I’ve taken my time with the Demigod review.  I wanted to make sure that the game I enjoyed playing, the game underneath all of the issues that plagued its launch, got a fair shake.

The issues were bad enough for the Stardock CEO Brad Wardell to post a blog called “Demigod: So what the hell happened?” a couple of weeks back.

I feel it’s had enough time though, and that playing the game now and offering my review gives an accurate view of what the game is like now that Stardock and Gas Powered Games have had a chance to get things under control.

Demigod is a unique kind of game because it combines various RPG and RTS elements to make something that’s pretty unique in the game space (at this point).  If you’re familiar with WarCraft III’s Defense of the Ancients (or DOTA) then you’re going to be at an advantage in terms of how the game is played.

There can be a multitude of objectives depending on the game-type you choose, but essentially it boils down to your units defeating the enemy.  There are flags on every map that give bonuses to the team that controls them.  If you capture the flag next to the gold mine and portal, that means your team will get more reinforcements and your cash flow will increase allowing you to buy better upgrades.

Other flags will give your team experience boosts or strengthen the hit points and damage of your reinforcements.  There’s also a nice flag that reduces the cooldown time for your Demigod abilities.

Demigod’s strength is in its Demigods

There are eight Demigods to choose from.  The most recognizable would have to be Rook (the huge walking castle which is the game’s essential title character).  One for suggestions, Rook was also the first character I played as when I jumped in the game.

The way I play Rook could be very different from the way other people play it, as there are different ways to level up your character.  (A web-based talent tree can be found here.)

I wanted to slam the Rook’s hammer, so for me I upgraded “Hammer Slam” as often as possible, which was every third level.   It proved to be a pretty potent weapon that did nice area of effect damage.

The Rook can also upgrade its team’s defenses by constructing towers on the map to guard key choke points.  Additionally, you can upgrade Rook to be a walking tower, which puts archers, a tower and a trebuchet in its arsenal.  If that’s not enough, Rook can heal itself by draining surrounding towers of their hit points to give the walking monstrosity some staying power.

Regulus is one of my favorite Demigods.  He’s the one I logged the most time on, and played with different styles.  My favorite ability on Regulus is Snipe.  A massive range lets you snipe from quite a distance away, and if you start casting while your target is running or teleporting away your shot will still land. (I kind of thought this was overpowered when post-teleport I found myself dead from someone else’s snipe, but there are similar abilities on other units that act the same way.)

Another favorite ability of Regulus for me was Angelic Fury.  Essentially it adds bonus damage to every shot at the cost of mana, and Regulus sports a cool pair of wings that let him loft above the action.  (Though he cannot truly fly, and thus skip walking around a corner).

Regulus’ arsenal is complimented by a talent that increases range and another that slows his enemies movement speed.  Additionally, you can lay mines as traps that explode for a nice chunk of damage and slow targets movement speed.  You can also rig Regulus’s attack with a tracking bolt, to give you the location of enemy Demigods wherever they are.  There’s also a Mark of the Betrayer attack that will explode for damage when the targeted Demigod performs an ability.

Rook and Regulus are examples of the “Assassin” Demigods, there’s also a set of “Generals.”  In that group, the most eye-catching would probably be the scantily-clad Queen of Thorns.  The Queen’s history says she was one of the fairies of the forest, but she’s no Tinker Bell.  The Queen can summon Shamblers to defend herself, and in turn can also destroy Shamblers to both heal herself and damage enemies.  There are also some more offensive weapons at her disposal which you can check out at the skill list page.

In the same group of generals is Oak.  Oak has a knack for bringing the dead back to life.  Oak can also shield his allies from damage, and a more powerful version of the shield actually heals them.

But don’t worry damage-dealers, Oak’s not all defense.  He can also cast Penitence on enemies, which not only damages them, but also slows them down and makes them susceptible to more damage.

Demigod’s strength is in its Demigods.  The Diversity of Demigods at level 20 (the level cap) can be pretty substantial because of the large number of talents you can spread points out to.  For instance, you could run into an Unclean Beast who is a ferocious melee fighter who has Foul Grasp (a stun that also damages).  But another player who chooses the Unclean Beast may choose to focus on leveling up Unrelenting Wrath (a 10 second buff that increases attack speed by as much as 65%).

This Is Your Battleground

The maps in Demigod provide good variety for their limited number.  (There are only 8, but more releases are planned).

Leviathan, the map to the right, is a round map with flags scattered over it.  As said before, controlling flags is important for controlling the battle.  Each map also has a unique defensive layout to start the game.  An equal number of forts, towers, unit spawn points and healing stones will be positioned around the map.

The healing stones are important for your Demigod, because if you’re interested in not dying in the battle it may be of interest to run away to live and fight another time.

The towers’ and forts’ range is limited though, providing ranged units an opportunity to snipe away from a distance, whittling away the hit points.  Regulus, my hero of choice, was particularly adept at this and would be able to take several towers down if I wasn’t rebuffed by an enemy.

All of the maps are symmetrical so neither team is put at a disadvantage because of their starting location.  Crucible, the map to the right, takes the player away from the central battle location from the spawn before pushing you right into it.  It’s also one of the more popular maps in the Pantheon.

You can see a full listing of the maps and a tally of the number of games played on Demigod’s site here.

The most popular maps are generally smaller in size.  The larger maps, Mandala and The Brothers have less than 10,000 games played each.  I would presume this is because it’s harder to field a game with 10 players, and there have been connection issues getting people into a game.

