Hit mobs, increase the level, collect equipment to increase the level, knock out more steep equipment and beat stronger mobs. Approximately on this principle, a game swore was based on the first, second, and, perhaps, the third Diablo. And so people liked this meditative extermination of evil spirits that they were pleased to rake off the products of Midelitsa from the shelves of stores and disappeared in this adventure for months and years or … a couple of hours, taste, whether you know. But there were these games, especially Diablo 2, so successful that they could not but give rise to a number of followers. And how even more tender and by the handle Gently bring Diablo Clons to you, it is difficult for me to imagine, so let’s go to them abruptly.
But before, I will still allow myself a small lyrical retreat. The theme of the clones of a particular game pops up every time when the mechanic pops up in the next game at least a little reminiscent of the one that was in the game of the already released. Give everyone technical progress, innovations and open worlds with non -linearies. But when they take the already worked out mechanics, they creatively process it and give rise to something new – the nearby community immediately begins to invent, whose clone is the next not aaa project. What am I trying to bring through these fabrications? To a simple and obvious thing-give the chances of those games that have known the clones of something else and take a closer look at them. Today I suggest a closer look at the work of German programmers and designers, game Sacred – Or, as he was called in Russian localization, Prince of Darkness.
The developer of this game was a German company Ascaron, which since 1992 has made economic simulators. Despite some inexperience in a new area for them, the company took up an ambitious project. It turned out that they did not lose and the first serious success came to them precisely thanks to Sacred. She was a worthy successor of Diablo’s ideas in the Hack & Slash RPG genre. In many ways, this success contributed to the fact that they supported their brainchild for a long time, releasing patches and additions. It is thanks to such extensions that the Sacred + and Sacred Underworld versions appeared, which together almost doubled the territory of our adventures compared to the original. A year after the release of the original game, she with additions was released in the form of Sacred Gold Edition. The yard was then in 2005 and we will focus on this version today.
And what did the person see in the game itself? First of all, the choice of the level of complexity, coupled with the hero. And if we talk about the heroes below, then in the levels of complexity I propose to figure it out right now. From the very beginning, only two difficulty levels are available to the player: “bronze” and “silver”. They are obviously the level of opponents. If the “bronze” levels of opponents are fixed and usually below the level of the protagonist, then on “silver” their level strives for the level of the hero or even surpasses it. When passing the storyline on “silver”, “gold” opens. When passing it, the "platinum" will open on the "gold". And if you exhaled and thought that everything would end there, then no. Go through the game on Platinum and you will open the last, most difficult level – Niobius. Why is it all important? Because the same equipment, but the complexity obtained at different levels will differ in its characteristics, and therefore Niobium gear is the coolest. Therefore, for those who need a clear goal and enough patience, you can offer the task of ending the original campaign and the Underworld campaign for Niobia.
The graphics in the game are quite controversial – everything is drawn beautifully, but already mediocre for its year of exit, especially considering that a Titan Quest, which looked great, came out a year later; Models of the main characters are well made and a little less well worked out, and not very well, the mass. Many opponents and allies are copied and propagated, as if on a printer, but recalling Diablo, where other opponents differed only in color, this claim becomes somewhat far -fetched. There is no ubiquitous random generation of the card here, which negatively affects reiglabia, but plays very well in favor of impressions from the first acquaintance. Sometimes there are quite beautiful landscapes. And overshadows all this beauty only that some elements of landscapes and architecture, exactly repeat each other. Also, sometimes you can see the atmospheric effects in the spirit of fog or rain, which affect little, except for visual perception. There is a day-night cycle here. Thanks to this cycle, the time for tasks is counted that have a time frame.
Ankaria is a good place to spend a vacation.
The background here is very standard for this kind of fantasy. A sorcerer named Shaddar comes to the world. He does not want to be content with the inherited wealth of his ancestors and longs to obtain power, and not just power over the kingdom, but over the forces of darkness. For the sake of his ambitions, he sacrifices his sister as a sacrifice. However, his dark cases did not hide from the eyes of the community of magicians and it decided that Shaddar should be betrayed to the Holy Cleaning Costrum. But the good king Valorian I changed the verdict and instead of the death penalty, Shaddar was waiting for exile. For several centuries, it flew over the world since then, and the sorcerer has saved all the forces in the southern deserts, terrifying orcs, goblins and ogres. He rebuilt his castle-Shaddar-Nur on lifeless rocks, where he began to recruit the army from goblins and improve his art in the field of black magic, while not stopping the search for the passage into the world of the dead. Shaddar had to get there alive and return back, simultaneously concluding an alliance with the demon of Sakkara ..
