Wystąpił błąd podczas deserializacji treści komunikatu odpowiedzi dla operacji „Translate”. Podczas odczytywania danych XML został przekroczony maksymalny przydział długości zawartości ciągu (8192). Wartość tę można zwiększyć, zmieniając właściwość MaxStringContentLength obiektu XmlDictionaryReaderQuotas użytego podczas tworzenia modułu odczytującego XML. Wiersz 1, pozycja 9352.
I held out on the original Puzzle Quest because it never came to the PC at the price point I wanted, and also because I had the sneaking suspicion that it would ruin my life. It sounded intriguing to me as it combined two great genres and I’ve always wanted to play it. When Puzzle Quest 2 was released on the PC, albeit a bit later than its XBLA and DS counterparts, I could resist no longer. Perhaps my unfulfilled desire to play the original produced high expectations. It was fun enough at the beginning but I found myself rushing through the end in order to just finish the game.
The inventory screen is clean and simpleThe best parts of Puzzle Quest 2 are the RPG elements. You get to pick from four classes and they each have different play styles. For example, if you’re a Templar you might end up focusing more on matching Action gauntlets rather than colours. If you’re an Assassin, you’ll want to build up to get your shield activated and then just constantly deal damage without relinquishing your turn. As you level up, you gain new spells, but you can only ever bring five of them into battle simultaneously. What ends up happening is that you’ll never use most of the spells given to you because you’ll have a favourite setup and that’ll work for you through large sections of the game. Leveling up also gives you a skill point to spend among five attributes, with each of them benefiting a colour as well as having secondary effects. For example, an agility point will grant you several bonuses for yellow, but will also raise your defense and give you extra Action points when matching gauntlets on the board.
In addition to leveling, you get to hoard gold and buy stuff. Unlike most RPGs, most of the best items I found were purchased from stores. Money also allows you to enchant your gear, upgrading their quality from common white items to legendary orange items. There are class specific items that helps to differentiate the classes, and these items are significant. The Assassin’s poison felt more than a little overpowered, but the Barbarian’s two handed weapons also seem devastating. The inclusion of a respec mechanism so that you can reallocate your attribute points was also a nice touch, even if it is pretty much mandatory these days. It was appreciated because I didn’t know how many points it would take to get the next level of benefit of a particular colour, so it helped me maximize my points later on in the game. Also you will want to redo your attribute points as your spells and gear change.
Though skull damage is not as vital, it can still be useful if you have high strengthThe main puzzling gameplay is where the game fails to meet my expectations, but there are many positives. The mechanics are simple as they are in the first Puzzle Quest, except that skulls are much less important. In addition to damaging with your spells and skulls, Puzzle Quest 2 lets you beat on your opponent the old fashioned way: With weapons. Different weapons will cost different amounts of Action points, but equipping the right weapon for your strategy is a key to success. For example, you might want the most efficient damage per Action point cost weapon if you don’t get a lot of Action points, but otherwise you may want a weapon that deals a lot of damage at once. Other considerations are that using a weapon can trigger a critical hit that does double damage, and that using the items in your hand does not affect the board. The items you hold in your hands will be used often, even if they don’t have the astounding impact of some of your spells. As an Assassin, it felt very satisfying to build up the colours for a few rounds in battle, and then use a series of spells and matches on the board to keep my opponent from having another turn. There are some mini games to break up the action, which forces you to match a number of certain types or get certain pieces into specific slots located on the board. These mini games are played to find traps, unlock doors, or to find treasure. Finding treasure was always a delight for me, even if it was a little frustrating at times because it often felt like luck was the deciding factor as to how many items you received.
Despite these cool mechanics, the game just falls short of achieving the kind of greatness that causes months of addiction. Perhaps sadly, Puzzle Quest Anonymous will never come to be. The balance of the game seems broken, which causes the game to be very repetitive as you just have your way with one opponent after another. The game stops scaling its awards for chains longer than five and the chains are more dependent on luck than anything else. This is because you’re dependent on what falls onto the board from the screen to chain matches, unlike puzzle games like Super Puzzle Fighter II, which lets you set up your chains through organization. The awards from battle stop being significant fairly early on and I kept very few sets of gear through long periods of the game, and winning eventually just becomes unsatisfying. The story and sidequests are barely worth a mention and do not provide an incentive to keep playing. All this combines to form an unexpected result of a fun puzzle game that doesn’t remain fun in the long run. I still had a great time for about 15 to 20 hours of the game, though.
The graphics are nothing to write home about. They’re pleasant enough that everything works and the colours are brilliant, but they were disappointing overall. Even the special story cut scenes amounted to no more than scrolling around a static art piece, and not great ones at that. The feedback for getting long chains does not look epic enough, and there is not a whole lot of variety of icons for the items. Overall, the graphics are not much worse than Culdcept, but lacks the variety of animation and art that Culdcept provides.
One of the many locales you'll visit in Story modeThe sound and music are similarly well done but also lacks variety. The sound is really what makes me feel good about long chains and the music is on par with what you’d expect. I would have liked more monster noises and things like that. The narration was not remarkable, but also not terrible, which is a plus in my book. Puzzle Quest 2 ends up with a pretty mediocre effort in the sound department.
There is a surprising number of modes packed into this title. Aside from the regular story mode, you can also take your hero into single battles against the AI or into an Endurance mode, which is like the survival modes found in fighting games. Each round pits you against a tougher opponent, and your health carries over. In addition, you can play any of the mini games or take your character online and play multiplayer. You can also play multiplayer with new characters entirely and choose the level of the characters for the battle. The coolest mode of all though is the Tournament mode, where you pick a team of monsters and pit it against an computer team of monsters in an team elimination showdown.
Puzzle Quest 2 is a good game if you want to kill some time and generally have some clean fun. If you were a fan of the first Puzzle Quest and are you not tired of the formula yet, then Puzzle Quest 2 will satisfy your RPG puzzling needs. However, if you’re looking for a deep and addictive puzzle game, then it may disappoint you.
Don Tam is a game enthusiast who currently resides in Toronto. He currently owns a two-year old PC, a Xbox 360 Pro and a DS Lite (black). His favourite games include Gears of War, Rock Band, Civilization IV, and pretty much anything Blizzard caresses with their gentle, godly hands.
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