Overlord from Codemasters
 

http://xbox360.ign.com/objects/825/825967.html


Alright, so I was checking out Penny-Arcade since I hadn't been there a while and one of the adverts had this game on there. I decided to go ahead and visit the website, since I was bored and really, it seemed like a pretty intersting game.

The game feels an awful like Fable in the beginning, at least the demo proved that much. While it took a bit getting used to controlling movement and camera angles (basically you use your mouse to look around, and whenever you walk foward you walk in the direction the mouse is facing) it wasn't all that hard to get used to it.

Now to the bread and butter. Your minions are the stars of the show in this game, and while, of course, your attacks are more powerful (using spacebar to attack, E to fire on the computer) your minions do a good job overwhelming the enemy.

I suck at describing a demo, so all I can say is for the half hour of it that I played, it was pretty fun, and when it all comes together it looks like it'll be a decent strategy/action game. Plus, you get to take a mistress, so that should perk a few people's attention.

I didn't buy the whole being evil schtick. In the demo, you can't get into the city right off the crack, so you gotta go kill "evil halflings". Wouldn't a truely evil person jsut send their minions over the city walls to kill who's inside and lower the gate for you? Felt kinda forced, if you ask me.

Also I don't dig the whole "We don't feel like writing anything more than the most basic of pathfinding routines for your minions, do the work yourself" bit. Unless there's a point to controlling them manually like that in the full game, it felt like nothing more than a cheap cop out in the demo.