[REVIEW] Dishonored

Well hai!

Today we will be reviewing Arkane studio’s newest game, Dishonored. Not only was it developed by the fantastic studio that brought us Bioshock 2, it was actually published by Bethesda softworks, which is responsible for such titles you know and love, as Fallout 3, The Elder Scrolls, and … Wet.

“Woah…” was actually the only thing that could escape my lips. What a mighty team up indeed! I still had no idea what the game would even be about. With a name like Dishonored, I assumed some type of military FPS. Probably with an epic story where I had to somehow redeem myself and restore honor to my country. Which would have been… Okaaay, I guess.

Oh boy was I wrong… So very wrong.

If you had told me that Assassin’s Creed 3 and Bioshock got together one night and had a few too many drinks and then somehow had a little love child.. I would have told you to stop playing with my emotions and tell me what really happened.

Well folks… That IS what really happened.

In this FPS, you start out returning to your home land by boat, to a city called Dunwall. It’s a lovely Victorian / steam punk like city that is being swarmed by plague. Sooo at least you have that to look forward to later. Anyways, you find out you are just a crazy awesome body guard for the Empress and her daughter, and that you are known as Corvo. You are returning from a mission where you are seeking aid to help with this pesky disease killing your people off.

You spend a few minutes catching up with random guards and such around the royal garden, and you even get to learn how to duck and stealthily lean around walls! After those shenanigans are done, you go and have a chat with the sultry empress. Pretty good day so far I’d say right?! Wrong. Just as you think you are about to relax from this long journey home from where ever you just were, some assassins appear out of nowhere with all sorts of black magic just to ruin your day. Now, you try and do your job and protect the royal family, but sorry my friend. For being a “legendary” bodyguard, you sure do suck something fierce. Not only do you not protect this fine honey of an empress from dying, you also allow her daughter to get kidnapped.

As I’m sitting here, trying to gather what just happened, some guards and the “Spymaster” for the empress, run up to me and blame this whole murder/ kidnap on me. Whaaattt!!???… and as you guessed.. there is no arguing with this man. So you get thrown in jail.

I guess like, 6 months pass and you are still in jail, and getting tortured. By this time, nobody believes your silly story of teleporting assassins and you realize… you were framed. Yeah, I know. That’ll ruin anyone’s day. So they pretty much tell you that you are going to be executed and there’s nothing you can do about it because they are powerful and you aren’t. Yet.

So back in your cell, you are feeling pretty lame and helpless and someone slides some delicious food into your cell. So you mosey on over and eat the food and BAM! someone has hidden a key in your meal! Sneaky little devil.

And now the fun begins.

Now you get to be stealthy. If you know anything about me, It’s that I’m a huuuge sucker for stealth based games. And chocolate. Anyways, in all of your sneaking about you find a pistol and a sword. Yes… weapons. now of course you are going to run into guards. And sure, you can just run in gun a blazin, or you can be a sneaky S.o.B and take everyone down by either incapacitating them, or just strait up slicing throats.

NOW KEEP IN MIND… this game has a scale. Not so much a good and evil scale.. but kind of like a chaos scale. The more people you kill and the more damage you cause, will have a definite effect, later down the road.

After sneaking through the prison and out through lots of sewers, you get a feel for the gameplay and of your dangerous surroundings. luckily, there are plenty of rat-kabobs and cans of blubber to regenerate your health all over this black plague infested city. Yum!

Finally you find the friend that slipped you the key and he takes you to a safe-pub like place where there are a few people who like you and actually believe you! You then get a sweet mask to wear and a place to purchase upgrades for weapons and supplies. While hanging out here, you encounter a mysterious man called the Outsider, He basically tells you you can now earn special magic like powers by finding “relics.” He then gives you a nice little power that lets you kind of teleport short distances and a human heart with gears all in it that helps you seek out more relics for even cooler perks you can equip to yourself.

Now as you can see, some RPG elements have found their way into the game, and I just gotta say, It’s okay. Totally fine with that. There’s not an overpowering imbalance here and it actually feels natural.

Now it’s your turn to find out whats really going on here and become the best assassin EVER. You now get to run through the city and kill (or not kill) anyone you please. With plenty of side missions and fun story telling, this game turned out to be pretty awesome let me tell you. How could it not be with upgrades like, making rat swarms attack people, or slowing time. Now I’m not going to give the whole game away, but I can give you helpful hints!

For example… I can tell you to really try hard to find as many relics as you can. Those are so ridiculously important, just cool it on your current mission and take time to get these. Oh, and even though you are a killer on a revenge-driven rampage, maybe use the murdering, sparingly. It might come back and bite ya where you don’t want it to. 😉 Don’t just strangle all the random people you see, because some of them – just might help you.

So overall… I would give this game a solid 8.5/10.

I enjoyed it so much, and I know there’s definite replay value. The story was definitely fun and the power ups were so rewarding to watch in action. Like I said before, big fan of being stealthy and I loved the over mechanics that the game had to offer. HOWEVER, I felt there weren’t enough options for me. It feels like it should be bigger, and that most places were closed off. I also wasn’t a fan of the enemy intelligence. It felt almost too easy most of the time. Button mashing could have definitely been used here and it would have succeeded. Overall though, this game was impressive. Most impressive. I highly recommend.

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