Harbinger Review

Few can argue that Diablo, and its sequel Diablo II are very good games, with excellent content, and addictive gameplay that keep players coming back for more, years after these games have fallen by the wayside. However, over the years, not many developers have attempted to refurbish the gameplay style of RPG classics like Diablo into anything other than the fantasy realm. Indeed it may seem to many of you that the old point-and-click routine became a mind-numbing nuisance and is hardly worth looking into. From a different point of view, however, it appears that even nowadays there's still room for such a game, even one that has been revamped with some sci-fi flair. Well, DreamCatcher Interactive and Silverback Entertainment thought of an interesting way to avoid the traditional fantasy stories and character classes. Their latest action RPG, Harbinger takes players through a very immersive sci-fi plot, offering an intriguing mish-mash of revenge, as well as a desperate struggle for survival and freedom.

His only thought is to get out of this place alive.

Of course, that's easier said than done!

To those of you who are uniformed, Harbinger is actually a ship, in which the entire game takes place. This mighty vessel is predominantly controlled by a merciless robotic entity called the Overlord, whose huge army of machines ruthlessly governs over the all other races that inhabit the regions of Harbinger. There are two other chief species dwelling within the ship - the Vantir and the Scintilla, which managed to live together in relative peace and harmony for a long time. After a while, every living thing aboard the Harbinger was suddenly faced with an alarming new threat; a bug-like race called the Cimicidae, who now put Harbinger and all of its dwellers in serious jeopardy. You begin your journey right in the middle of this great conflict with a group of outcasts that must survive and at the same time find a safe way out of the ship.

One of the reasons why I became absorbed in the worlds of Harbinger at the very beginning was the imaginative character design and plot structure that was fashioned by the development team. Okay, so it may not be an epic fantasy scene involving dragons, elves, and dwarves, but it's surely more than enough to justify your attention. After all, a good story is something we all miss in games today (or in movies for that matter). Still, don't leap out of your chair just yet. Harbinger has some unbalanced issues that needed to be worked at. But we'll jump to those later.

At the outset, players get to select three different characters that have their own set of skills, weapons, and items. Sadly, this selection process was exceedingly simplified and the whole thing isn't particularly elaborate on attributes and unique abilities, which means you have to judge the characters strictly by their appearance. Although this isn't an actual gameplay drawback, it creates some issues when you wish learn more details concerning the character you're about to play with.

Harbringer has three chief elements that make it similar to the classic, Diablo. Number one: the action-based gameplay, which is basically strolling around isometric levels and rummaging through various caskets and chests while you look for any items that might be of use to your character (although I should also point out that the levels aren't generated randomly like in D1 and D2). Number two: experience and skill advancement is almost identical, expect in Harbinger it was trimmed down to four basic skills (which differ according to your character). And finally, number three: you progress through the game by chatting with NPC's and completing quests in order to get more experience.

Like I've mentioned, each of the three characters has different skills to advance. The Human has melee combat, ranged combat, rigging skill, and life. The Gladiator can also advance in melee and ranged combat, but was also blessed with the override skill. Last but not least, the Culibine (the last of its kind), a very expensive character to maintain; if you play as the Culibine you can improve ranged combat, focus and radial skills (which help the character to improve his competence with unique energy weapons). This sounds all well and good, but somehow when you play, these skills don't seem to help you overcome any real challenge, and so I guess this way the game loses a lot of its RPG charm. Another slightly disappointing RPG aspect is that the player doesn't get to advance any skills that would allow him to use other weapons besides those he uses by default. All in all, it should've been a lot more complex.

This bug is a nasty creature!

I didn't know they had 'Transformers' in this game.

The clashes and fights with enemies suffer from a few hitches that significantly reduce the game's addictiveness. Namely, after strolling through a number of levels, the players will be drawn into a very simplistic combat system, which sort of limits the gameplay to aiming, firing, and slicing at close range. This arrangement soon becomes somewhat tedious, since you get to use very few weapon types. In addition to that, the game doesn't seem that difficult to beat (it all ended really quickly for me - it took less than two days of intense playing to finish Harbinger with the Human character). On the plus side though, I guess it's good that each character has a set of separate quests to complete, which might increase the game's replay value... just a bit anyway.

The AI is not bad. Most of your enemies will usually act in groups, trying to surround you whenever they get a chance. Also, they will flee to seek reinforcements if they're fatally wounded. Generally, your foes appear to have been endowed with solid AI behavior patters, but sometimes that won't be enough to stand against your firepower. The simple fact is you can use the shoot-'em-and-run tactic, making your way to the very end of the game with almost no effort.

The graphics are satisfying for this type of game. The levels are well-designed and the background looks okay and features a solid amount of colors and details. It's commendable that the designing team made an effort to create a completely different GUI for each of the three characters. This move is appreciated and it offers a unique experience when you switch characters and play the game from an entirely new perspective. Also, I rather enjoyed watching various death animations for some of the foes; for example, a particular enemy (I think he was called the Vantir Inquisitor or something like that) will screech, stick his spear in the ground and fall to his death. Nice. Still, for some reason the developers haven't gone all out to create a wider variety of opponents. Usually, you'll encounter a set of two, maybe three types of enemies per world (sometimes they are given a new color and a different name, while the model of the creature stays exactly the same).

The sounds are decent enough, even though I think that some of them could have been considerably richer. A fairly good job was done with the music, which produces a really chilling ambiance - you get to hear eerie tunes that go along with the creepy environments and scary creatures you'll be running into.

Although Harbinger misses some major gameplay elements, like more profound RPG features, a greater longevity, a multiplayer mode, there are certain aspects that make it fun to play - a decent storyline (which I consider to be rarity these days), three individually designed characters, who all have their unique skills and weapons, and an enjoyable atmosphere altogether. Regardless, the game lacks gameplay depth for an action RPG, which means more skills, weapons, and items are needed to grab the attention of the hardcore crowd.