Dungeon Siege 3 - PC Demo On Steam

The PC demo for Dungeon Siege 3 is now available on Steam. Have at it and let us know in the comments what you think.
More information.

I will try it tonight.

At work, but based on feedback - it's another Obsidian fumble.

Will have to check it out tonight.

Just ran through it, not great.

Graphics were meh, low resolution textures and blurry all round.

The camera was bad - 2 modes give you a zoomed out and zoomed in. Neither showed me as much as I wanted to see. I just don't like that camera style, it feels too "close" and I can't ever see what I want to see.

Movement was OK, either keyboard or hold down the right mouse button to move. This felt a bit unrefined. Kind of slow and cumbersome. I prefer Divinity 2 movement.

Fighting was a bit all over the place and not very interesting. Whack this, special move, whack that. Oh and whack all those barrels, lots of barrels for spare change.

You seem to get lots of loot but need to go through a couple of screens to equip it which is a pain. Hit C for character, then select Equip and then select the armour slot. It doesn't sound to bad but it felt unrefined again. All the UI does really. Leveling up required going through 3 or 4 screens to allocate points. These screens had giant icons on them and the whole lot could have been laid out on my 1920x1200 resolution quite nicely.

To be fair this wouldn't really be my game any way but I normally like the 3rd person action games more than this. Loved Divinity 2 and NWN 2, this style seems to be in between both of them.

I think this could have done with a bit more polish and development.

I got bored of the story in about 10 minutes so that won't carry it. I will be interested to hear what others think of it.

So its just another terrible mess for Obsidian then? I had hope for the game. How about bugs are there any in the demo?

with games like titan quest and such - how can you fumble such a simple thing ?

Fumbling is often what you do when your heart isn't in it, or if - as an artist - creative control is taken away from you.

Just to confirm for this title, if playing multiplayer, only the host of the game gets loot?

I was interested in this title, but if the above is true forget it. My quest for filler before Diablo 3 continues and I'm unsated given what an absolute disaster (understatement) Daggerdale was. Even its price does not justify the immense crappiness.

Originally Posted by DArtagnan
Fumbling is often what you do when your heart isn't in it, or if - as an artist - creative control is taken away from you.

Only if you have no pride in your work or respect for your future employability. These guys are professionals - they are paid to provide to the full extent of their skills.

Originally Posted by kalniel
Only if you have no pride in your work or respect for your future employability. These guys are professionals - they are paid to provide to the full extent of their skills.

When the people calling the shots have no shame, it's not quite that easy.

There are skills that have nothing to do with being a professional. Something the industry keeps missing and keeps being shocked by.

Obsidian were never about "professionalism" or "technical prowess" - their games were always about the heart and the art.

So, it's pretty inevitable that this happens if you try to make artists into robots.

They should have picked a very different team for this kind of cash-grab.

This is what happens when you develop a game for consoles and pc together and try to please both. You wont you either make a game more for one or the other there is no middle ground. Its been proven over and over again.

I only want to know if it's fun.
If it becomes boring after a couple of hours, I'll just skip it.

It seems console controls are only part of the problem. Apparently, the actual game is crappy even for a Dungeon Siege game. I hope they're exaggerating, and I plan to give it a fair shot tonight.

I don't think it being a multi-platform game necessarily means the game has to be bad. That's an extreme assumption, in my opinion. Some of the best hack/slashers were on consoles, to my mind.

I'm not sure if I'll bother with the demo. I have to little time as it is so if I'm playing anything atm I'd rather play TW2. I think the game looks interesting enough and I have enjoyed previous Obsidian titles like NWN2 and Alpha Protocol. Diablo/Titan Quest/Sacred games are enjoyable for what they are so I believe DS3 will be fun enough for me.

I had to give it a try since everyone was talking about it. The demo wasn't even worth the download for me.

I only played for about 30 minutes, but I'd say pox67 summed it up well, and I have to agree with pretty much everything he said. The controls feel awkward (and there are no menu options to remap anything), the camera is awful (odd angle, and much too restrictive), the UI is sub-par by PC standards, and the story did nothing for me at all.

Other than the visuals and animations, which are decent for this type of game, there is absolutely nothing I liked about it.

It plays like Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance, there's barely any Dungeon Siege left in it. It has practically no soul or atmosphere. My advice would be, unless you're very bored, wait until it's in the bargain bin.

So its another Obsidian game guaranteed to be a bargain bin game in a month then. Thanks for the info. Tried the demo and I agree with all the comments.

Seems like Obsidian has fallen to the point where seeing their name on a game is more of a negative than a positive. It's a shame… The stuff they do well they do better than just about anyone, but it's overwhelmed by the stuff they just can't seem to get right.

I know we've seen Obsidian here before, but I'm still shocked and disappointed by the comments. I thought for once I would find a DS game enjoyable. Perhaps not overly deep but fun and I would've been happy. I didn't have any major gripes with Alpha Protocol, and certainly none with New Vegas (but that's the general consensus on that one). Anyways I have to at least try it for myself so I'll be back.

Ok, played the demo for about an hour.

Yep, quite underwhelming and surprisingly bland. I guess I'm a UI/controls angel or something, because they didn't bother me. I felt the same way about TW2 controls, and even Gothic 1 controls. Ok, so you have to spend a few minutes adjusting - but then it's fine.

Anyway, it still has the potential to be a decent cooperative game. It depends on how it evolves, and how much variety the characters have, and how the loot works. It's a bit too early to tell, but it's most definitely not a classic. Dungeon Siege 2 was much more interesting and non-linear, based on this demo.

I don't really know what Obsidian is doing these days….