As someone who didn't enjoy Gothic or Risen, this one surprised me as I found it to be a fun, albeit clunky raw gem. The story is pretty good. The world is immersive with fairly distinct factions. The characters are good, some are even great. The game could use some quality of life improvements, namely better quest markers, a better skill system (finding teachers is too old school and inconvenient imo - not a no go though, reminds me of the good ole Might and Magic days heh) and definitely better controls & camera (and more fuel for the jetpack). Other than that I really don't have much to complain. The graphics are decent, though not the greatest. Actually there's one more thing that "bothered" me: You are insanely weak in the beginning, but you can mow down anything in a few shots / hits in the late game. Difficulty scaling is NOT this game's strong suit. So if a steep difficulty curve is not for you I would recommend to avoid this game. Steam purchase btw.
Man it's been a long time since I played this game. I played it when I was like 12 years old or sth. This is an RPG unlike many others, especially considering the POV with your characters on the bottom, only as character portraits. But it's done so incredibly well that this never starts to bother you. And the commentary from the characters is just great. Loved the Orc Knight repeating "´tis but a scratch" when he got a huge gash on his face lol. My favorite character's gotta be the Lich. You basically have to put your soul (? I think that's what it was) into a vessel and carry it around with you. The guy looks kickass too. And oh the spells that guy can cast. Armageddon anyone? haha . Honestly though, I mostly used poison cloud. Best dps/mana imo. Oh and the fun I had casting confuse on the griffins who then went on a rampage killing villagers and knights alike. Hehehe. Gotta get that sweet loot somehow right? Anyway, the story ... honestly, I forgot most of it, but I do remember that it was great. And I loved being able to basically choose between "heaven" and "hell". Obviously I chose the dark side because screw those arrogant air/light elementals and angels! So what more is great about this game? Well for starters you can either choose turn based or live action. I always chose the latter because it's more fun. Plus I gotta admit I did exploit the dumb AI to kill dragons and other strong enemies. It also has an incredible game in the game: Arcomage. Man that was hella fun to play! And I mean, what other game lets you fly, levitate, wipe out an entire map with Armageddon, make endless choices, explore etc. for hours without end? Sure, there are a few, but none quite compare to this game. It saddens me greatly to see the decline of M&M starting with 9, going slightly back upwards with MM X but it just wasn't the same anymore and any new titles aren't likely to come out. And even if they did, the quality most likely wouldn't be the same.
