Dungeon Siege III
Review
A combat-oriented fantasy romp
by Robert Zak
reviewed on PS3
Sounds great
It is also a shame that in a game whose appeal comes from the sheer amount of loot on offer, there is little variety to how the various weapons and armour look on your character; it may seem like a small complaint, but the pathetic little thrills I get from seeing my hero don the hottest gear is, for me, a central aspect of the genre.
The merely passable graphics are more than made up for by a subtly immersive soundtrack. Each of the game’s many environments has its own deep palette of sounds – ranging from deep, bassy echoes of a cave, or chirping fauna in an old forest – that envelop you in this fantasy world. The gentle, sombre music that accompanies you throughout much of the game reinforces the sense that you’re in a kingdom that has fallen on hard times. The sounds of Dungeon Siege play a crucial role in bringing the Kingdom of Ehb to life.
Stubborn side-quests
The world is filled with a reasonable amount of side-quests to divert you from the main storyline, though it still puzzles me why you even have an option to turn side-quests down. In one early quest, a grieving woman wanted me to avenge her husband’s death. I diplomatically suggested that revenge might not give her the closure she seeks, to which she basically told me to f*ck off and come back when I’m ready to do her dirty work for her. There is just no talking sense into some people, or any people if you are in the Kingdom of Ehb, and you will find yourself short on quests if you don’t do exactly what they demand of you.
Many of the side-quests are dynamic and open you onto creatures, events, and dialogue that you wouldn’t otherwise encounter; much better than the usual chore of clearing the rats out of some inn-keeper’s basement. Sadly, many of these quests you do for old hags or hapless bumpkins, and the rewards you get for completing them are usually a meagre amount of coin or some pitiful item that’s equivalent to the kind of present your grandmother gives you for Christmas; still, you just smile and pretend to like it… then go sell it at the nearest vendor.
What the hell went wrong with the multiplayer?
A general rule with these top-down action RPGs is that they are a lot more fun when played with a friend – or three if you’re the sociable type. Yet somehow Dungeon Siege III manages to cock up this opportunity to deepen the game experience by leaving the multiplayer badly underdeveloped. In local co-op, the camera zooms out to an awkward distance where it is hard to see just what the hell is going on most of the time. The online mode is unavoidably fun, but there is no character progression. If you join another player’s game you simply replace one of the AI characters, and don’t get to keep any of the XP or loot you gain; in this day and age where online character advancement has become something of an obsession for most gamers, the lack of it in Dungeon Siege makes the online experience feel a bit empty.
Dungeon Siege III does not try anything new, but its audience was always going to be those seeking a traditional action RPG. For the most part it delivers on this modest promise. The combat is visceral, the loot plentiful, and the world feels believable thanks to a spellbinding soundtrack. But the area of the game which should have been its selling point – the multiplayer – is poorly thought out, in effect restricting you to the single-player mode if you want a satisfying experience. There are few games of Dungeon Siege’s kind on the home consoles, and it will offer a decent fix to gamers who are nostalgic for a Diablo-style romp through a dark, combative fantasy world.
7.2
fun score
Pros
Fast and fluid combat, a refreshingly traditional Action-RPG.
Cons
Poorly developed multiplayer, trivial dialogue.
