Reviewed: March 2, 2003
Reviewed by: Mark Smith
Publisher
Xicat Interactive
Developer
Expec
Released: March 18, 2003
Genre: Action
Players: 4
ESRB: Everyone
6
7
6
6
6.6
Supported Features
You have to admit that any game with a title like BlackStone: Magic & Steel is going to raise a few eyebrows. I know I was fairly excited when my review copy arrived. I had only been following this title for a few weeks prior to my review and not all that closely. I had some loose info that this was an RPG game with multiple character classes, weapons, and magic. What more do you need?
It took me less than 60 second after starting my first game to come to the obvious conclusion that BlackStone is nothing more than a Gauntlet clone, borrowing so heavily from Midway’s arcade classic that this title must have narrowly squeaked through the legal department. And while cloning a great game isn’t necessarily a bad thing provided you add some significant improvements, BlackStone really doesn’t bring anything new to the table and in fact, suffers from several issues that were never even issues in Gauntlet.
The similarities begin from the moment you hit the START button. You start by picking one of several available character classes with just as many characters being locked down to be unlocked through gameplay. Each class has two variations, usually a male and a female counterpart, and each has varying stats such as strength, health, and magic. Characters like the archer make use of long-range attacks while fighters use hand-to-hand combat and wizards use magic. There are hybrid classes like the Pirate and the Thief but these are just clever names and images to disguise slightly modified statistics.
The opening movie is quite impressive, but it is merely an MTV-style movie that doesn’t pertain to the story. The story itself is told through static images with scrolling text narrated by a booming voice. The premise is not that original and makes use of silly sounding names like Xylon. The simple fact is that a game like this doesn’t really need a story, so if you are going to bother to create one at least try to make it interesting. About three chapters into the game I was skipping the narration entirely and just looking at the next objective or quest item I was commissioned to find.
My first session with BlackStone had me playing alone as the Pirate character mainly because he was the most powerful of the classes, or so it seemed. It didn’t take me long at all to realize that this game is heavily geared toward multiplayer and that at least one of those characters needs to have a long-range attack like the Archer. Here is why.
Much like Gauntlet this game has monster generators. The problem lies in the fact that these generators spit out monsters at a rate of about one per second and it takes you about two seconds to kill a monster in hand-to-hand combat. Unless you have a magic scroll or something to deliver an area of effect blast the space between you and the monster generator will quickly fill up with monsters and you will never be able to fight your way close enough to destroy the actual generator. This problem is only made worse when you get in an area with two or more generators. My Pirate quickly got shredded (all 5 credits exhausted) halfway through stage two.
I restarted the game and this time played as the Archer. This made things a bit easier, as you can often get in a flurry of arrows and destroy the generators before you even trigger the flood of monsters. Even so, you are at an extreme disadvantage if you play this game alone.
My next session had me teaming up with another GCM reviewer where I once again played the Archer to compliment his hard-hitting Warrior. Working together with both melee and missile attacks, we seemed to actually stand a chance against the overwhelming odds and were finally able to analyze the other aspects of gameplay.
If you have ever played Gauntlet then you will instantly recognize the chests and the keys you need to open them. You will get the familiar fruit, meat, and other tasty morsels to regain health and will need to watch out for poisoned food and chests containing a deadly leech monster that drains your life – apparently putting the Grim Reaper in a chest would trample on Midway’s vision a bit too much.
You get to explore 26 large levels that are rendered in full 3D but are often locked down by a restrictive and troublesome camera system that is either too far, too close, too high, or too low. The camera is almost always too close in the single player game but once you start adding new players it is forced to pull back to keep everyone in view and then it begins to work a bit better.
As with most four-player games where everyone plays on the same screen there is a certain level of cooperation required. If one player is moving SW and you are trying to grab that magic scroll to the NE somebody is going to have to give to allow the screen to scroll. It’s virtually impossible to get lost, as there is a map overlay you can call up at anytime that shows you the entire level. Some sections are locked off and require a button press or some other remote activation of a door to continue. There are plenty of clues to keep you from getting stuck. The first locked door pops up the clue that the trigger is between a pair of giant statues, but chances are you’ve already found those statues earlier in the level and opened the door without even knowing it.
