Pros
- Compelling storyline
- Superb soundtrack
- Mix of Mass Effect and Greek mythology
- Leveling up / skill trees proceed in a very unique way
- Dedicate yourself to three gods, in both dialogue and fighting, and be rewarded appropriately
- Fun combat; multiple weapon types to use
- Voice acting is excellent
Cons
- Very, very glitchy
- Not as much combat as you'd think; mostly lots of dialogue
- Not really any bosses to speak of
- Can drag on at times
- Feels like with just a little more polish it could have been something exceptional
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| BOOM. There goes the head. |
The Rise of the Argonauts is a game from Codemasters, the guys mostly famous for making racing games like Dirt and Grid, and Liquid Entertainment, who have made no notable games as of yet. It sort of came out of nowhere in 2008, sold a meager amount of copies, and silently slipped away. This isn't Codemasters' first attempt into something besides racers; they created the Overlord games as well. While their non-racing games all seem to share some common theme (read: they are all super buggy), Rise of the Argonauts is actually an exceptional title from beginning to end, blending the best parts of other games while adding enough unique touches to provide a captivating experience.
The plot is a loose version of the Greek mythological tale "Jason and the Argonauts." Essentially, Jason's wife gets axed on their wedding day, and so he goes off on a quest both for revenge and to try and persuade the gods to bring her back to life. After a quick trip to the local oracle for guidance, the game lets you pick from a variety of islands to tackle at your leisure, finally throwing you in the Underworld (not a huge spoiler; literally every game set in ancient Greece puts you in the Underworld at some point) and off to an epic-ish final battle. On the way you'll run into plenty of ancient Greek staples (Hercules, minotaurs, cyclopses, the works) though it doesn't mine it's mythology quite as heavy as the God of War series. Actually, at first glance people might think this game is just some God of War knock-off. They couldn't be more wrong.
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| Does this look familiar? Like...I don't know...MASS EFFECT? |
Rise of the Argonauts is an action RPG, and a very unique one. You still go out and bash stuff with a trio of weapons (you have spears for quick strikes, maces to break shields and amor, and swords are just all-around good), knock dudes' heads off with spears, and generally just wreck shop if somebody tries to get up in your face. But what is interesting is how little combat the game has relative to its dialogue choices.
One of the islands, for example, is pretty much 90% talking. The island you start on, also, is primarily you conversing with people in order to get to know them better. Sounds boring, right? Well, luckily the game has an excellent script and superb voice acting, but there's another bonus.
Each dialogue choice puts points in one of four gods. For example, pick the war-like, aggressive response and you please the god Hades. Be witty and clever and Hermes will benefit, and so on. Each of these four gods have a tech tree (and are tied to one of the three weapons or the shield) and so how you choose to play your character (brutal, clever, compassionate, or lawful) changes what abilities you'll be able to spend your points in. It's a really cool system, and one that actually makes your dialogue choices important in more than just "I want to play this character as a massive jerk."
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| The graphics and art ain't half bad, either |
The leveling is also really, really unique. You don't get experience points at all in this game. Rather, the game has a "constellations" system, where basically each star is a different goal (example: behead 10 enemies, complete a quest objective, kill 1000 enemies, etc). These "achievements," if you will, progress naturally throughout the game, so you don't ever feel like you have to grind, but you will have to try some tricky stuff during combat in order to get them all. They even have ones for talking to all your companions you pick up along the way, which is pretty cool.
Getting stars gives you points, when you can then use on the God trees you've unlocked. Basically you are "dedicating" your achievements to a certain god, who in turn grants you the boon you've requested. It's a really clever system, especially considering we've been pretty much doing the XP thing forever and Rise of the Argonauts essentially invented an entirely new (and workable!) way around it that also fits wonderfully into the game's mythology. Really, really clever stuff.
The combat itself is pretty basic (play on hard) but never too overwhelming. I actually didn't spend any skill points for about half of the game (was saving them up to blitz a tree when it finished unlocking), and with some skill I never really had too many problems. The fact it requires you to switch up your weapons (maces on shields, spears on fast enemies, swords on...everything else) keeps things fast and fresh, and while it isn't God of War, it was never unfair or clunky. I was a bit disappointed by the lack of bosses (it's not like Greek mythology is lacking for big nasties to take down), but the experienced still felt complete regardless.
The soundtrack really needs to be mentioned. It's by Tylor Bates, the composer behind the 300 soundtrack, and it is really really good. The music is appropriately haunting, with plenty of backing vocals singing in...greek, I'd assume. One of the best songs in the game happens when your health is low (you have regenerating health in this game). The screen pales to a muted color, all other sounds and music cut out, and you hear this.
Really haunting
Other points of note are just the continued similarities to Mass Effect. You get more and more companions that you haul around on a ship, taking two of them with you on missions. They bicker and comment based on who you've brought, though you can't equip or level them. The dialogue wheels, as I said above, are straight out of that game, and the super-cinematic camera angles that pop up during conversations and cutscenes are ripped straight from that game. This isn't a bad thing - Mass Effect did all these things right, and so does Argonauts - it just can seem a little familiar at times.
Lastly, this game is really, really glitchy. This is especially the case if you install it to the Xbox 360 hard drive; for some reason this seriously increases full system freezes (no good). I don't know if the PC or PS3 versions have the same issues, but from what I hear they are still pretty glitchy. I never hit anything that erased my progress or made it so I couldn't continue, but I did have to do a few manual reboots because of freezes, odd geometry catching, or other weirdness. It's a fragile game, and was never patched, which is too bad because it could very well have been a masterpiece had they just taken the time to polish it up a bit further.
Rise of the Argonauts is the very definition of a lost gem, if one still in the rough. It's beautiful, has great voice acting and storytelling, and while it might be Mass Effect meets Greek mythology, it brings enough on its own to the table to make it a completely enthralling experience. The unique leveling system alone makes this game worth checking out, and also it being a game that can focus almost an entire section completely on dialogue choices with no combat and still stay entertaining. It's just a pity they didn't squash all the bugs or put a little more effort into marketing it; I'd love to see more games like this come out of Codemasters.
You can get the game new for $20, and even less used. This is absolutely worth it at that price. If I were to give it a star rating, it would be four out of five, if only because the lingering issues prevent it from being completely perfect.
And it's also an easy 1000/1000 for achievement hunters. So there you go.
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