Rant: Overlord

I like Overlord, I really do. Something about the game which combines some of the best parts of Fable and Dungeon Keeper into one big evil shaped pie makes it really, really fun. You see Overlord is an action RPG masquerading as a RTS game, with a big dose of black humour and a small amount of micromanagement. Unfortunately while it’s really fun, lately it’s begun to really piss me off. And this is why…

Picture the scene, I’m about three quarters through the game at present and last night my evil Overlord (Sauren + to his freinds) is merrily slaying his way through a Dwarven Brewery with lots of minions in toe, showing those gold humping bearded types the awesomeness of my power. At least I would be if the ridiculously fiddly nature of the controls and the games habit of hurling your preciously harvested minions into a situation of certain death every five miniutes wasn’t getting to me a little. “Sweep into the room boys” I gleefully cackle and my minions trash yet another keg filled room, getting throughly drunk in the process, before suddenly and without warning getting completely wiped out by some flamethrowing dwarf bastard who happened to be round the corner where the lovely camera couldnt see him. Several explatives leave my mouth and I trek back to start of the place to get some more minions knowing full well if this repeats itself a few more times Im going to have to leave the fricking brewery go back to “newbie zone part A” for the fifthteen millionth time and get some more minion souls for my spawning pits.

This is something that happens only too often in the world of Overlord and frankly when it eventually and invariably results in the death of my armour glad anti-hero I get a wee bit annoyed as the games levels can be lengthy and frustrating at times and if you die in the last room well you have to do the whole thing ALL over again. As one can probably tell by this point in time I’m not that bigger fan of strategy games, nor games where I am expected to play the same bit repeatedly till I get it right. Overlord isn’t the biggest culprit in gaming history to frustrate me but after my entire minion team (along with my actual Overlord) perished trying to nick a big barrel of alcohol last night (based largely around the fact a fat dwarf got stuck on the scenary and was endlessly fuelled with drink rendering him invincible) I was ready to imbed my controller in the TV stamp and claim I had a Wii style grip incident. “Yes Nintendo/Microsoft (delete as appropriate) you must replace my entire entertainment system as I forgot that holding on to a controller is an integral part of the gaming experience”.

It’s not that I can’t stand dying in games even once (O.K I do, but I can kid myself all I like) it’s just that when you die in some cheap ass way due to bugs, crappy controls or the fact that the camera is about as useful as a chocolate kettle. Overlord is responsible for being one of the few games to rile me up lately (along with some achivements on “The Orange Box“) and while the game can be very enjoyable, wickidly amusing and IS actually fun a lot of the time these issues may prevent me from actually finishing the damn game. So if you see Overlord vanish from my now playing list, assume that I have finally snapped and decided that my sanity is of far greater need than kicking some heros asses.

End Of Rant.