Viking, for those of you who haven’t seen much about it, is an action adventure sort of game. The player plays as the inexplicably epileptic viking warrior Skarin. I have to start by saying Skarin happens to be one of the most badass video game characters I’ve played as, this guy tears people to shreds, literally. The game is set in Midgard, where a bitter war rages between Freya, goddess of love and war, and Hel, goddess of …well, goddess of something evil. Chosen as Freya’s champion, Skarin and his viking buddies are thrust into the war to end the tyrannical opression of Hel’s forces over Midgard.

I’ll start with the flaws of the game (basically so I can have a nice rant about how fun it is). I found the controls pretty reasonable and easy to adapt to but there is the odd occasion where you find yourself lunging in dismay at some hapless undead minion as a rather larger and more intimidating enemy is patiently waiting to cut you short.

Alright, maybe thats a little unfair criticism, if you’re going to make a big slow attack I guess you have to prepare for the consequences; but after the nth respawn it begins to take its toll. There could at least be some way of realising your mistake and blocking. I’m probably nitpicking.

Moving on in frustration is the “sneak into the enemy encampment and active some crazy portal”. What they fail to mention is that you’re a 7 foot viking warrior who isn’t the most adapt “stealth” character. Your camera is ultra sensitive with no real changeability and trying to work out where the next bastard undead soldier with his bastard horn ready to summon the whole bastard undead legion is really quite a grievance. I suppose it achieves its goal of mixing up the gameplay from simple hack’n’slash to sneak’n’stab, just not in the most preferable way.

A widely cited criticism seems to have been with the sound in this game, the almost lack of ambient sound in the “wilderness” is a little bemusing, but not particularly a large flaw I’d acknowledge. The average player is not left in wanting of sound, particularly when it comes to the large scale battles. Coming onto the battles, I have little to complain about except for maybe the idea of giving the player set objectives such as “kill the shamans”. Its a good idea in theory, it means the player isn’t left to simply slaughter endless tides of undead. But some of the objectives become more than a little irritating when you alone are left to complete them with seemingly none of your entire viking army to help out.

The graphics seemed acceptably nice in combat when things are fast paced, things look pretty slick. More noticeably, in cut scenes the closeups on specific characters are surprisingly low detailed, the game seems a little lacking in the graphics department compared to a lot of next gen games coming out recently. They reach an acceptable level though and there’s little to complain about in the midst of a battle.

In terms of gameplay, I personally love this game. I’ll admit theres a level of repetition to it, but I haven’t found any lack of fun in single handedly raiding an enemy camp. Maybe its just my worrying affinity for violence, I don’t know, but the whole “hack limbs off to kill them” thing is something I’ve fallen in love with. The storyline seems to flow smoothly with what you do in the game, freeing more and more vikings from the hands of the undead increases your army and theres definite reward in seeing your horde of vikings charging towards the enemy.

As far as combat goes, I haven’t enjoyed fighting this much since Assassin’s Creed. Rather then, as you might find in some games, avoiding enemy confrontations, you will find yourself drawn towards them with the lure of possible loot and the satisfaction of swiping the head off the dude’s shoulders. The traditional RPG element of upgrading your skill shines through with the option to learn new “rage moves” at the Battle Arena. The more you learn the more you can counter the difficulties you find with certain enemies and the more you develop your own fighting style.

Overall as far as games go, Viking seems like a solid effort. Theres some obvious flaws, some more irritating than others but the game makes up for it in the “raw fun” category. The epic battles leave no want for something interesting and the storyline is interesting enough to hold onto.

• Graphics 6.5/10
• Sound 7/10
• Storyline 8/10
• Gameplay 9/10
• OVERALL 8.5/10

Laurie.