izigame.me

A truly great PS2 era top down Hack and slash

In a world where games like this exist and can still be played with friends via Remote Play Together (that's how I played through the campaign with my bro) there is no good reason to play live-service trash like Diablo etc.
As with the first game, it is a fully 3d, top-down game which just works when you turn it on. (It's sad that the game running as intended without tinkering is something I have to note but that's the state of gaming in current year 2024.)
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3238758462

Classic Dungeons and Dragons story with action RPG gameplay.

As with the earlier game in this series (my review for that is here ) this game is basically the same as Champions of Norrath in most respects, having been made at about the same time by the same company.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1695830/Baldurs_Gate_Dark_Alliance/
To be honest, I was disappointed when I found out that Baldur's Gate 3 was a sequel to the old CRPGs rather than to this game. I understand why people like those games but I think that a straightforward hack and slash like this is just plain fun and the story, gear, customization etc. still has enough RPG to give me that D & D feeling.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3238220094
This game was actually so good that I even toyed with the idea of buying the new Dark Alliance game (despite the reviews) simply because I want more like this one.
On a related note, I really hope that this company can bring Champions of Norrath to Steam in the same way that they brought this.

Plays well with a controller

My introduction to hack and slash games was via a controller so I always default to that when I play games of this type. Fortunately this game works very well if played this way.

No more running out of arrows!

One of the features I did NOT like about the earlier game in this series is that you use up arrows as ammunition which means that if you have a bow, you will find yourself relaying on melee instead to save money/conserve arrows for the boss. Even if you use the item duplication exploit (see the section below for that) it would be tedious.
Fortunately, in this game as with many other fantasy games, you have infinite arrows so the economic element in choosing arrows vs. melee is no longer a factor. Now its just a question of tactics.

Loot and upgrades

This has a decent RPG character upgrade system. It also has a good loot system... though I can't really say for sure how well the economy is balanced due to the item duplication exploit described below.

Item duplication

One feature of these games which is carried over from the PS2 era originals is that you can save the game, then drop your loot and have a friend pick it up (or do it yourself with two controllers and an alt character) then reload your character with all of the loot you just dropped.
(If you don't have two controllers or a friend to play with, just dropping and then reloading your character does work but sometimes things disappear so it's more reliable to have a friend pick it up and then return it to you.)
Using this method, you can essentially duplicate anything you find as if you had a Star Trek replicator... though this doesn't break the game as you might expect since enemies don't usually drop loot that is too high level and even if you did, you have to be the right level yourself in order to equip high-level items.
Rather than breaking the game, this exploit just basically removes item scarcity and gives you a Star Trek style economy.


Conclusion

If you want an enjoyable top-down hack and slash game set in the D & D world and don't mind PS2 era graphics, you can't do much better than this game.
Here's hoping that Champions of Norrath gets the same treatment.