The monsters range from creative to downright silly. There are a few cheap shots where they will attack you through seemingly solid walls if you get too close, but the good news is that you can attack them through those same walls. A few of the mission critical objects are cleverly concealed behind false walls. These are often noted by a off-color texture or they will flash when hit with an arrow or weapon, but a few of them are totally obscure and you will find yourself walking along every square inch of every wall hitting it and hoping it breaks away.
Gauntlet was traditionally a top-down game that went to a high angular perspective when it finally moved into the world of 3D. BlackStone never settles for a specific camera angle, which keeps things a bit confusing. In one of the early levels you are playing almost from a side-scrolling perspective and have no real depth perception. The passage you must navigate has all these little steam and flame jets that randomly shoot from the floor but you simply are not given the proper view to navigate these traps without taking a lot of sucker damage.
You collect plenty of magic scrolls that offer some of the best visual effects and stunning attacks in the game. You’ll also collect plenty of gold and other items that you can use and you get to go shopping between levels to buy health items and level-up your character to increase their maximum health, etc.
I must make mention of one of my favorite elements in the game and perhaps the only original concept I came across. You will come upon a power-up that temporarily puts you on the back of a giant lizard that can stomp around crashing through things and biting the bad guys. This is great fun and gives the rest of your party a chance to rest while you rampage the level. Unfortunately, the ride only lasts about a minute.
BlackStone is very dark, and in some places you are either going to have to be playing this game in a pitch-black room or crank up the brightness on your TV. While this darkness does a great job of contrasting all the amazing special effects and real-time lighting, most of the time is just hampers your ability to play the game.
The opening movie kicks ass and really had me pumped to play the game. The static images behind the scrolling story are simply okay. Character design is really nice as far as the portrait images, but you never get to appreciate the 3D characters that are running around the level. They are either too small or obscured with all the combat effects going on.
The mission select map looks very nice and the shopping screen is laid out with nice big icons and the cost of each item. The overall interface works quite well.
The music in BlackStone is one of its best features. It changes with each level and seems to fit the theme of the graphics. There is a Persian theme going on in the initial level and then you get all sorts of woodwind instruments when you go into the forest level. As good as the music is in many of the levels there were a few where the music was so annoying and repetitive that I was racing to the end of the level just to end the torture. I think it was level three where they had the same 3-4 bars repeating over and over with maybe an octave change. I felt like Captain Picard listening to the Red Alert klaxon for 15 minutes and finally saying, “Somebody turn that damn thing off.”
Sound effects are pretty good and range from the metallic clash of weapons to the zing of arrows and all the supernatural effects that go along with the spectacular array of magical attacks. The spells sound as good as they look and really steal the show.
Your value and your enjoyment are going to vary depending on if you are playing this game alone or with one or more friends. Tackling BlackStone alone is an exercise in futility. I tried on three separate occasions to finish this title by myself and died horribly quick deaths, even as the Archer. You simply reach a point where you must have at least one other person along for the ride to be remotely competitive against the endless hordes of monsters this game is capable of delivering.
With a party of two or more you can make your way through all 26 levels in about 15-20 hours depending on how well you can organize and work as a team. Teaming up against monsters and their generators and sharing the contents of chests is critical to successful gameplay.
I really wanted to like this game more than I did, but when you are going up against previously established franchises like Gauntlet and even Hunter: The Reckoning, you need to have that extra edge to put you over the top and BlackStone: Magic & Steel just doesn’t have it.
It’s not a bad game, but it could have been so much more, and that is why I am perhaps being so overly critical. BlackStone certainly has a place in a particular niche market, mainly the niche of simultaneous four-player games that don’t split your screen. And once you tire of those other four-player games you will definitely want to take this one for a spin. There’s just enough cool stuff mixed into this game to make it worth a look, at least as a rental.