Dark Messiah of Might and Magic was developed by Arkane, and released by Ubisoft. Arkane deserve a ton of credit for a very bold project. Not only did they on the Source engine, which gives fans a certain level expectations from the get-go, but they also took the risk of mixing genres when developing a game, which is a rarely-successful undertaking. Arkane did a good job in both of these aspects when putting Dark Messiah together.

You are put in the boots of Sareth, orphan and a student of the mage Phenrig. The game's tutorial level introduces you to your master and gives out the basic plot of the game. The game has you searching underground lairs, orc strongholds and killing the odd dragon or two, in a quest to find the skull of a dragon god. The story is everything you would expect from a fantasy game, but sadly, it won't take a very clever mind to decipher the general plot of the game after the first proper level. If you're expecting a deep story on par with Oblivion or Neverwinter Nights, this game doesn’t cut it. Instead, the plotline is shallow and somewhat obvious, usually involving an incredible amount bad guys that need killing. Also, the item and area names are bland and sound like they've been used before.

Aesthetically, game is very well designed. Arkane has managed to take the Source engine and tweak it in several ways, making Dark Messiah one of the better looking Source games I have seen yet. Expect awesome HDR environments, detailed weapons and cool spell effects.

In terms of weapons, Dark Messiah an incredible plethora of them, many of which can be specialized, an aspect of the game I really enjoyed. You can get fire staffs, lightning daggers, poison swords and plenty of other types of specialized weaponry. The sheer amount of assorted specialized weapons means that you'll always have a weapon that is right for the situation and enemy you're fighting. A particular favorite of mine is the lightning shield, which strikes enemies who try to hit you with lightning and then stuns them for a short time.

Dark Messiah also has a very unique character building system. Instead of having to bind yourself towards one archetype, you can combine elements of a Mage, Warrior, Priest and Assassin to create your own hybrid. I found this to be quite a nifty feature, but as the game progressed, I noticed that there was a lack of diversity in each character build. Arkane seemed to have wanted to push players to create hybrids, but in doing so, did not add enough depth to the skills and abilities of each character style, which could present a problem for those who want to have stand-alone Warrior, Mage, Priest, or Assassin classes.

There's also a multiplayer segment to the game which was developed by Kujo. Here, you have the standard modes you know and love (DM; TDM), as well as a new crusade mode. In the crusade mode, you level up as the crusade goes on, so playing longer actually pays off. The crusade mode is basically the battle between human and undead, and the nifty thing is that once a side wins a map, it goes further into enemy territory, and if you lose, you get kicked back a map. Add this into the fact that you can choose different classes such as Priests, Warriors and Assassins, and you're in for a real treat in terms of a multiplayer experience. The only thing that disappoints me with the multiplayer is that the excellent swordplay aspect doesn't make it into the multiplayer package. I can see how it would have been difficult to accomplish netcode wise, but it would have made the multiplayer mode that much more exciting.

When it comes to the combat, Dark Messiah shines. I have never seen a first-person game involving swords do this well. It's unbelievably intuitive, and if you've played the demo, you'll know what I'm talking about. You run up to an orc, and do a simple slash. He may block this, and you can lean back to do a power attack and break his parry, and so on. The sheer variety of things you can do with a sword in this game is incredible, but as I stated before, it is unfortunate that the multiplayer package cuts most of this out, since the player cannot perform the defensive moves the same way the computer does.

If you can get past the bland storyline and enjoy slaying thousands of bad guys, you may be in for a real treat with Dark Messiah. The singleplayer a good 12 hour play-through, and the multiplayer aspect of the game is quite fun. Overall, Dark Messiah is a good addition to the Might and Magic family.