What it's all
about:
 In Stonekeep you are Drake, a castle
boy who was saved by a magician when Stonekeep was destroyed by the evil Shadowking. You
return ten years later to defeat the Shadowking and raise Stonekeep back up from the
depths of the earth were it has been buried. The Review:
Stonekeep is a typical fantasy single character role playing game in many senses.
While you can find others to join, you play mainly a single character, Drake. I personally
prefer playing multiple characters for this type of game, but if you like just one main
character (similar to the style of Arena: Elder Scrolls) you will enjoy
Stonekeep. You start off with almost nothing and have to work your way up from there.
Stonekeep had some interesting innovations in game play that set it
apart from others. The fighting is nice; you have two hands and can control each
independently with the left and right mouse buttons. For equipping your characters(s),
there is a mirror you activate which shows you an actual reflection of your character(s)
as he/she stands there. Hence, you get not just some generic outline of Drake, but the
real thing with background and all, depending on where he is standing. This brings up
another good point: the characters and monster seem to be scanned in so you are fighting
or controlling "live" looking figures rather than "cartoon" ones.
Despite some of the better features, the game still
had its share of flaws. The spell casting seemed to be cumbersome. Not nearly as bad as it
was in Ultima, but not as natural as Dungeons & Dragons, or Wizardry.
You have no spell casting ability to begin with, and have to locate
"runecasters" which are like guns for casting magic. Once you do that, you also
need to find "runes" which are like the scroll that needed to be inscribed onto
the runecasters. Then you may use magic, but when you do, it drains some mana from the
runecaster. When all the mana is drained, you need to find a new runecaster or recharge
the old one. Yea, seems a bit tedious to me too. Secondly, there was no rest option or
anything like it. If you get hurt, you had better find some healing potions or health
roots fast or you will die off in short order.
--Brent Hegarty |