Where in the magical adventure and without dragons?
The territory where you will have to travel, truly huge and, in addition to various mobs, towns and tasks in it, you can find very entertaining places. The most entertaining of them by irony of fate is cemeteries. Having read the inscriptions on grave stones, you can at least smile, or even rejoice that a reference to your favorite film, beloved writer and even one porn actress is left here. In large cities, you can find useful NPSs, a magic chest in which you can store your things, and portals, which in activated form will help to carry the running around the fields and weights of this magical world.
This is a mill? This is a peacock? No, this is Seraphim!
We will be allowed to participate in the next salvation of the world, in total, for 8 characters, as usual, with their own characteristics, advantages and disadvantages.
Natural berserker that can use any type of weapon. The near is preferable, but also the ability to operate in long -range battle is also available.
The only character who does not have combat techniques, but there are enough spells for every taste. Here you have auras of all colors, and treatment, and fire balls with meteorites.
Can operate with unique https://chancebetcasino.co.uk/bonus/ blades of dark elves, customs or to be a master of traps. Very cheerful and effective hero.
A hero for whom the change of time of day is the most critical. At night, turning into a vampire, she does not receive periodic damage from sunlight, and therefore can fight the most effectively. In addition, it can create a small army of the dead.
A typical shooter. Lukes, arrows and magic of ancestors at our service. It can be called a unicorn, and this is not a joke, guys.
A sexy girl who has good potential for neighboring battle and not frail, in terms of effectiveness, heavenly magic.
The last representative of the technologically developed race in this magical world. The only hero who can use firearms and has in his abilities such things as a gun, mines and flamethrower.
The Demon girl, tired of the mortals and this world in principle, but exalted in her world, abandoned for this in Ankaria as a punishment. The only hero who can fly and overcome this inaccessible to other places.
Each character begins the game, as expected, in its place – Seraphim in the Temple, a gladiator in the arena, and the dwarf’s gnome at a broken helicopter.
Subsequently, according to the wave of the scriptwriters, all the backgrounds of these characters converge in one place and continue to proceed according to the same scenario filled with palace intrigues, treasure and war.
What, in fact, can be done in Ankaria? Kill monsters, collect loot, trade and perform quests. And if you discard the murder for some time, then the fulfillment of quests becomes the main occupation of beginners (and experienced) travelers. Quests are divided into two main types: plot and quests of settlements. And if everything is clear with the first enough – it is they who will lead us to the end of the game, then with the second everything is somewhat more interesting. In any settlement, whether it is a city, a village, a castle or some other place, there are suffering people who seek to not leave poor travelers without work. It is for these tasks that we get the main awards, money and experience. Basically, these are the banal “kill 10 goblins and bring their hearts” or “bring a medicine from another part of the city”, but you need to make a reservation that sometimes there are tasks with an unusual approach, with interesting references to literary and not very characters, as well as small moral elections that do not affect anything, but they please their presence.
Dismemberment is a trifle, but nice.
But the tasks are the tenth, because we have RPGs here and it is more interesting to talk about the role system and other related things. So let’s do so. With gaining experience, we increase our level, the maximum level here is as much as 216th (other MMOs will envy). For each new level, we are given a certain number of points for pumping skills and characteristics. Characteristics – standard parameters in the spirit of strength, endurance, dexterity, charisma, physical and mental regeneration. The initial characteristics of all the characters are different and, in addition to those points that are given to you for a new level, pump 10 percent of the original characteristics themselves.
Skills, in addition to the two original ones, allow you to choose yourself (and if you use the magic of googling a little, then the first two can be chosen by yourself). We choose them at 3, 6, 12, 20, 30 and 50 levels. They improve the character in a variety of ways: increase damage to a certain type of weapon or magic, increase the parameters of attack and protection, the amount of life and regeneration, even trading more effectively and jump on horses like a real cavalryman. Let me not paint every skill, for there are about 30 in the game, and detailed descriptions and optimal builds are not what you need Gotem review today.
