by Al Shield

Created on: January 19, 2009

Load up your bows, sharpen your swords, commit a few handy spells to memory and get ready to brave the underworld once again - your team of 4 intrepid adventurers are going to face one hell of a quest in Avernum 5. You might want to buy shares in a healing potion producer too, you'll need them...

Your Empress has been attacked by an assassin by the name of Dorikas and as soldiers of the Empire, it's up to you and your team of barely trained recruits to enter an underground world full of hostility. You'll have very few supplies, fewer friends and not much to go on as you combat monsters, solve puzzles and explore a land on the brink of chaos in order to bring Empire justice to the damned.

You can't really claim to be much of a PC role play gamer (RPG) if you haven't heard of Spiderweb software or the brilliant Exile software - Jeff Vogel and his team have been busy for years creating games for both the PC and the mac. Most of them follow a very simple formula: What they lack in cutting edge graphics, they more than make up for in terms of story and game play.

In the 5th adventure of the Avernum series even more innovations have been included, making this one of their best releases to date. It's also one of the biggest as you will literally spend hours exploring new lands, rivers, rapids, caves, dungeons, buildings, mines and tunnels in your search for Dorikas and other quest related adventures. Occasionally you will also have to make a moral choice which will affect your game play further on - giving you more reasons to return for another play through to see what you missed.

Dorikas is also a huge pest with a legion of supporters who will cause you no end of grief. Let alone the vast legions of other creators good and bad. The team at Spiderweb really know how to make annoying critters...

The games mechanics are very easy and explained in great detail along the way. You'll learn how to fight, interact and cast spells along with a heap of other actions. Character customisation is very easy with plenty of choices and in the tradition of most role playing games, the more you kill = the more experience gained and therefore the stronger you become.
Combat is turn based but leaves plenty of scope with all the weapons, armour, scrolls, wands, gems and missile weapons available.

Even if you just try the demo version, prepare to commit many an hour to really appreciate this game. Many people new to RPG's will die a few times and give up in frustration but if you continue on, your patience will be rewarded. Like an engaging novel it gets better with every twist and turn and I've lost track of how many new places I've found to explore just by walking my team around and attacking anything that's tried to attack me.

While not an easy game (it's so big you're bound to miss a lot on your first couple of play throughs) or one that's visually spectacular, there's plenty on offer to keep rpg fans happy for a while. The storyline is very engaging (By the end you too will want to throttle that mangy assassin Dori and his evil co-horts) and if you're a fan, this should be a definite download. Get it here.

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