Dark Messiah v. Severence; Blade of Darkness

[Muzman]

Apologies if this has been brought up before.

I've been reading a bit about DM and it sounds like a blast, but I can't try the demo right now (no graphics card). Severence is the melee combat high benchmark for me. You can blast into crowd of orcs and create your very own Frank Frazetta scene of blood and limbs flying, then get stuck desperately fencing with some very good opponent for an hour all in truly massive castle levels.
DM sounds similar; dodgy story, slightly linear, the biffo will amuse you for hours. I'm aware DM is first person and more of an RPG, I was just wondering if any Severence lovers want to compare them for me.

cheers

[driver]

The combat in DM is more brutal and in-your-face (As you'd expect with a first person view), quite different to the combo-pulling style of Severence. As you pointed out, in Severence you could be dueling with one tough foe for a while, but most of the fights in DM are short and to the point. Either a swift flurry of blows and a sharp boot to the face or a couple of measured heavy hits finished with an adrenaline attack, then you're off to your next foe.

There are a couple of 'boss' fights that take a bit more work than the average grunt, but mostly it's about getting in there and getting the job done, rather than showy special moves and fancy footwork.

Plus the melee combat is only one side of it, should you choose to play as a mage or an assassin, you'll play a very different type of game that's not comparable to Severence.

[Fafhrd]

Severance is definitely more visceral than DM, as severed limbs and blood geysers are the norm, instead of the exception as in DM. I'm also a sucker for a good in depth combat system, so Severance still wins on account of the combo system. Dark Messiah is close, but the combat system is a little too much like Jedi Knight, (strafe left and attack to slash left, strafe right and attack to slash right, forward for overhead, backward for thrust) up until you unlock the two combos.

Severance wins for the ability to pick up limbs and use them as weapons.

[driver]

Severance wins for the ability to pick up limbs and use them as weapons.

Aye, but in DM you can use Telekenisis to pick up whole enemies (Still alive and kicking) and fire them into the sunset or use them as bowling balls. Comedy value there.

[Darkelf]

Yeah Severance is a great game combat-wise and is slower paced than DM but the fighting can be very addictive in both games. Too bad the devlopers went out of business after that, because I'm still hoping for a sequel of some sort, oh wait, the sequel's already here, it's Dark Messiah... No seriously they're both similar yet very different games. When Severance came out I had a hell of a time to get accustomed with the controls and it was an insanely hard game. Now I can practically breeze through it. In 5 years time I will be able to do the same with DM and have fun at the same time. Now my PC lagging behind and the not-so-easy to use weaponry is giving me a hard time.

Severance is also one of my most re-played games ever (about 5 times now I think).

[Hemebond]

Yeah Severance ... Too bad the devlopers went out of business

I dunno. I just installed it and I think it's shit. Movement is cumbersome and awkward. Graphics are fugly. Movies don't play. Animation is rubbish. Physics are crap.

Uninstalling...

[Muzman]

I would accept that the controls are a little tough to come to grips with (but that's partly because the combat is so complex) But...

Graphics are fugly..... Animation is rubbish. Physics are crap.

...you have no taste.

[BEAR]

Severance wins for the ability to pick up limbs and use them as weapons.

Rune baby

You could also hurl them at people, in arena maps you could kill someone, pick up their arm/head and use it to beat them to death next time they spawn, although it was a poor weapon and I usually just threw it as a challange.

[Hemebond]

I would accept that the controls are a little tough to come to grips with (but that's partly because the combat is so complex)

Rubbish. There are plenty of ways to make the controls not suck and still have keep the same combat system. It's also ridiculously unresponsive to mouse input.

...you have no taste.

Taste? WTF has it got to do with taste? I have no problem with the style they've gone for, but others have done it better. The models are poor and the animation is awful. Watching that dwarf jump is just painful. Nothing to do with "taste".

[Muzman]

I've never had any trouble with its mouse input. The only thing I think is missing are some strafe keys, but if you are making a proper sword fighting game the ability to circle your opponent is realistic, useful and difficult to impliment without that 'locking on' business. The option to choose strafe keys would have been nice though.

Anyway, yes you have no taste. The models are solidly put together and high poly for their day, the animations are smooth and seamless between cycles (difficult for motion captured stuff even now). Not liking how the dwarf jumps is a matter of taste.

[driver]

To be fair, the physics were incredibly iffy. Running down a steep slope causes your character to drift into the air every other stride. Smashed crates had fragments that would spin about on end for several minutes, pirouetting like ballet dancers, not to mention jumping as a whole looked thoroughly bizarre, especially if you missed your target ledge.

It was a fun game, but the physics engine they used in order to have severed limbs soar though the air in amusing arcs was far from stable.

[LancerChronics]

Severed heads, leg shaped clubs...where the hell can I find this game? I assume it must be difficult to obtain nowadays. I think I want to find rune too now, i played the demo once looong ago and loved it. Of course, it would be a bitch getting both to run on my laptop with xp i think.

And though I have no clue what you are talking about, in all fairness, how do you think it would look if u missed a ledge and were falling to your imminent death? I would think all spinny, hazy, and bizarre. Probably would make the game's jumping look perfect in comparison. Of course, this is just argument for argument's sake, cause I'm bored.

[driver]

I imagine if you fell off a ledge you'd plummet straight down, as opposed to float sideways/backwards for a moment before the whole plummet and arm-flailing business.

[Muzman]

Yeah the physics were a bit quirky. (I think spinning weapons and box pieces were actually intentional, as it looks pretty cool. Other things...not so cool)
Really though there's not a 3d action game from back then, using an over-arching physics system (I think its an early version of Mathengine) that didn't have physics quirks up the wazoo. In those days "physics" was something that only happened when you got hit by a rocket or got on a jump pad. It's taken a long time for games to get good at properly implimenting third party global physics systems (and they're still not that great at it really).
But point taken.

[Random]

The technology behind Severance, like real time physics and dynamic lighting, was way ahead of its time.

[fetgalningen]

Ahh Severance... one of my favourite games back in the days.

[MadMartigan]

I prefer DoMM. it has becamed my new benchmark for those kind of games. first of all..there is actualy decent story there, nothing exceptional, but it's told really well and writing is nice( I absolutely love Xana's comments). The game also offers more than just one duel after another, the levels are more varied(with some cool scripted sequences), the stealth is fun, there's great magic system and puzzles are better, apear more often and they are simply fun. After a while Severance did get repetive.
Now....the combat itself. DoMM basic combat is a little bit simplier(no combos), on the other hand it;s much more dynamic..the lock-on system in Blade of Darkness removed most evioremental interaction, it felt more like a fighting game on closed arena than fight in real setting. Domm combat feels just more freeform. Addition of kick and all those nifty spikes/other envioremental traps only helps.
Plus DoMM has fun MP(it could have been much better, but still), the one in Bod preety much sucked.
Now..don't get me wrong...I absolutely adored BoD, it's just that to me DoMM just blew it away