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9th September 2003:
Dungeons & Dragons Heroes (ECTS 2003)
We remember playing the original role-playing game, so we were interested to see Atari's take on the D&D universe.
Posted by John Grothier - Xbox - UK and Europe

It's over twenty years ago now since my friends and I were gathered round my mother's living room table playing the original role-playing game, Dungeons & Dragons. Imagination and dice were the key to fantastic worlds with treasures galore, albeit just in our over-active minds. Even in those days we played computer games on our ZX-81's - typing code from computer magazines in the hope of adventure and excitement, but in those days it was just one large pixel attacking another large pixel. How we wished for a good D&D computer game. Now those days are gone, and at this years ECTS our wishes we granted as we were invited to see Dungeons & Dragons Heroes in a playable form. Now you get the chance to take on the role of one of four resurrected D&D heroes; a Fighter, Wizard, Cleric and a Rogue.

Dungeons & Dragons Heroes is all about combat and developing your character, and the games quest is to find and collect all of the 'Planar Gems', while battling evil and banishing it from the world. We were pleased to see that the game captures the spirit of D&D perfectly with detailed characters and gorgeous environments to explore. The world is alive with many different monsters - we battled Ice Golems, Trolls and the Undead. The monsters look and behave very differently thanks to some above average A.I. and you will have to work hard to find their weaknesses. As you would expect some are more obvious than others - the Ice Golems are invulnerable to ice attacks, but fire is another matter. Holy water is an obvious use for the Undead, while we found that Trolls are very susceptible to acid and fire attacks. The combat interface suites the Xbox controller perfectly and in no time at all we were hacking and slashing our way across the frozen wastelands. One nice touch we discovered was when firing an arrow into a monster - it did not just disappear, the arrows remained stuck in your foe, just where you aimed.

The key to success in D&D Heroes is to have variety in your party, as Rogues can pick locks and disable trapped chests, Clerics can heal the party while everyone else is attacking. Wizards use magic to engage the enemy from afar, and Fighters are expert in close rage combat. We experimented briefly with some spells and special attacks and had fun using the Wizard's 'Gust of Wind' spell to slow down enemies, while our Fighter used 'Frenzy' to cut them into little pieces. The Cleric can use the 'Glyph of Warding' to keep foes at bay and the Rogue can fire off rapid arrow strikes to wipe them out. D&D Heroes is also about levelling up your character, and deciding where you spend your experience points. The game allows the player to learn new combat feats and attacks, or to improve the ones you have already. Your chosen character will also have access to many different types of weapons and armour, many of which have special or magical powers, such as increased abilities, lighter weight, faster movement, and resistance to certain elements. Discover 'Soul Shards' and players can upgrade their characters 'Ancestral Weapon', find all 20 shards and you will be able to upgrade the weapon to its highest level, changing its appearance, bonuses and modifiers with each upgrade. There are also many magical rings and necklaces to be found in the game which will also improve you hero's abilities.

Overall we were really impressed with Dungeons and Dragons Heroes, it really did capture our imagination, and the spirit of the role-playing game, and we look forward to reviewing the finished game on Silicon Fusion very soon.

John Grothier

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