As I had always been a great fan of RPG games, Drakkhen appealed to me greatly when I first bought it in the early 1990's (the actual date escapes me). I was not disappointed!
The main feature that I particularly enjoyed is the freedom available within the game - ie. you can go anywhere regardless of what is happening in the storyline- this is a good way to get equipment etc, but not the fastest way of completing the game! Another thing I liked was the look of the monsters which strike me as highly unusual (for the time obviously) and the way in which they appear completely at random (when you least expect it).
However, I should point out that it is not all good. The actual playing area completely lacks any kind of graphic at all - it looks really empty. Also the story or plot is really weird and difficult to follow unless you have played the game many times and (sort of) got the hang of understanding it. I have since heard it claimed that this is down to translation but I doubt the story made much sense in any other languages either. Every character in the game (as far as I can tell) has it's own sound which is often nonsense and just strange noises but this adds to the appeal of the game as these strange creatures probably wouldn't make much sense.
The
game is split into 4 separate areas - Fire, Earth, Water and Air (each named after the Elements) - and is represented by something similar to these elements - for example the Fire area/element is a desert. This leads me on to one thing that did drive me mad and that was the loading time! You had to wait a little while every time you cross the boundary of one of the four areas, which is very annoying when your in the flow of what's happening in the game and want to get on with it, particularly later on when you sense the game nearing completion.
It is a good long game to play, and quite difficult to - some of the monsters will almost certainly kill you unless you run away - it doesn’t seem to matter how well armored you are. This can be a little bit annoying but not too damaging to the overall effect of the game and as far as I'm concerned it still deserves to be rated as a classic.
