For years, Diablo reigned as the premiere point and click RPG for PCs. Featuring the right balance of action and storytelling, the title from Blizzard managed to deliver a great game that withstood numerous challenges to its crown from other titles. However, for all of its merits, Diablo was way too restrictive with its characters, restricting them to blatant stereotypes: magicians sucked at hand to hand combat, while warriors were a joke at using spells of any kind. Thankfully, Chris Taylor’s Dungeon Siege revolutionized the genre with a more user-defined character experience, a vast world to explore and a party of intelligent warriors under your control. Gas Powered Games’ follow-up, Dungeon Siege: Legends of Aranna, looks to continue the innovative gameplay with new features for Role-Playing fans. Much more than a simple expansion pack that provides basic tweaks or retreads over previously explored territory, Legends of Aranna acts as a total overhaul to the game with a new storyline outside of the kingdom of Ehb. The story of Legends revolves around the Utraeans, an ancient race whose magical tinkering has resulted in the creation of countless forms of magic. Unfortunately, it also resulted in the destruction of their civilization by their own monstrous creations rebelling against their control. This devastation has also allowed a primordial evil, the Shadow Jumper, to return to the land and start causing massive destruction. The only thing that can stop them is you, but this time, you’re no mere farmer. You’re the offspring of two famous heroes who’s predestined to take arms against a sea of troubles, and by opposing, end them… (sorry, fell into a little Shakespeare there. Ahem…) Unlike typical RPGs with a few rare powerful items, Legends of Aranna introduces item sets, magical pieces of equipment that, when combined, provide significant stat bonuses to any character. Since this gear is often scattered throughout the land (presumably to prevent it from falling into the wrong hands), characters will have to lug the parts of each set with them wherever they go. In other RPGs, this would take up tons of inventory space, but Legends of Aranna has two different ways to solve this problem. The first is with the inclusion of backpacks, allowing every character the option to store excess items in an additional container. The other way is with pack animals, like the packmules from the first Dungeon Siege. The newest addition to the pack animal class are traggs, fierce creatures that are willing to assault any monster close to the party. Parties also get much easier to control and manipulate within Legends of Aranna, thanks to new commands that eliminate the need for micromanagement. For instance, players can now create control groups to handle different situations. Need to take out enemies from a distance? Switch control to your long-range slots and pepper your targets with projectiles. Control groups also come in handy for spellcasters, since you can choose up to 10 of your favorite spells and switch between them on the fly in combat. Of course, anyone who’s played the first game knows that magicians fly through mana. Fortunately, there is the option to redistribute potions to party members who need them the most. This means that fighters and other melee combatants will get more health potions, while wizards will receive more mana potions. Also, players have always benefited from the tactical formations present in the game, but along with localized attack moves, players now can make their parties search and destroy enemies or objects as they enter an area. It might seem like a slight to say that there haven’t been any overt improvements to the graphical engine, but if you consider the Dungeon Siege engine itself, you’ll notice how striking the game is. Smoothly animated characters, beautiful particle effects along with massive background scenery that doesn’t ever feature a loading screen gives Legends of Aranna a huge advantage over flashier, more graphically intensive titles. Add to this the fact that newcomers to the series will actually receive the first Dungeon Siege title, and you’ve got an impressive expansion pack that should fly off shelves when it appears today. Check back soon for a full review! Questions or comments about the upcoming release of Dungeon Siege: Legends of Aranna? Talk to us! [ E-Mail Jeff 'Linkphreak' Haynes ] [ Comment in our Forums ]

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