First Time In Amalur

I checked out the demo last night.

My first impressions: looks a lot like World of Warcraft and Torchlight. It doesn't bring anything brand spanking new to the fantasy gaming genre, but it does bring the expected tropes shined up nice. The origin story was a variation on the 'Amnesiac With Hidden Powers' we've seen before, but I thought the presentation was interesting. The set up of a bad guy drifted over me, and the infodump--already a hard sell--was made even more incomprehensible by the soundtrack riding over the narration (a problem the developer has already addressed).

While on the matter of sound quality, it did drop out for awhile, and the demo actually froze on me. But I was ready to forgive it that, since it was spinning a lot of plates, and for a rather lengthy demo, it wasn't an issue for me.

But...BUT...Amalur does combat very well. You can switch very quickly from primary weapon to your secondary ( I switched from a greatsword to throwing daggers, alternating the sword with a fireball throwing scepter, the game giving you higher XP if you mix shit up)and movement worked very well, outside of an odd re-set moment when the game would move my character back a few feet while I was attempting an attack.

There is also books and lore, but it seems at this point somewhat less dense than what we see in Skyrim.

So, overall, it's bright, it's colourful, and the combat was fun. I'm not sure if I'd pay sixty dollars for it, but as a thirty five dollar game, it would be something I'd be interested in.

If I ever had thirty five dollars.