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View Full Version : ENCLAVE: Impressions from e3



XboxGamers
05-29-2002, 02:12 PM
Can't wait till July!! ETA: 7/30/02 Got all this info for a member that went to E3 and played the game. Heres the post.

http://forums.teamxbox.com/showthre...&threadid=95250

[quote]Simply, Enclave rocked at e3! I played a version which was pretty much done. The only characters I tried were the knight and huntress, both coming from the light side. Being the archer and running around taking people out with my bow and crossbow was so much fun; I could never relax because there were enemies hunting me down from all corners.

It is cool being the archer, because there is a delay when shooting because you got to load up and also you can load I believe up to 8 arrows at once, which is a very neat ability. Anyway, one of the best looking things in this game is when you witness your character in heavy armor; I wish I had a digital camera for this!

This brings me to my next point, before you play the level you have like a character customize screen. You pick which character you want to play with and what you want to bring along. For example, with the archer I brought along a poisionious dagger, sniper bow, and fire crossbow, but this is because I had thousands of gold. You also choose which armor you want, and this all relates to the amount of gold you have picked up. Each level you pick up this gold and spend it for the next level.

It is cool because all the levels have a gold counter, so you know which levels you need to go back through. And the lists to go through are so long. There are over 70 weapons (staffs, hammers, axes, swords, crossbows, bows, daggers, etc.) in this game! Should I talk about the weapons? Sure! The sniper bow was one of my favorites. You can zoom in once pretty good and a second time which can spot enemy up close from a FAR AWAY.

There is just a dot but what is truly neat is when you point it at an enemy and it turns red. Say I point it at his head, on the screen it will say head so I know if I nail him there, I'll get a head shot. So goes for the chest, legs, and so forth. One time I zoomed in all the way and there was an ogre running at me with heavy armor on.

I quickly aimed up high because I knew he could hack me down up close, shot at his head and he proceeded to fall down on his kneews with an arrow sticking through his head. Pretty neat eh? BTW, this game is not only in TPV. You can switch to FPV anytime, which ain't bad especially since you don't got your weapon filling up half the screen.

I like TPV the most though. Let's see, framerate was probably over 30 since the game never lagged once. There are 27 levels in this game, and all are split up into many sub-categories just like in Halo. When you hit a character, a number will pop up which indicates how hard the blow was received to the enemy. And no, it does not distract you from the feel of the game.

The only negative things I can think of were some bodies disappear and the blood doesn't look good at all, but trust me, it is all good! Last thing I want to tell you is I found out there will be secret characters in this game. I don't think I can tell you how many, but let me say it is a pretty good number.

If you want, I can spend some more time talking about the combat, like with the warrior. You can take a shield (and of course there are about 10) or not. If you don't you can take better armor and/or better crossbow with either fire, bomb, or poision arrows. Oh yes, I hate the bad wizards. They summoned 2 skeleton warriors to fight me, which were quick and took forever to take down. I am really good with the warrior and those 2 killed me on the first try, I couldn't believe it! I usually killed the rest of the guys, but then again I didn't play high leveled guys. I'll just tell you this, I witnessed a dev picking a warrior with the best armor and shield. He played probably one of the last levels in the game which is that hellish looking level. At the beginning ran 2 guys, 1 big ass Ogre warrior and an assasin right behind. He could take out the Ogre but it took awhile and took a lot of his health down. Once this happened though the Assasin would take him down in a sec with her 8 arrows, lol. He must of tried this like 5 times until he could kill both of them. Let's just say you'll need a shield and must be quick at using it.

XboxGamers
05-29-2002, 02:12 PM
Overall, it received a good showing by many media people. SBZ told me they are thinking about a sequel, but it is really up to how many copies of the Enclave they sell, which should be coming out late June/early July. Marketing has not yet begun for this game, but since Vivendi (sp?) acquried the rights to publish Enclave, they will do good job with the marketing aspect for this wonderful game.

Great job SBZ! Oh yes, and all future SBZ games will use Enclave's engine. This is very good, especially with a smaller (12) size team. So if they do make an Enclave 2, it will probably be Xbox Live compatible and be a candidate for game of the year.

controls...
I think these were the controls-
Left trigger: Open stuff and use shield
Right trigger: Attack
Left stick: Move
Right stick: Look around
Push left stick: Zoom in
Push right stick: Jump
Y: Drink health reliever
A or B: Switch weapons
X: Use torch
Black button: Switch views

So as you can see, the control system is not bad at all. You don't use the right buttons that much, unless your a freak at switching weapons like myself. I got used to it fairly quickly, and if your are a pretty good gamer, you'll become good at the game within an hour. The feeling...well, I was always on my toes. Take the archer for example. One level I had to protect this dude and I did not know I could of taken a dagger with me. Well I played a long way with just my regular bow and it was tough. It isn't easy hitting people that are on the move, because like I said before, there is a few second delay (realistic) when shooting your arrows. It was fun. I didn't play with the warrior as much but I loved just running up to guys, using my shield and going in for the kill. It was a swipe fest! I however did not witness many swipe animations besides the basic side swipes with the sword, but then again I am no master at this game, heh. I believe there are a few ways to attack with a sword, but I would like to hear a confirmation on this from the devs. Anything else?

