Saturday 9 February, 2008

Sacrifice

GAMEPLAY

So, about that Gnomish civil war… I may or may not have used unnecessary force. Well, it was going well at first; I was plunging deeply into the heart of the war torn gnome kingdom, effortlessly pacifying or conscripting the warring gnomes. This continued right up until I came upon the warcamp of Thestor, the gnome who dared to usurp the monarchy and start a war that pitted mythological fae creature against mythological fae creature. The battle was glorious albeit swift and the rebel was killed in the melee. Apparently assassination was not exactly what Peresephone aiming for when she sent me on this mission of peace. After the god of death decided to take time out of his busy schedule to personally commend my handling of the situation I realized that I had erred, and erred greatly.

My next mission got me into the real meat of the game as in it involved my first real battle with another wizard. I had decided to make the best of a bad situation and do a mission for my new friend, Charnel, the aforementioned jovial god of death. I can’t help but feel very wrong when the deity whose portfolio includes slaughter, pestilence, death, and strife is more fun to be around than the lady who is supposed to protect nature and safeguard the weak!

Whatever, that’s politics, so apparently Charnel wants me to take back some real estate from a squatter wizard, and open some sort of demonic portal to horrors incomprehensible. Which leads me to describe why removing wizards is no easy feat. All wizards have altars venerating their chosen deity, in this case mine is to Charnel and my enemy, Abraxus, has one supporting Stratos, the god of (hot) air. If either of us is killed we’ll simply regenerate at our altar to go wizarding once more. The only way to prevent this is to desecrate the wizard’s altar by sacrificing one of your minions there in an elaborate ritual performed by the ever useful “sac doctors.” You can then grant your spell slinging foe a final death so long as they don’t interrupt the ongoing ritual. If this sounds extremely difficult, that’s because it is supposed to be. Just as other strategy games want you to raze all the buildings of your foes, Sacrifice requires that you desecrate your opponent’s altar. The game really does earn its name in this regard.

DESIGN

Sacrifice is a game like no other. In trying to be both an RPG and a strategy it manages to blend both genres seamlessly together and creates and experience I have yet to see replicated. Other games that have attempted this merging have split players into the differing roles of strategist or hero, Sacrifice requires players to be both. If you plan poorly your summoned troops will collapse under the magical onslaught of your foes and if you take too long to plan then your wizardly rivals will overwhelm you. That eight years have passed without a game even so much as attempting what Shiny had done in 2000 is a testament to Sacrifice’s innovativeness.

In addition to having ingenious gameplay, the plot of the single player campaign (like any strategy game worth its salt, Sacrifice also has multiplayer) is truly inspired. The characters are all beautifully well written and voice acted and few games have offered such a cornucopia of memorable quotes. There were times during gameplay were I honestly felt for the characters onscreen, something unheard of for me outside of Bioware games and Metal Gear Solid much less a strategy. That the game can manage all this and still juggle the freeform level system and multiple endings is something short of miraculous. I’m only disappointed that the game was such a commercial flop and so few people have actually experienced the enjoyment I got from it during my five some playthroughs.

Very funny read, great game log, though there wasn't much discussion about game design. Sounds like a great game, but your design section is more of the selling points of the game. -Trevor(grader)