Release Date: March 4, 2008

Saga Review

Nearly a month after release, some bugs have been squashed but the design still has flaws to spare.

Two weeks ago, we published a generally unflattering article in which we laid out our first impressions of Saga, a new MMO from Silverlode Interactive. Given the tremendous uphill climb that most MMOs endure during their first few months, we wanted to wait a few weeks before offering up our final review. The team has squashed a few more bugs and improved the overall presentation but, even with these improvements, the fundamental frustrations of the gameplay still kept popping up in the same old places.

While we love to see developers taking chances and pushing the boundaries of what we've come to expect, it feels like the team at Silverlode Interactive just bit off more than they could chew with Saga. The ambitious nature of the project is impossible to deny; the massively multiplayer online real-time strategy collectible card game sounds like it would be appealing to a wide range of gamers, but the truth is that there are just so many moving parts here that even the Sonys and Microsofts of this world would be hesitant to take it all on at once.

Players can choose from a variety of traditional fantasy factions, each of which can lead an army of troops appropriate to their type. Dwarves get axemen, dark elves get sorcerers; you know the routine. After picking a city type (which still seems kind of arbitrary), you'll be plopped down in the world. At your city you can order the construction of new buildings, direct your peasant work force, and recruit armies before heading out to seek your quests. Clicking on a quest in the overland map gives you a bit of story about the quest and then transports your forces to that particular battlefield. You select your starting troops, kick the snot out of whoever's opposing you and then head back to your city to start it all over again.

The quests themselves start out a bit repetitive but things open up a bit later on. The objectives almost always involve capturing something or destroying all the enemy units, but to max out your experience and loot gains, you'll probably want to do both in any case. Most quests can be repeated at higher difficulty levels for greater rewards but you're likely to need the help of other players. Still, there are so many quests here that you can effectively solo through the game with little need to actually interact with others.

Unfortunately, there's not much going on tactically. Your units have a few different formations, but all these amount to are just simple stances that you can switch between depending on whether you're being attacked by melee or ranged units. Any concept of fronts, flanking or maintaining groups of units in their own formation just don't seem to apply here. Worse yet, the formations don't matter at all in terms of impeding a unit's movement, so those nasty beast riders can just walk right through your carefully positioned pikemen and charge right into your archers. Of course, you can take advantage of this as well. There are some missions that ask you to run a gauntlet of enemy forces. Just select your starting forces and click their destination on the other side of the map and you can go make a sandwich.

The enemy usually puts up a good fight but that's due more to numbers and event scripts than actual tactics. Sure, the enemy knows to keep his archers in the rear and his swordsmen up front, but he doesn't know how to gather distant troops together for a massed attack or to send out a sortie when your long-range artillery units are smashing his gates. We've stood outside enemy fortifications and reduced them to rubble before the enemy force, who just happened to be standing on the other side of those gates, ever stirred.

The one thing that we really do like about the tactical side of the game is the way you can create and field your own armies. Rather than just giving you a generic set of units, Saga ties army creation in to the whole collectible card game scheme. Players can buy booster packs that unlock new unit cards that can be used either to recruit new unit types into their own armies, or traded through the in-game marketplace for other cards. Since each faction has unique cards, you'll wind up with some that you have no use for that might nevertheless be very attractive to other players.

And even beyond that, there's a lot of thought and planning that has to go into how you create an army. You'll have to build units of the appropriate size and equip them with the various weapons and armors you've looted during battles. Since the size of a unit limits how many you can field at a time (and how many you can put out as reinforcements throughout the battle) you'll have some careful balancing and number crunching to do. Add in the fact that the units each gain experience and you'll really start to create an army that reflects the way you want to play.

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Game Details

Published by: Silverlode Interactive
Genre: Persistent Online Strategy
Release Date:
United States: March 4, 2008
MSRP: 19.95 USD
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