Like most every other game I’ve played, I don’t tend to jump around from map to map.  I settle into my favorites and try to become an expert at those.  In the single-player game you can choose the specific number of opponents you want to face, including outnumbering yourself in battle (which if you’re in the mood for a comp stomp isn’t all that bad if you set the difficulty to easy).

Do Me A Favor

Demigod incorporates an MMO-type element to the game play in with “Favor Points.”  You earn favor by being awesome in battle.  The better you do, the more favor you gain.

I actually really like the system because it gives you the option to either save up for some truly spectacular items and forgo weaker items.

I started out with the “Charm of Life” because it was cheap and seemed to offer some nice benefits.   The fact that I didn’t have to re-buy it every time was also a nice factor.  After that though, I didn’t go after other items along the way, but instead saved up honor points for an “Amulet of Transportation” that allowed me to quickly jump to allied buildings (which include captured flags) after a four second cast.

Other players may have preferred to spend as soon as they were able to, and that’s an option but I chose against it.  The persistence of the items is a great feature though, and one that keeps people playing the same way that MMO item-grinding keeps people playing.

It’s Dangerous To Go Alone… Take This

In the non-persistent realm are two different types of items.   There are the items that you can purchase from your main base,  the Citadel.  You can also purchase items from an Artifact Shop, which on some maps is capturable and other maps is not.

The Artifact Shop sells much more powerful items, but with that power comes a hefty price tag.  For instance, the first item I buy is usually a +mana helmet that costs in the range of 3,000 gold.  But my favorite item at the Artifact Shop rings in at 25,000 gold.

You get room for 5 items and 3 consumables in your inventory, maybe this is my lack of experience speaking, but I always focused on getting items instead of consumables.

So how do you keep yourself flush?  You earn gold throughout the course of the game.  The amount you earn is based on upgrades to your citadel, the number of gold mines you control (which are capturable with flags) and finally the number of heroes you kill.

Then There’s The Pantheon

The defining aspect of Demigod’s multiplayer action is The Pantheon.

The Pantheon is the grand arena with thousands of players ranked nicely in the ladder system.  On the Demigod site, there is a plethora of information breaking down almost any stat that you want to read about.

You can sort players by rank, experience, favor points, playtime, wins and losses.  Alternatively, you can just search for the player (I’ve managed to get half up the rankings in my limited Pantheon play time).

The Pantheon site also shares stats on Demigods.  As you can see, Regulus isn’t just my favorite, he’s the Demigod of choice for the masses (narrowly edging Unclean Beast for the top spot).

The amount of information on the site is pretty impressive, and in scale is comparable to World of Warcraft’s Armory. Granted the WoW Armory tracks millions more users with even greater detail.

But There Are Some Issues

Connectivity issues were bad enough with Demigod at one point for Stardock’s CEO Brad Wardell to come out with a public statement.

He provided this analogy to kind of explain what was happening with the online gameplay.

“So in Demigod, on launch day, Alice would host a game. Tom would be connected to Alice by the network library and then that socket would be handed to Demigod.  Then, Alice and Tom would open a new socket to listen for more players to join in.  As a result, a user might end up using a half dozen ports and sockets which some routers didn’t like and it just made things incredibly complex to connect people and put a lot of strain on the servers to manage all those connections.”

That’s one positive thing I can say about the problems that plagued the Demigod launch.  The company actively works to fix what’s broken.  In their defense, the testing of games was probably done on a LAN, and thus they would not have been able to foresee the connection issues that players faced online.   In his post, Wardell talks about delays of information being sent between players that would kill any game.

In my experience, I did have some connectivity issues.  Running the game in a window afforded me the opportunity to start the search for a game and do something else.  At least three times while searching/connecting to the game it crashed.  This was after the first patch Wardell talked about in his post on May 18th.  There was a subsequent patch though and things seem to be getting better.

In a game like Demigod though, this is a make or break issue for a lot of players.  If you’re going to have a matchmaking system it has to be sound.  Connectivity aside, I did not find I was outmatched by other players, as say the matchmaking in the older Warcraft 3 so often displayed (link has some salty Penny-Arcade language & euphemisms).

The Michigan Connection

Demigod also has a Michigan connection.  Stardock is located in Plymouth, Michigan.  (Which is actually just in my backyard, hailing from Canton).

Stardock is also doing a pretty awesome thing.  All of its games are released 100% completely free of any DRM (digital rights management) system.  DRM creates nothing but headaches for paying consumers, and often times can devalue a game if its frustrating enough.  I have to commend Stardock for putting the consumer ahead of the pirate.  It may make games easier to steal on torrent networks, but even games laden with restrictive DRM will still be there.

Additionally, Stardock is also embracing the future of digital distribution.  You can actually save some money by purchasing Demigod on its Impulse service.  And just like Valve, the company I’ve heaped praise on for Steam, you can download the games you own to any computer you own.  This kind of consumer-first thinking is really encouraging to see.

A Game Has To Be Fun

Overall, a game’s value really comes down to whether or not its fun.  In that respect, Demigod delivers.  The units, the maps, the persistent elements all come together to form some very nice gameplay.  It’s a game I’d recommend because I see that they’re working to address any problems that crop up.

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Tags: Demigod, games, Gas Powered Games, Michigan, Not Made Of Wood, Stardock