Playing Driftmoon was truly a pleasurable experience. Great puzzles, some of them were rather easy but some were truly demanding. I only had to search help in the Internet only once (I was at my wits end). My favourite ones were logic puzzles, for example the riddle in the last chapter. Battles were neither too easy nor too hard (there are four difficulty levels, I picked one of the middle ones), so playing this game is a challenge, not a chore. I recommend it for everyone - it took me almost 10 hrs to finish Driftmoon and I think it was time spent well :)
At first, I enjoyed this game greatly. I hadn't play this game earlier, so there wasn't any nostalgia at play that could cloud my judgement. The plot is somewhat linear and straightforward, but engaging, an the gameplay is really addictive. For a time, at least. What irritated me to the point I actually stopped playing? - inventory; it's a mess, believe me. In most RPGs you have your backpack + your body, so whatever you put on, it dissapears form the backpack. Not in Nox. You click on the item you want to use (shield, boots etc) and it highlights, but it stays in the backpack? By the time you have a lot of items in your inventory finding the ones you are using and the ones for sale or use at a later time is not so easy anymore. - Durability. A lot of RPGs has that item characteristic, but in none I've played before I actually got an item destroyed during a quest, before I could get to a shop to repair it! So you have 3 choices: 1) when an item is almost broken you stop wearing it and continue to play without it (making you weaker, with lesser armor); 2) you play having 2 or 3 items of each kind but then you have little place for items you find on a quest and the profit from the loot is really small; 3) you don't care and let the items be destroyed which for me is not an option at all! I stopped playing Nox altogether and got back to Diablo II, to reasonable inventory and items that are not so breakable that they can be destroyed in the span of one quest...
Some reviews compare Disciples to the HoMaM series. While on the first sight they are similiar, the game mechanics are mighty different. You don't hire legions of units - you may have maximum 5 units plus the leader. You don't cast spells on the battlefield but before or afterwards. The spells are also the reason why I didn't give the game five stars. The spells, while not that powerful themselves, are a killer force when cast one after another, and another... Our army has no defense against them as there are scrolls and tomes which protect only against the first spell, not all of them, even for one turn. I played the Empire campaign. On the fourth chapter I had a mighty army with two White Dragons (800 HP) and a really strong leader. It didn't matter though as the Legions of the Damned where casting at me one damage spell after another. After they were done with me I had no leader and my dragons were so injured that killing them off was no trouble for an below-average army. I will give this chapter another try but I know one thing for sure - there should be some artifacts that protect our army against enemy spells by giving it at least a partial immunity. Besides this one big flaw I think DIsciples is a fun and engaging game. Also strongly addictive - when I started a chapter, I had to finish it, no matter the costs - a neglected home and an irritated husband amongst them... ;)
