In December 2008,
style="font-style: italic;">Spore
sold over a million units in its first month. While it was an
over-the-top commercial success,
style="font-style: italic;">Spore
hardly pleased the critics or turned into the kind of IP Electronic
Arts hoped it could mine for success. That is, until now.
style="font-style: italic;">Darkspore,
Spore’s
unlikely spin-off – an action RPG set in a sci-fi universe
with hefty co-op and PvP elements.
style="font-style: italic;">Darkspore
brings what Spore so desperately needed, a tighter, lighter context,
and one apart from the sideshow of penis-shaped monsters.
To say Darkspore
is a kids game is to severely limit its potential and
draw. True, the game has a hefty
style="font-style: italic;">Pokemon
collect ‘em all aspect with the Heroes–
hot-swappable protagonists with persistent hitbar and energy bar a la
Trine – and a kid-friendly bright palette. Also true: an
ability-spamming five year old could easily dive in and have fun with
the game.
But Darkspore’s
gameplay is also surprisingly deep, and relies (especially in PvP) on
countering enemy types and effects with the correct abilities and hero
types. You wouldn’t want to take on a planet boasting hordes
of plasma enemies, for example, with a plasma Hero. As for spotting
these problems before they begin, you’ll have a list of enemy
types for each planet as you’re choosing your Heroes. Plus,
Heroes (by default) and enemies use the same dominant colors so you can
easily spot these problems up-front without reading through stats and
descriptions.
border="1" cellpadding="5" cellspacing="2">
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/node/96136">
style="border: 0px solid ; width: 300px; height: 240px;"
alt="darkspore"
src="http://www.tentonhammer.com/image/view/96136">
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/node/96137">
style="border: 0px solid ; width: 300px; height: 240px;"
alt="darkspore"
src="http://www.tentonhammer.com/image/view/96137">
Maxis has already revealed several dozen heroes, roughly sortable into
tanks, DPS, and ranged/support roles. I got my grubby hands on several
of these Heroes at GDC:
- Vex – a
short-range teleporting, time-shield sporting, fast-meleeing Quantum
Ravager. I found Vex to be quick, but pretty lacking in defense, making
him a better option for PvE than PvP. - Sage – a froglike,
pet-spawning healer that’s classified as a Bio Tempest.
Sage’s Tree of Life was my primary healing ability
throughout my playsession, but was highly interruptible with stuns.
Sage has a few frog-like pets and some moderate damage-dealing
abilities, but he’s primarily a support character. - Skar – my favorite
– a Necro Ravager with a life leech ability and a few tankish
damage absorbing abilities. Skar also looked cool, huge, purple, and
carrying a large bladed weapon.
A writer from Gamespot and I teamed up for a quick PvE map, but first,
Thomas Vu, Lead Producer on the project, showed us the Creature Editor,
a thankfully abridged version of
style="font-style: italic;">Spore’s
signature system. In
style="font-style: italic;">Spore,
players could create freeform characters - a system that Maxis/EA has
used to their advantage in allowing players to create enemy types via a
contest. Thomas noted that over 50 have been added to
style="font-style: italic;">Darkspore
so far based on player submissions.
border="1" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="2">
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/node/96141">
style="border: 0px solid ; width: 300px; height: 228px;"
alt="darkspore"
src="http://www.tentonhammer.com/image/view/96141">
Darkspore Sage
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/node/96143">
style="border: 0px solid ; width: 300px; height: 228px;"
alt="darkspore"
src="http://www.tentonhammer.com/image/view/96143">
Darkspore Vex
Darkspore’s
creature editor differs in that you can add wings, antennae,
and other modifications that you loot (out of the millions of available
items) to existing models. You can’t change the body type,
spine, or add limbs, but the modifications that you can make add both
stats and an element of customization (and a certain kind of camoflage
in PvP) to your Heroes.
The planet loading screen allowed us a glimpse at the types of enemies
we’d be facing, along with one more chance to swap out our
Heroes. We found ourselves on Cryos, an ice planet facing a variety of
enemies and turrets, including a variety of damage and stun-based
enemies along robotrons that repaired enemies. Gameplay was fairly
simple – left mouse button for a melee attack,
right mouse button for a ranged attack. Q,W, and E switched between the
three Heroes, 1-3 were individual / direct abilities, and 3-6 are group
/ area-of-effect abilities. I found the control scheme to be
very intuitive to pick up and play – a must given
style="font-style: italic;">Darkspore’s
swappable Heroes premise and all-ages appeal.
We managed to get through the map and even a boss fight done
arena-style, with nary a death despite waves of bugs attacking. I used
Sage’s Tree of Life ability to keep Gamespot in the pink, and
with a minimum of tactics we beat the map in about 10 minutes. Thomas
explained that this single mission time range is what Maxis is aiming
for, but upon completing the map we were offered an interesting choice
– keep our spoils and quit, or take on a bonus round for
better
prizes. But should we die, we lose everything we gained in the
first round. Who said all-ages games couldn’t have a nice
little hardcore twist?
border="1" cellpadding="5" cellspacing="2">
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/node/96138">
style="border: 0px solid ; width: 300px; height: 240px;"
alt="darkspore"
src="http://www.tentonhammer.com/image/view/96138">
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/node/96139">
style="border: 0px solid ; width: 300px; height: 240px;"
alt="darkspore"
src="http://www.tentonhammer.com/image/view/96139">
Gamespot guy, having played the game before, opted for a PvP battle
instead, and I should have known I was in for a thumping. Thomas
explained that due to the complication of balancing the myriad
combinations available in PvP,
style="font-style: italic;">Darkspore
PvP would be limited to 1v1 or 2v2 battles conducted in an open-oval
shaped arena with no walls or obstructions to break line of sight.
Since I was lacking a Sentinel (
style="font-style: italic;">Darkspore’s
tankish class), I had to rely on hit and run tactics with my vulnerable
Ravagers (rogues), while swapping in my Tempest to pop Tree of Life and
heal my DPS Heroes. Gamespot was onto me, however, and through slows,
stuns, and channel abilities, easily wheedled through my
Heroes. It’s likely there was a far better way to
play my deck, but I enjoyed seeing how quickly the tactics stack up.
Darkspore
shows compelling evidence that it might offer the kind of whimsically,
deceptively cerebral fun we were so desperately hoping
style="font-style: italic;">Spore
might offer. The game offers that elusive blend of all-ages fun and
extreme tactical depth, not to mention a solid layer of co-op and PvP
fun, tons of loot, wisely imposed design limitations (i.e. keeping PvP
limited to 1v1 and 2v2), and, with collectible Heroes, lots of
prospective merchandising saavy. Look for the game to launch
on March 29th, 2011.
To read the latest guides, news, and features you can visit our Darkspore Game Page.
