Pools of Darkness

The Good
The epic starting with Pool of Radiance, continuing through Curse of the Azure Bonds and Secret of the Silver Blades, finally got a worthy final. The graphics are majorly improved, as are a few other features we all know and love from the gold box games: now your character name is highlighted when he's ready to level, etc. Also, the story is completely non-linear, very intriguing and challenging. Your characters wander around the Moonsea, from Phlan to Zhentil Keep to Myth Drannor and back into other planes to meet and oppose deities (Lloth, Moander, Bane). You get to meet famous NPC's (Elminster from the Forgotten Realms RPG as well as old faces from the previous games), you fight Dragons, Demons and Devils, and you - of course - save the world. Simply awesome.

The Bad
Well, if you like gold box games there's nothing not to like, although many RPG'ers dislike gold box games and prefer the Ultima's, Might & Magic's or Wizardry's. Also, this game sticks very closely to AD&D rules - which, at this high levels, means that non-humans are ridiculously underpowered due to level limitations.

Another thing is that on modern machines combat is much too fast for you to see details. Moslo doesn't help here, interestingly enough, as it only slows down the intro. This is weird because Moslo DOES help out in Pool's predecessor, Secret of the Silver Blades. Anyone else have this problem and/or know why that is? I'd love to replay the game with proper combat speed.

The Bottom Line
If you've enjoyed the whole story arc starting at Pool of Radiance, you'll simply LOVE Pools of Darkness - the best of the lot.

The Good
Like the starter of the series, Pools of Darkness features a non-linear plot that allows for wide latitude in approaching the game. Whereas in Pool of Radiance you operated withing the environs of Phlan, here you campaign around the whole Moonsea region. The plot itself (Bane making an all out attempt to dominate the region) allows for a wild array of creatures to fight - giants, dragons, undead, drow, demons, rakshasha and so forth. The game offers lots of battles and quite a few challenge the best parties.

This game also has the characters journeying to other dimenisions to fight Bane's lieutenants. This can be fun as it offers new terrain, experience, and more bizzare creatures. One of the dimenisons is in fact the body of the fallen god Moandar - and you get to move and fight around his body and in it. This is without doubt one of the freakier gold box games.

The Bad
The above mentioned journeys to other dimensions are in part a poorly desguised attempt at leveling. When you travel to these places, you have to leave all your magical gear behind as the winds of limbo will probably destroy them. This means you land in a new land with nothing but memorized spells for protection. Usually you can find some new gear fairly easily, but in effect your party is underpowered while in the alternate deminsions, but you have to go there to win the game. I do not mind play balance, but this seemed like a last minute thought.

More importantly it exposes a crucial flaw that is common with all the gold box games. The characters seem to be nothing more than platforms for cool magical gear, weapons, and spells. Remove the +3 plate mail and +4 sword from your fighter and he is worthless in combat - no matter how strong! The only other important features seem to be the character's armor class and to hit stat.

Thus your characters have no real personality. Even alignment has no real effect in the game, which I thought was a shame. One of the plot devices of this game is that the various evil leaders you fight do not like each other. They often will offer money to the party to kill a rival, and then try to kill you later no matter what you did. This should have been changed into a possible plotline for an evil party, but you cannot play it out that way. You have to win by killing all four of Bane's lieutenants and their subordinates no matter your alignment.

The Bottom Line
This is good hack-n-slash with some added dimensional travel, but no much else.