While this game is certainly a fine addition to the Everquest franchise, it still leaves a lot to be desired.
If you were a fan of Baldur's Gate 1 and 2, you'll love this game and have no problem picking it up. Anyone who has played the Baldur's gate series will feel right at home, as the menu and gameplay system remains virtually identical. For those unfamiliar with the game however, there's a lot to learn.
Champions of Norrath is pretty much a straight-forward action-RPG. You can choose to create your character from one of five races (elves, barbarians, clerics, etc...) and you then have the option to change their appearance. The appearance options are very limited, however, which dissapointed me. After creating a character, you then allocate points to various atrributes and then start the game.
The gameplay is simple- walk around the level, chop guys up, cast some spells, pick up the items fallen enemies have dropped, and progress to the next town. While this is a tried and true gameplay fromula, it grows a little old here. Some of the quests you are put on take upwards of two hours, which I found to be tedious after a while. You always have the option to save at various intervals in a dungeon, but I would have preferred more variety in the worlds. Speaking of worlds, there are five acts, each of which has about 8 quests for you to complete. Completed quests give you additional experience and gold. Different from Baldur's Gate 2 is that here you don't really need to synthesize items. You can find little trinkets around the dungeons that may add some power to your weapon or armor, but there are no longer any +5 status weapons or anything.
The game controls fine, and there really aren't any times where you feel like you are fighting the camera, which is a welcome suprise. There is a slight pause, about 2 seconds or so, between when you hit the menu button and when the menu actually pops up. This annoyed me at first, but once you get farther inot the game, you don't notice it at all. Strangely, the creators of the game decided to remove the ability to jump, something that has been present in many previous Everquest games, including the Baldur's Gate series. This doesn't really change the gameplay at all, but it does seem odd that they rtemoved it.
The graphics in the game are superb, as all the environemnts are finely detailed. When enemies drop weapons, you can actually differentiate between them. For instance, a two-handed longsword looks different laying on the ground than a rapier. With the right analog stick you can move the camera around to pan and zoom around your character, and you see some neat details. Dungeon environments, while pretty much the same from act to act, are very pleasant to look at, although they are a little dark at times.
One of the biggest problems games in this genre usually have is the lack of replay value. Champions does little to correct this. After you beat the game the first time, you open up the next difficulty level. While there are new weapons and armor types to pick up, there really aren't any new dungeons or quests fro you to complete, so there really is little point in continuing. I played through two times and then was completely bored with it. There are co-op modes up to four players which does add some fun and replayability to the game, but not much. I can't speak for multiplayer mode over the internet since I don't have a network adapter.
All in all, Champions of Norrath is a fun action-RPG that will definitely kill a few boring nights after work. If you liked Baldur's Gate or similiar games, you'll no doubt want to pick this one up, but with little replay value, casual gamers may want to settle for a week rental.
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