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Sacred 3
A Not-So- Sacred Review

First off I’d like to introduce myself.  I’m Dark Hope, and I’ve been playing video games for 23 years now.  I use a “10” system in my ratings, giving  games 10 points in every category to start, and docking points for faults.  If you ever see me give 10 points in any category, that means I can’t find a single thing wrong with it, and it’s perfect in every way.  I also rate games objectively and without bias.  That being said lets get on with my review of Sacred 3!

  I am a huge fan of Sacred 2, so going into this game I had high expectations.  The previous game had an amazing number of weapons, gear, and variation in the characters, enemies, levels, and bosses.  I was expecting updated graphics, new characters, and obviously new content, which the trailers delivered on.  Upon loading the game I was greeted with the trailer as the main menu background.  It was simply on a loop with no sound, just the “press start” option, followed by a new game/load screen.  This seems incredibly lazy to me, but oh well, time to jump into the game!

I played a few of the characters before realizing that they are all exactly the same.  They all have different animations, but the skills all the same.  Also you can only equip two skills for each mission, out of about 7 for each character.  That  is down from 15 skills per mission n the previous game, of which you could equip 12 at once.  You can’t change your skills mid level, so if you need a specific skill for the rock paper scissors system of the skills (shield break, knock down, or interrupt), you’re pretty much screwed.

The characters are crazy…seriously.  The story and characters look like they were written by a middle schooler.  They all have some dumb character trait that is over played.  The story was so flavorless that I really didn’t care what was going on.  The enemy NPCs change randomly from level to level and it’s very confusing.  I really didn’t see much structure to the extremely linear story/plot progression at all.

I played a few  levels before realizing that they are all exactly the same.  They all have different backgrounds, but none the less, all the same.  In every story map, you are bombed with something…catapults, volcanic rock, boulders, poison bombs, regular bombs…you name it.  The first boss I fought was cool.  He has a shock wave attack, a slam attack, and a running attack.  You have to make good use of the dodge skill to beat him without using any potions.  Then I fought the second boss, and the third boss, most of them exactly the same.  There were a few neat battles, a pirate ship, a big guy in a furnace, a big guy in the forest, a big guy in a fort, a big guy in…well you get the idea.

Items, loot, and armor are almost non existent.  You get one set of armor, which you upgrade as you level up…zero choices there.  You get three slightly different weapons, which you can upgrade in  slightly different ways.  This is what I was most upset about with this game.  You go from millions of different options in the previous game to…maybe a few dozen.

OK…so here is the lowdown…if you want a vast open world game with tons of character development options and hundreds of hours of game play like the last Sacred, save your money.  If you want a gauntlet/god of war hybrid game you can smash through, this is the game for you.  Not relating this game to the previous one, here is how I rate it.

Game play-7/10
It gets pretty stale only having two skills, but it is still kinda fun smashing lots of big dudes.

Controls-8/10
It’s mostly easy to do what you want, but aiming a skill can be tough sometimes.  Camera controls are non-existent, which is really frustrating.  However this usually isn’t a problem.

Graphics-6/10
The game looks like it should be an early PS3 title, enough said.

Story-5/10
Like I said, middle schooler, but the humor is there at least.

Music-5/10
I didn’t even notice it was there, at least it wasn’t bad.

Replay Value-4/10
Since every character is almost the same, very little.  If you want better gear you need to play the harder difficulties.

Total Score-5.83\10

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