* Story: Manually shoved exposition, not very captivating story that seems eerily similar to may others, including Spellforce, bugs in dialogues make the story painful even if it WERE interesting. 250 components? Why? We all play Fire, because by the time I get anything cool I already like the levels I have, plus, Fire has solid damage. Also, the crafting system is nice, but the UI is weird, the walls of text unnecessary, look at Magicka for clues. Eurogamer review has it right: These have all been tried, and abandoned, long ago. And don't get me started on enemies that take control from you, flying and dodging enemies, cheap enemies that spawn behind you, and enemies that spawn other enemies, SO YOU NEVER HAVE CONTROL OVER DIFFICULTY. Dying replenishes your shield, checkpoints don't, so it encourages you to jump off a cliff. Developer responded that checkpoints work fine, you don't lose your loot. There was a discussion on Early Access with someone suggesting that people with 2 year old child simply cannot play long sessions. Put checkpoints before cutscenes at your own peril. Keep me in your game for more than I want at your own peril. There is no point in not letting me save.

Nobody cares if you beat Battlemage, dude. You listen to (or are) 15 year olds (inside) who believe games are challenges. Designs levels so you can see ahead, but have to go around for 20 minutes (not ACTUALLY 20 minutes). Making me painfully slow doesn't make the level bigger. Encourages you to try-and-die, with limited, non-regenerating shield boosts, kills your loot if you die. Encourages you to experiment combinations, makes you lose progress if you switch sigils. * Gameplay: Encourages experimentation, punishes you for the useless combos. I should be able to render a rock at 62+ FPS if I can render 1000 rocks at 50. It is smooth and decent, but I can't help but feel like it wasn't optimized correctly. Inexplicably can only do 62 FPS on a 79 series AMD when facing a wall. * Tech issues: No-vsync has at least SOME tearing, VSync locks to 30. * Gameplay: Encourages So much potential, so much wasted.

Download lichdom battlemage review