Game Reviews: #1 Living the Dark Life

by Alphaville Herald on 17/02/05 at 10:21 pm

by Koden Farber

For those who love role playing games but are so addicted to Second Life they can’t log off to play something else, several in-game games may be the solution. In this report, I begin a series of reviews of in world games. This week we dive into Dark Life. In subsequent reviews we will look at Unreal: SL, SimCast, and whatever else may be on the horizon.

It All Begins Here

Like any new game, there comes a time to make the purchase and to read the manual. So after forking over 500L for a backpack, sword and shield, I made my way to the manual. Ah the manual, the thick, long, extensive manual. The so long it’s practically a quest in itself manual. Funny thing about manuals, either you read them and know what your doing, or you go out into the game blind and stupid bugging everyone who can hear you to tell you the simplest answers. I know that a fair number of people hate to read manuals, but in this case I would recommend it. [Writer’s note: I’m exaggerating some here; the manual is like a 5 minute read tops.]

The in character story itself is a very quick read. It basically tells you that, “everything was fine then the monsters came” in more words than that. Not a bad story line, and lives a lot of room for improvisation. After reading everything, I was pretty anxious to get started.

First stop, shopping

As I ventured from the loading point, I found myself in the main town Navorn. Being about as new as a baby and half as smart, I stumbled into the local outfit store. Feeling frugal, or cheap as the case normally is, I decided to wait a moment until I bought a new outfit. I figured I would play the role of a traveler new in town, the best excuse I could think of on such short notice for why I look nothing like the locals.

It is worth noting that there are scripted and non scripted clothing, the non scripted are bought with lindens, and the scripted are bought with in game gold.

Itching for action

After looking though all the items that are too expensive for a novice to purchase, I decided that it was now time to get myself killed. I proceeded to make my way out of town and find something to kill, or something to kill me. Either way, I knew something was going to die very soon.

I soon found my pray, a little rat, and figured it would be an easy battle.
Stupidly, I clicked when I was standing too far away and didn’t begin attacking till I clicked again and already lost about 15 of my health points. The battle was well fought, and I came out victorious.

Unfortunately, I had soon learned that the rat had friends, and I was soon attacked by another rat. Furthermore, the rat was at full health, and I had only 20 or so health points left. To make a long battle short, I won, but was one hit away from death. Oh the woes a noob like me must face.

Take Two

After my first adventure, I lugged my damaged body back into town and made my way to the shrine. After a few seconds of healing it is time once again to try fighting rats again. I leave the shrine feeling refreshed.

Right about now I wish there was mood music for my adventures, so I decide to whip out my winamp and get a play list going. Now with music in hand, the blood bath will continue once more; ok maybe not but I’d like to think highly of my weak self. After attacking my 4th rat, I find that you apparently gain experience points while battling, and not at the end of battle. I say this because I ended up leveling before I killed the rat.

Now that I have leveled, I need to figure out what the heck I’m going to do with my new found skill points. Speed is pretty important, so I figured two points into than and one into attack would suit me nicely. Unfortunately for me, I nearly died again when another rat tried to take me on when I was low on health. Being the life lover I am, and also a coward, I got my butt in gear and ran back to Navorn to heal up. I decided it would be in my best interest to not explore until I’m at least level 3 or 4.

First Death

Well it was bound to happen sooner or later; I got over zealous and ended up dieing by a rat. Death isn’t so bad; I lost some exp and ended up having to walk back to the shrine to be reborn. On to more adventure!

Spooky Old Cave

I seem to have stumbled upon a spooky looking cave.

Dare I enter it? Oh sure, what’s the worse that could happen to me? Time to find out!

I wonder if this is a bad sign?

Well the cave was a waste of time, nothing happened and nothing was in there. Or maybe I just missed it and didn’t realize it?

A Few Levels Later…

Now that I’m at level 5 with a new sword I had purchased, cost me 50L and 250 gold, I’m ready to go adventuring elsewhere. I decide to ignore all the rats and continue traveling until I find something interesting, this may take a moment… After a while I found a Culiseta to fight, pretty strong and fairly painful. I decided after defeating the Culiseta that I would finish my adventures for today.

Review
Learning curve: 30 minutes

Gameplay: 6/10
The game’s easy to play, a few commands you have to learn and most of them can be hot keyed. There are a few spells to learn and from what I figure they are pretty easy to use.

Graphics and Sound: 7/10
The in game sound is pretty basic though it’s a nice touch that you can set your sex to male or female so your grunts sound correct. The island’s design is beautiful though. You’d almost think you were in a professional game when you play this.

Keep factor: 7/10
I’ve heard there are some people here that RP in groups here, so that should keep you going. Also the game is still in beta, so new features should be added eventfully.

Overall: 7/10
I felt pretty good about the game when I played it. The price is nice considering the amount of work that had to have been put into making this and it is a pretty fun game to play at times. If you have a spare 500L, I recommend trying this game. Buying new items are pretty cheap too; most items will cost you around 50L.