Severance's blunt brand of conflict resolution may not be applicable to real life but that doesn't really matter as the game delivers the goods in the form of a great fighting system, surprisingly advanced physics, body mutilation and lighting and 3 fun characters (the dwarf is a slow, clumsy prick with stubby arms and no combos). The main issue is the lack of variety in levels. The engine seems to excel at torch-lit castles and caves, so you get a lot of those. It also doesn't help that the story is absent for the first five levels and when it does show up, it isn't that compelling. You're mainly motivated by your bloodlust. Still, these are minor issues. When you best your first troll after a tense battle and your final swipe cleaves his torso in two and you watch, in silence, as the bottom half crumples to a heap, it's a moment you want to shout into the wind, you want to whisper it into a seashell and you want hide it in your heart, forever. My favorite character: Tukaram the Barbarian (Huge sword, troubled brow, great stuff) My favorite level: Fortress of Nemrut (It's a winter wonderland! Also some nice gregorian chanting.)
If you look up "mixed bag" in the dictionary it says "Evil Genius" The game's audio and visuals score a perfect ten and then some. The love and care that went into the design and animation of the characters is palpable. I could watch my minions torture agents with Michael Jackson-moves for hours. But as it happens, Evil Genius is a game, which means you have to push buttons to make things happen and this is where problems start to crop up. Exhibit A: The World Domination screen. You receive no forewarning of stuff that happens there, so you need to keep checking it manually, until it becomes an involuntary tick. I guess you could rationalize it as a way of putting you in the head space of a high-strung, paranoid megalomaniac but for me it was just a big bummer. This, combined with issues making money and exceptional soldiers massacring my hapless minions made me concede and start using cheats. Through cheating I was able to rekindle a lot of the initial fun, building cool lairs and setting up ridiculous trap-corridors. I've never been much good at micromanaging stuff so more seasoned players can probably find workarounds for my annoyances but at the end of the day I just want to watch the supercomputer tickle ambassadors.