Anyway, yes, there is a very nice level select screen. It shows the entire map of Enclave like it is a RPG, and there are about 30 dots (places) where you can go to. When you select one, it'll show the few sub-levels that you can play, and also how much gold is on that level and how much you have collected there so far. This will help me a lot when I am trying to unlock...well, you can figure it out.

Going into e3, I wanted to see some mad battles between lots of allies and baddies. Sadly enough, you won't be fighting with multiple allies in this game, but nonetheless it is cool what they have accomplished instead. Mostly you run into allies and they'll be either searching the area or engaging in the battle. One time this warrior was fighting an Orc (usually the humans lose) so I ran and saved him, and he helped me out taking out a few more guys. However, once the battles is done, they'll just stick there and protect the area. So basically most of the time you are on your own. Now about the enemies, I only played 2 levels and most of the time you are fighting up to 2 or 3 guys at once. However, there were 2 occasions which rocked! One when I went outside and they were shooting all these fire arrows at me and sending waves of 1 or 2 guys at me. Another time when I ran out of arrows and did not purchase a dagger (lol), I thought I was home free and I witnessed the biggest ambush ever. It was embarrasing but the devs knew I was good since I got that far without a melee weapon. Basically 8 baddies ambushed me and this fat merchant/warrior dude, and all I could do was run around helpless, heh.

No, I do not think you can two weapons at once. But you never know with SBZ.

About jumping, yeah, it sounds a bit painful but it ain't. You don't jump that much, I mean come on, you are a freaking warrior (or archer, or mage, or...). Anyway, the only times I remember jumping was trying to get out of the way from the walls, which loved to crumble on top of me!

Lastly, about the graphics. DO NOT WORRY, the game has NOT been downgraded and STILL looks GOOD as it ALWAYS has. Yes, there is dynamic lighting/shadowing and bumpmapping every so often to make the game look smooth, especially with the characters armor (since you barely see your guy with full armor) and on the walls. It is not just the graphics that make this game look, it is the art. When you see some of the better bows, crossbows, and armor, you'll know what I mean. When I first saw some of these weapons, I thought they were an anti-armor rocket launcher, lol! Don't get me started on the armor now, lol! You've all seen the warrior in full armor (helmet with the horns), just wait till you see the Huntress and the 10+ other characters! Also the animations are very smooth and life-like. I really like how these guys run, especially the assasins.

I did not see this survival mode but the devs said it plays a bit like deathmatch, with waves and waves of enemy sent at you. Probably will get tougher the longer you stay alive. Also there will be siege based weapons as well, which will undoubtely be fun.

And yes, this game will have a TON of replay value. There are 12 DISTINCT chararacters along with a few BADASS secret characters. There are 27 levels, each can be played from the perspective of the light and dark (so basically 54 LONG missions, times 2-3 per mission, equals close to 150 level sections). And despite what people say, playing a warrior is MUCH DIFFERENT than playing say an archer. They are plainly two different types of characters. The archer can take a dagger, but when surrounded by a few guys, she must use her badass sniping and magic (fire, posion, bomb) arrows to take them down. When I was the archer, I was constantly running around to try and get a good angle on the enemy, and it is tough to do! On the other hand, if you are a warrior the assasins will probably own your ass constantly because they can see you from afar and you can't. Fighting Ogres and Orcs though up close is one of the most satisfying experiences with the warrior, besides drinking that booze (you'll know what I mean when you get the game, heh). Now I didn't play with the mage, but if you are a Lich, you can summon up skeletons and other undead units. Now how cool is that??? Also looking at that new movie, the good mage looks like a pimp when fighting those evil dudes. He rulez with that staff. The devs told me there around 10 staffs alone too!

What is cool is you determine before a level starts what you want to take. So if you are feeling like a master, try being the archer and not taking the dagger along, which is what I did once without knowing it. You'll be in all kinds of challenges. It all depends how much gold you can take but you can have 3 types of weapons with probably bad armor or focus with one and good armor. Plus with over 70 weapons, I think you'll be playing with each guy alone more than once.

I believe the game looked just as good as all the newer shots of Enclave that were released these past few months.

I asked one the devs about the PS2 version, and all he did was laugh. Take that in any way you want to, but I'll be getting the Xbox version and so should you, especially after I saw what happened to the graphics with Wreckless on the PS2, ouch! I have no idea about the GC version, but it probably won't happen...for now at least.[/quote]

SWEETNESS!! :D

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