May 23, 2002

Slow days are so much harder than busy days – especially when it's nice out. On a slow day at work, I pretty much thrive on interruption. I'm helpful and provide answers. I respond to e-mails immediately. It's just that on slow days I realize that I'd rather be out shopping for a picnic table or playing tether ball.

Wiley Wiggins

...is the guest blogger on BoingBoing this week. You remember Wiley right? From Dazed and Confused and Waking Life? Of course, you do. If not, then go out and rent a real movie for crying out loud. Just put down the thriller, ma'am, and step away from it. The best pick from Mr. Wiggins so far – ACME Novelty Gallery. Nicely done sir, nicely done.

May 22, 2002

Dungeon Siege

The truth must come out; I did spend a couple of the last five evenings hammering through the demo version of Dungeon Siege. Again, I'm thankful for my cable modem, so I can try out a game before dropping $35 on it.

After wasting a few nights playing it, how did I like Dungeon Siege? In short, not that much. The game is a third person/3D Fantasy Role Playing game. You play an intrepid farmer who must fight his (or her) way to the nearest town after his (or her) village is attacked by monsters. You're armed with a knife and a couple of basic magic spells, and off you go down the road. Along the way you battle monsters in the woods, you battle monsters in someone's basement and you battle monsters in some crypts. You fight a lot of monsters, mostly the same monsters. In case you don't get the picture – you're just going down the road killing monsters.

The map (at least in the demo) is very linear. At points along the way, you can detour into a cave or a building, but otherwise you are heading down a path from point a to point b. The path is clear and signs literally point the way. Even the crypt had a single line through it. As a Diablo II player, I found navigation a little too easy; I didn't find myself searching on the map. The only way I missed things was if I didn't look to the sides often enough. However, seeing the periphery and navigating off the path was difficult due to the 3D camera; it would go all over the place if I started walking between trees. If the map was uninteresting the first time through, it became tedious the second and third times. At least in Diablo, the maps change – the same quest item isn't always in the same place. In Dungeon Siege, the map and every encounter was identical each time that I played through.

On the plus side, Dungeon Quest has a couple of neat features-

You meet NPC's along the way who will either volunteer to join your party or that you can hire. Unlike Diablo II, these NPC's are full fledged characters; you can fully equip them, give them spells and even have them lead the party. By the end of the demo, I had a nice group of four – usually some variation of a fighter, a wizard and an archer in addition to my character. By the time we left the town and headed towards the end of the demo, my little band was very entertaining to watch in action. You can give the NPC's orders (to defend the party or to pursue foes and attack) and the party runs itself. However, at that point, you're mostly walking into groups of monsters, killing them and making sure everyone drinks their health potions.

The experience system is usage based – you have four "skills": melee weapons, ranged weapons, earth magic and combat magic. Using a skill advances you in that skill – i.e., if you don't ever cast spells, you'll never gain magic experience. After my first run through, I figured out that you really want to stick with one skill. The NPC's can pick up the ball in other areas – you just need to focus on your specialty. On my first run, I split my time between ranged weapons and melee weapons; by the time I ended the demo, my character was somewhat of a weakling. On my second run, I ran through only casting nature spells and was a formidable mage by the end of the demo. On my third try, I only used melee attacks and by the end of the demo was an axe-wielding brute. However, while I was formidable hero in the last two cases, I was also pretty bored – I spent all of my time either zapping or whacking everything.

Lastly, the 3D graphics were impressive. The woods, especially the wilder parts, are very dense with tons of undergrowth. The crypts were nice and creepy. Even the town interiors were interesting. The spells and fighting moves where quite impressive looking; I had a character with a pitchfork as a weapon who wielded it like Bruce Lee with a bo staff. I actually think that Dungeon Siege would have worked better as a console game – you don't have to master too many controls and you tend to sit back and be entertained rather than work at the game that hard.