And finally, abilities. Abilities here are mined almost as in the first Diablo, if I do not confuse anything. That is, they are knocked out of the mobs and get for tasks. But unlike the system, there is no mana in principle in Sacred and you have to dance from traffic rollbacks. In order to achieve the greatest effectiveness from them, skills and equipment with appropriate bonuses that reduce the reload of abilities will help you. Most characters, except for the gladiator and a combat magician, have two types of them – roughly speaking, combat techniques and special techniques. This separation is fundamentally for the reason that all the abilities of the same type go to the rollback. Combo-welcome is designed to correct the situation, allowing you to connect several spells sequentially and have their reloading.
The heroes are not very for a lot of abilities, but the scope for fantasy still remains. Thanks to skills, you can sharpen the hero towards magical techniques or banal assault. In some classes, intermediate branches are quite viable.
Sects and here they do not give peace.
Useful not game characters will meet in our way.
Dealer – allows you to produce goods. With a well -pumped skill, “trading” allows you to trade very profitably for itself, and the assortment in stores changes for the best side for the player, for nothing that net and unique things are not for sale. But be careful in their desire for wealth – “trade” is not the most useful skill in this game.
Blacksmith – allows you to shackle the blacksmiths, or jewelry, which retains all its properties into the thing into the thing that is in the one, into which it is clamped by. Also, when pumping the appropriate skill, the dwarf can do their own.
Combo-master -allows you to create the same combo attack. Also allows you to change unnecessary runes to other. He will change two runes to a random rune, three – to a random rune suitable for your character, and for four you can choose the rune of your class that you need. As you know, the most effectively change runes 4 to 1. Although this is a robbery, it is worth it.
The groom – Sells, heals and buys horses, no more or less.
It was necessary to manage and break the last helicopter in the kingdom!
But I am unlikely to be mistaken if I say that we break through the crowds of enemies not for the sake of delightful stories of peasants digging in manure, but for the sake of a huge number of swords, pistols, shields, armor and other equipment. And the main criterion by which you will take the objects for yourself is their quality and the bonuses you need. The quality ladder begins with white things that are more standard GOST. Then there are magic things whose names are blue. They give weak bonuses to your characteristics. Rare things look more interesting, the names of which are yellow, in addition to characteristics to bonuses, they give one or more unique strengthening. They are followed by green – maximum things. Not only do they themselves give very tasty and interesting bonuses, but one of them can also be assembled from them. Sets, as usual, give amplifiers for several things from one set of wearable together. There are 47 sets in the game. For each character there are 7 of them, except for the demon and the gnome for which 5. Plus 7 more sets, which, in principle, can wear any character when choosing and pumping certain skills to the desired threshold.
There are still unique things that are quite rare, but bonuses often have very interesting. What is only a ring that allows you to attack peaceful living creatures, for example. The color of their name is gold, or brown, depending on what angle to watch.
What else is worth saying about things is that they can contain holes for inserting various useful strengthening. When you play, you will understand that these holes are painted over in different colors and this should mean something. But it means that cool holes How it sounds! They will give bonuses when leafing to fixed bonus values. Silver will give 5-6% of the bonus, golden 10-12%, and if you are lucky enough to meet with such a rarity as green holes, then in addition to the joy of the collector, you can feel the joy of a bonus to a leaf of 15%.
Beauty is a terrible force.
Do not forget about multiplayer and. And if the official Askaron servers have long deceived in a deep sleep, then the fan servers are alive, and no one will pick up the opportunity to unite through the local network. The modes in which this can be done as follows: the cooperative passage of the campaign by a group of up to 4 people and a free game in which you can do anything. The maximum number of players is 16, the maximum number of the group is 4 people. There is also a duel mode – the same free mode with the possibility of PVP.
The duet of German composers Dag Winderlikh and Matias Steinvahs was engaged in music for the game. To observe the stylistics and emphasize the atmosphere of different regions of the magical world, and a couple of compositions can even be a more intimate listening.
The Germans created far from the perfect game. But she has enough charm and beauty, which, at least for one race, but capture the player and pull him through dark forests, wide deserts and green meadows of the magical world of Ankaria. There are enough problems for the game – this is a large number of repeated models, not always adequate animations, very rarely, but incomprehensible quests. A fixed card, although huge, does not play on the hands of repeated passages. Nevertheless, Sacred was and remains a commendable game in his genre, with a bit of interesting mechanics, pleasant style and a lot of references.