Dark Alliance - "Icewind Fail" @PC Invasion
 

PC Invasion has reviewed Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance and dubbed it "Icewind Fail". The game is mostly negative on Steam.

More information.

Well, I don't think anyone here is going to find this too surprising. :)

Here are all the high standards of Wizards of the Coast. This is how this legendary party of beloved heroes led by Drizzt, in this legendary scenario known as the Icewind Dale is trashed and whored about by their creators, including the writer R.A. Salvatore, just to milk some money at the expense of some random studio that offered themselves to do it. Watch and rejoice, righteous paladins of DnD.

And when you are done, maybe strut over to spend a few hundred bucks worth of microtransactions on Idle Heroes of the Forgotten Realms.

By then you might be feeling that Larian shouldn't be doing BG3, not because the BG franchise is too high a standard for Larian, but because Larian is way too successful to get themselves involved with a Wizards of the Coast franchise.

Here is the quote that ultimately sums it up for me "less of an RPG and more like a modern Gauntlet game than anything else. It focuses on action, but said action is quite unimpressive"

Glad I just replayed (and yes, overpaid) for the 20 year old game on Switch and can give this one a pass!

Completely agreed. Wizards of the Coast is a major fail right now and I only hope Larian is able to keep the standard of bg3 up despite them.

https://youtu.be/jIEOF-Aa1Rk

Just about sums it up

Lets wait a few patches.

Or more exactly, that the D&D remains recognizable despite Larian and without WotC's direction ;)

I was surprised to hear, in one of Larian's interview, that WotC was happy about their personal implementation of the D&D mechanics. Either WotC didn't really know the details, or they were more concerned with the settings.

Perhaps the relaxed stance comes along with the 5th edition and the desire to please as large a community as possible.

You do know Wizards of the Coast is making tons of money with table-top D&D. It's more popular than ever. They do need to wake up on the old video game front. The D&D brand is Hasbro's biggest moneymaker.

Yes I'm referring to the videogame realm where they routinely pozz things up and I am aware of the tabletop success thanks.

It's what I expected a mediocre Hack and Slash action game.:(

Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance Review Roundup

• ACG
  
• Destructoid.
• Dungeon Fighter
  
• PC Gamer
• PCGamesN
• SkillUp
• TheGamer
• VentureBeat

100% agree I felt the same way after NWN 2. :nod:

At that time they released the hated 4th edition that was made for MMO games. They stopped licensing SP games and focused on MMO's as well. Their decisions baffle me.

21:23 "Dungeons and Dragons Dark Alliance is available for $40, that is a complete waste of your money. It is also available on GamePass both on XBox and PC, that is a complete waste of your bandwidth to download, and a complete waste of your hard drive to store it."

That's worse than I had anticiapted, honestly. I thought it'd be a moderately fun but soul-less action RPG, as the previous Dark Alliance ones.

Ouch.

And the score on Steam is "mostly negative", while their previous game was rather well received with a "very positive" all-time score. What happened, bad inspiration?

Perhaps some "If they can play Drizzt & the gang, they'll buy every crap!" thinking?

Ouch. And just when I thought my expectations couldn't be lowered any further, this article comes along.

Ironically only PC Gamer seems to have given a good score for this game: https://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/d…critic-reviews

What's going on? That guy probably never played tabletop DnD nor read the books?

They scored it higher than Mass Effect: LE :)

I don't think it matters if you played DnD, the game is horrendous in every way. I think he probably didn't play it at all.

Not surprised this is a stinker. The trailer video was a potent psychic attack on my RPG sensitivities.

$40 is a joke. Back in the day this would have gone straight to the bargain bin. I feel sorry for the poor developers who had to ship this. I mean the elements are there for a much better product.

At 23 minute its less of a summary and more of a marathon :)

One of my RPG groups is currently talking about this game in a group chat. They're talking about trying it, because it's D&D, and they're talking about how shitty similar past games have been.

It's endlessly sad to me that an attached name means more to some folks than any kind of quality. You see it with Marvel games, you see it with this. Of course, this is why companies poop out these low effort games: they don't have to try very hard and they'll still sell them.

Yet another game released in sorry state.

The best thing about the game so far was the trailer featuring Jemaine Clement. Made me laugh, anyway.

I've played the developer's previous game, Livelock. Fun enough action RPG(ish) in co-op, but nothing to write home about. Decent enough at the right price, but not certain why it's rated Very Positive.

Not exactly -

https://icv2.com/articles/news/view/…bro-profits-q1

Hasbro is a pretty big company even if it completely got rid of WoTC. However, WoTC is a profitable company under the Hasbro umbrella and D&D is probably more popular and possibly more profitable now than it ever has been. This has both good and bad effects. It's like watching a really, really cool experimental band that you and a few friends really like get smoothed out for more of a "pop" sound…

I also just have to say the same thing everyone else has. It's a steaming pile. It's so sad to see a D&D "action" game released like this. I don't know who the audience is but it isn't me.

So if a capable developer group got the Dark Alliance models, maps and made a top-down turn based game with these units, how would it turn out to be? A fantasy XCOM.. I was just pondering.

A capable developer would likely churn out something good, by the above listed criteria. Unfortunately, from what I'm hearing, this release falls very short of such goals. Personally a fantasy/light magic X-Com affair would be pretty sweet.

Do you have an unspoken rule that says you must mention XCOM in at least half of your posts? ;)

I'm willing to not be a grumpy old fart and dismiss any game right out the gate, but yeah that video seals the deal for me - it looks pretty awful (and hilarious)

Looks graphically cool tho (for what it's worth)

They just stand there waiting to be slain ! The best game for someone who wants to play a psychopathic killer !

I guess you are joking? I'm never quite sure.

The idea of fantasy RPGs is heroism which means confronting those with ill intent. The better ones allow dialogue and clever solutions but sometimes it is not possible for diametrically opposed people - ie slavery proponents and opponents - and a dialogue compromise would be neither heroic or sincere and feel very forced.

You should be imagining you are dealing with people that want to end all thats good in this world, to quote Samwise Gamgee.

Somtimes, what I write is satire. Also in this case.

I have read in the past of people who say that in Action-RPGs, or in games with lots of battle in general, they'd like to play a psychotathic killer … character. I vaguely remember this argument brought forth with Fallout ? Wasteland ? as well.

I merely tried to turn this argument "over the top". If someone really wants to have nothing but cannon-fodder within the game, and wants to be able to kill EVERYTHING (the infamous children in Fakllout ? Wasteland ? discussion comes to mind), then it would be the best for such a character, to have cannon-fodder which does not react at all ! Rather than fighting back.

From the psychological standpoint, a psychopathic killer wouldn't want to have victims which fight back. Or, maybe, to simply create for himself/herself an excuse of a "reason" to be able to kill everything aka the usual "it's me or them !".

What you're describing isn't psychopathy. Sounds more like paranoia.