game-worn

Hack Fan
I love the old fashioned hack and slash games. I own the two Untold Legend games for the psp and was very happy with them. They never produced any for the ps2, but Dark Kingdom feels more like a ps2 game than a next generation ps3 game. The graphics are decent but could easily be done on the ps2. The camera is a pain sometimes with trees and other scenery getting in the way. The combat is basically button mashing as you grind out levels to get better equipment, magic, fighting technique etc. There are a few puzzles to spice things up, but it is not enough to give this game a very positive review. If this was a downloadable game by a smaller company for .99 it would be okay, but as a big studio release it is very lacking.

Could have been better.
I played the Champions/Baldor's Gate games and was hoping this would be very much like them. Not so. Although I was enjoying the more simplified combat and item choices, I eventually got to a level where it seemed that jumping onto small platforms or outcroppings was the main goal. Unfortunately, many of these jumps or crossings (narrow bridges) resulted in the death of your character if they were missed or if you slipped off one. This became very frustrating with the bad camera angles and the fact that many of the save positions were no help at all. Even if you crossed the dangerous narrow areas or jumps, you would have to often come back the same way and if you fell off on the way back, you'd have to start with your initial crossing..again. The camera angles often showed you nothing that would help you..until it was too late. I wanted a RPG with some strategy and this game became an arcade game with poor controls and terrible sight lines (camera angles). Deep in the caverns, Dark Kingdom turned into a jumping, arcade game (and not a good one) and less of a fun RPG. Very disappointed.

So much you think they offered so little you get
Untold Legends: Dark Kingdom is another offer from Sony Online Entertainment along the same line as Champions of Norath. However, it proves itself to be falling short of what gamers expect the game to be.

The story is cliche full of dark arts, possession, addiction to power and betrayal. So you can't really expect much as they were just excuses for you to go through dungeons after dungeons. There are only 3 character classes you can choose from. This is quite limiting as you would expect on a PS3 they will allow more character classes and micromanagement of your characters. That's not really the case. You only have Warrior, Mage and Scout and that's all because the class you can choose was "tied" to the story line. Also there is a maximum level that your character can go and after that nothing more. So there will be a substantial part of the game you will be wondering why are you fighting the enemies if you are not gaining any levels. Also the skill sets available for your characters are quite limited and some of them are not as useful for your adventure at all. Character management can also be done through buying armours and crafting your weapons etc. However, the number of armours you can choose from are not that many and you need essence which are not really that handy to come by for certain classes if you are playing the offline multi-player mode. In my case most of the essence went to the Scout and leaving the Mage on a shoe string budget most of the time. If you are thinking of selling extra armours to cash in, you are not much better off either. Not only most only sold for minimal amount, you have very restricted space in your luggage to carry them around before you got slashed into oblivion by swamps of enemies. Also with the limited level up ability of your character, you would wonder why they even bother put in some runes that can help you level up quicker near the end of the game - because there is really no more level up after level 45.

Dungeons are ok but some of them are so repetitive that you just really lose interest after half way or even a quarter way through. There are platformish kind of elements put into this dungeon crawler that you don't even know why they put them in except for the sake of extending the play time of this game. Some of the levels are so annoying that eventually you just don't care about whether your character die or not after some time. The environments are quite monotone most of the time so there aren't even anything pretty to look at. Puzzles are not particularly ingenious although there are levels that important elements shown on the map are so obscure in the real environment that you could hardly see which polygon you should be interacting with. Also if you want to know what bad camera angles mean in a game, nobody can beat this game. A lot of time your views are blocked by trees, buildings, walls, bookshelves etc. etc. So you can hear your characters being attacked but can't see where to counter. So you could end up just using wide attack in a corner where you have no idea what your character is doing until you see all the enemy life bars disappeared on the screen (or your own character's cry of death).

Enemies and bosses are equally monotonous although they managed to create some bosses that really put your patience to test. For a fair share of the game you will see the same skeletons and demons coming after you again and again as you hack and slash through them. Then suddenly after certain part of the game, the enemy curve went up so quickly that even if you maxed out your defense you will still think what wrong have you done to deserve such brutal and unfair treatment. Also they managed to put in puzzle solving inside some boss fights. So you will be busily dealing with demanding puzzles while trying to fight the bosses and their minions off. In some areas they even throw in a bit of environmental hazards that you will never be able to forget the importance of OH&S in real life.

The game also has zero replay value as you cannot save your final level up'd characters for the next round. So you will need to go through this hell again if you are one of the brave souls who dare to replay this game.

On the whole Untold Legends: Dark Kingdom lived up to its name by making it should not be told to anyone to waste time on it as it will command some of the darkest hours of your life. The orchestral score managed to help you to remember how better you could spend your time with other more thoughtful games that you could have played instead.

I wish I liked this but its not even good as most PS2 games.
I baught this for the reason and love of the first PSP one. You'd think way way better being on PS3 but gameplay is a step back. Online would of been fun if it linked to the single player but insted its just a online mess where matches are pointless and thrown around.
All in all its a nice sit and dont think game but to much wrong or "lack of" to keep the average gamer entertained very long.

Underrated
I cant comment on the co-op play I only play single player. If I want co-op i play a PC mmo. The single player game is a lot of fun. I realize the game is not Champions of Norrath but whats with these 2 star reviews? Graphics are nice enough and the game play is good. I do agree with those that say the camera work could have been better but anything less than three stars for this game is just someone ranting. For the price of the game now its a very good deal.