We'll have our full review of Hellgate: London review in a couple of days; check back later today as we kick off our special Hellgate: London blog, chronicling our team's play-testing of the multiplayer.
The more we play the game, however, the more it begins to feel like the very randomness that makes the game compelling and addictive also adds to the aforementioned empty-calories analogy. Randomized loot robs the game of some of its personality because there's no "uber-loot" to quest for or an orderly progression of powerful equipment that keeps pace with the player's development. As a result, there's a lot less satisfaction with killing big bosses or getting each individual loot drop when most of it will be garbage. The randomized floor plans preclude a real sense of "place." The player travels through London districts with fascinating names like "Cheapside" and "Mansion House," but upon entering them find yet another collection of generic sewers, maintenance tunnels or randomized streets with eight different copies of the same roofless English pub. The difference is even starker during the far more enjoyable set-piece story battles that take place in places like Piccadilly Circus or the Tower of London. Since they never change, the designers went all out and create a real feeling that, yes, the player is fighting in the ruins of London.
There's more to explore in Hellgate: London, of course -- we've only been able to play the single-player campaign so far -- but with each level we pass through and every identical demon battle, the constant diet of Doritos is starting to wear thin. Perhaps multiplayer will offer more charms, but as of this writing, the servers just went online. Based on our experience in the beta, multiplayer looks like more of the same because the nature of the combat doesn't seem to be conducive to the kind of fun teamwork to be found in a standard MMO or even a team-based shooter. The developers are promising to add all kinds of new content to the game for subscribers, but at launch, subscription benefits are restricted to a few minor things like additional item storage and a hardcore mode that restricts a character to one life. It's roughly the gaming equivalent of going from nacho cheese to spicy nacho cheese. We'll have our full review of Hellgate: London review in a couple of days; check back later today as we kick off our special Hellgate: London blog, chronicling our team's play-testing of the multiplayer.
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