Hellgate: London (Windows)

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Description

It's the year 2038 and London lies in ruins. The nearby Hellgate has turned the sky gray and it's presence dominates the horizon. The Invasion eradicated the powerful nations of man and the decades-long process called The Burn has begun which alters and assimilates our world to make it feel more like home for the demons that now roam the streets of the destroyed city. The last surviving members of mankind are hiding in the shadows deep down in the former train stations of the city and do what they can to fight back and perhaps even stop the madness.

The game is an Action-RPG very similar to Diablo II. At the beginning you choose one of the three available factions called "The Templar", "The Cabalists" and "The Hunters". Each faction also features two different classes. For example the Templar use swords and fight face to face with the demon hordes but you can choose if you want to be a Templar Guardian or a Templar Blademaster. While the Guardian is more of a tank which uses his sword and shield to go deep into the crowd and increases his effectiveness when he's surrounded by demons, the Blademaster wields two swords at once and tries to kill his enemies as fast as possible.

The choice of your character also changes the way you will play the game. While it is better for a melee-character to see his surroundings and so playing from a 3rd-person view, the classes that use guns are better off in the 1st-person view because they need to aim right at an enemy to really hit him. Of course you can change the view at any given time.

What remains the same for all the characters is the core gameplay. You kill monsters, fulfill quests to level up your character and get the precious talent points you then invest in your attributes and the big skill tree to unlock new abilities or make you stronger. On your way you'll also find many items like armor or weapons. Although most of the stuff is limited to specific class, you can always dismantle an item in the hope of getting crafting material out of it. If you have enough material you then can upgrade your gear at the train stations.

Although Hellgate: London has a single player-component, the main focus of the game lies on the multiplayer-mode which comes in two flavors: free of costs and a monthly subscription-based premium access. The premium model grants you access to additional content and other benefits like an additional Hardcore Mode (when the character dies, the character stays dead forever) or more inventory storage space. But both player types are on the same servers and can play together.

Screenshots

Promo Images

Part of the Following Groups

• Diablo variants
• EA Classics releases
• Games made into books
• Games made into comics
• Hellgate: London series
• Physics Engine: Havok
• Setting: City - London
• Technology: amBX

User Reviews

The servers are dead, but the single-player lives on	BurningStickMan (18028)
Tedious and Disappointing.	Scott Monster (1009)

Critic Reviews

Power Unlimited	2007	91 out of 100	91
Gameplay (Benelux)	Oct 25, 2007	82 out of 100	82
Jolt (UK)	Nov 12, 2007	8.1 out of 10	81
GameStar (Germany)	Dec, 2007	80 out of 100	80
Vgames	Dec 06, 2007	70 out of 100	70
Eurogamer.net (UK)	Nov 02, 2007	7 out of 10	70
Video Games Daily	Dec 10, 2007	7 out of 10	70
Gamesmania.de	Dec 10, 2007	68 out of 100	68
Boomtown	Nov 19, 2007	6 out of 10	60
Legendra	Jul 20, 2009		60

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Trivia

Asia

In Asia the game had a rocky launch. After several weeks of server crashing issues, a server patch was created to deal with it once and for all. Unfortunately, it could not be rolled out on the servers without a complete character wipe. All players lost their characters and had to start over, but in exchange they received four weeks of free subscription.

German version

In-game blood effects and cut off limbs were removed in the German version.

References to the game

Hellgate: London was parodied in an episode of "Die Redaktion" (The Editorial Team), a monthly comedy video produced by the German gaming magazine GameStar. It was published on the DVD of issue 03/2008.

Shutdown and resurrection

In October 2008 Namco Bandai announced to close down the servers on 31st January 2009, ending the multiplayer mode permanently. In the meantime, it could be played free of charge.

On Dec. 9th, 2009, Hanbitsoft Inc re-released in Korea as Hellgate: Resurrection. This new version uses a free-to-play business model.

Information also contributed by Trucidar