Hunted: The Demon's Forge Review
Kid Safe: Low (3.0 / 10) Game Quality: Moderate (6.5 / 10)
Genre: Action/Adventure Role-Playing Game
- As
an Action/Adventure title, players will adventure and fight their way
through the world while also finding alternate means of completing their
tasks including battles, negotiation, and puzzle solving. Likewise, as a
role-playing game, players will are able to create and develop their
own unique character based on the decisions they make.
Internet Requirements: Low
- Hunted:
The Demon's Forge features a low amount of internet requirements that
is exclusively build around "cooperative" gameplay. What this means is
that players are able to connect to each other via the internet in order
to help each other play through the game's story.
with akeen eye and well-taut Bow, and Caddoc, a brutal and vicious barbarian
warrior who lets his sword do the talking. Following a recurring vision that Caddoc
has been experiencing, the two mercenaries set off in search of an answer to his
dreams. Everything comes together when they meet a magical young woman who
leads them on their quest to find a mysterious artifact that will not only help her, but
grant them incredible wealth and power.
Kid Safe: Low (3.0 / 10.0)
- Foul Language: Low
o Hunted:
The Demon's Forge contains a relatively low amount of foul language in
the form of the following words: "d*mn" and "h*ll". These words tend to
occur rather infrequently and can normally be heard in dialogue between
the characters. They are not overly prompted by overt anger or emotion.
- Violence and Gore: Very High
o Hunted:
The Demon's Forge features a high amount of violence and gore. To start
off, players will be controlling two human characters that are
encourage to fight and kill a number of different monstrous and humanoid
beasts that include demons, skeletons, dragons, arachnids and more.
Players will use a variety of weaponry including swords, axes, clubs,
torches, bows, crossbows, ballistae, magical spells, and more. Players
become covered with blood and gore as they fight.
o When
fighting against an enemy, the screen will occasionally shake to denote
a particularly powerful hit. Enemies will, given they have blood,
lightly spray viscera when they are hit by sword or bow attacks. Players
are also able to complete headshots in which the enemy's head will
explode and spray gore in all directions. Likewise, players are able to
perform "special attacks", which focus on particularly brutal ways of
killing an enemy. E'Lara will fire an arrow which the camera follows
until it embeds itself in an enemy's head. Caddoc will viciously knock
down an enemy and embed his weapon in their skull.
o Aside
from what players will see while fighting, the game also features
several scenes of violence and gore in the game's cutscenes and
environments. Players will regularly discover killed or mutilated bodies
lying around. Likewise, they will also find a number of people who have
been strung up as prisoners or who are mourning the loss of a loved
one. On top of this, players will witness the deaths of different
characters including where a man is pushed through a window, attacked by
a monster, and has his heart ripped clean out of his chest before the
monster presents it and then runs away. Other examples include a
civilian who, when trying to escape the creatures, has a sword run
completely through him so that it is visibly sticking out of his chest.
- Sexually-Related Content: Low
o Hunted:
The Demon's Forge features a low amount of sexually-related content
which consists of a number of female characters wearing exceptionally
revealing outfits that show an ample amount of breast cleavage and/or
buttocks.
- Use of Drugs and Alcohol: None
o To the best of the reviewer's knowledge, Hunted: The Demon's Forge does not contain any instance of drug or alcohol usage.
Game Quality: Moderate (6.5 / 10)
- Graphics / Visuals: Moderate
o Hunted:
The Demon's Forge features a really mixed bag when it comes to graphics
and visuals. While it is certainly not bad, it does not have any real
visual strengths. To start off, the game is generally very drab in
appearance and has an relatively dark color hue that contributes little
more than frustration when it comes to trying to navigate a number of
the almost-lightless dungeons that players will be exploring. While the
textures for things like stone and wood the dungeons tend to be decent,
there is nothing that really stands out.
o The
character animations are equally lackluster. Hunted uses a slightly
dated system to design their characters which results in many of the
characters have a very unimpressive appearance. Strange facial
expressions, choppy or distorted body movements, and the problem of some
characters not even being fully animated all detracts from an enjoyably
immersive gameplay experience. Likewise, a lack of overly interesting
enemies as well as the occasional graphical glitch or visual malfunction
further detract from the player experience.
- Audio: Moderate
o Much
like the game's visuals, Hunted: The Demon's Forge features a moderate
level of quality in terms of audio. The game does not boast any
particularly ground-breaking strengths or extreme weaknesses. Starting
with the voice acting, the actors are decent but do little to add any
real weight to the performance. While the occasional back and forth
banter, cracking jokes and making quips, tends to be amusing, the
characters feel rather soulless and the lines of dialogue that are
spoken simply don't provide any emotional weight to be worth anything.
The music is very similar in this aspect. When there IS any music, it is
generally enjoyable and well-done, but the soundtrack for this title is
nearly non-existent and therefore what bonus is could add to the
gameplay just isn't there.
- Gameplay / Playability: High
o Luckily,
Hunted: The Demon's Forge actually features a relatively high level of
gameplay and playability. As always, starting with playability, the game
caters relatively well to both casual and hardcore gamers alike. This
title uses a relatively standard control scheme that many players,
especially those that have played Gears of War, Unreal Tournament, and
Uncharted, will be familiar with. For those that haven't gotten a chance
to sample the controls before, the game slowly and casually introduces
them to the player as they travel through a relatively safe environment.
The player's first introductions into puzzles, combat, and special
events are all done easily and with full instructions.
o The
gameplay is of an equally high quality. Players will not only be able
to explore the fully fleshed out story of E'Lara and Caddoc as they
search for the answer to Caddoc's vision, but they will also be able to
discover and explore a number of completely unrelated dungeons and areas
that will grant them extra powers, magical weapons of incredible
strength, and richest beyond their wildest dreams. Not limiting the
players simply to fighting, they will also be able to solve a number of
puzzles, rescue civilians who have been captured from their plight,
interact with the dead, use siege weapons, and more.
- Dollar-Value: Moderate
o Overall,
Hunted: The Demon's Forge has a moderate dollar-value. While the game
boasts somewhere between 8 to 11 hours of gameplay, there is very little
reason to play through it again. Having only a cooperative mode that
will allow two players to play through the story together, there isn't
any real multiplayer function to fall back on nor is there any way to
influence the story enough that a player will be tempted to play through
it again. This title can be generally enjoyable despite the slightly
lackluster audio and visual quality, but offers little in the way of
replayability.
Recommendations
- First,
if you are looking for a less adult-rated title, we would recommend
Arcana Gothic 4. However, if you are ok with mature-rated content, Elder
Scrolls: Oblivion, Sacred 2, Witcher 2, and Dragon Age 2 would all be
excellent choices.
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