Disciples 2: Dark Prophecy

List Price: $49.95 Discount Price: $2.49

Features:

• WINDOWS 95/98/2000/XP
• Over 200 individually animated units and over 100 animated spells
• Each race has a unique Saga (campaign) that tells the story from its own perspective
• Multiplayer supports up to 4 players through hot-seat, LAN or Internet
• Campaign editor allows you to make your own custom campaigns

Accessories:

PC Gamer (1-year)

Customer Reviews:

Epic [Posted on 2003-07-10]
Disciples II is a good game. Most everything about it conveys a sweeping epic feel to it. Awe-inspiring music and graphics/artwork abound. During combat, the backgrounds change according to what type of terrain or location - if you fight on territory held by the Mountain Clans, you will be fighting on a cold wintry field; likewise, if you are fighting in lands held by the demonic Legions of the Damned your background will be a twisted, hellish place - and of course, if you attack an opponent's city your background will be, well...like a city and attacking an enemy on the water, your background will be as if on a ship.
The graphics during combat are always fun to watch - these are awesome pre-rendered artwork animations imported into the game, not pixellated blocky graphics. The music conveys a sense of both granduer and urgency - like a Conan the Barbarian-type movie with an epic score. The music really does enhance the overall feel and experience.
On the downside though, I've discovered that this game does get a bit boring and repetitive after a while. Playing only against the computer in single-player mode contributes greatly to this situation (in fact, every single computer game I've ever played falls prey to this conundrum). If I was to play real live humans via the internet, I imagine it would vastly and exponentially increase the fun factor.

Very Good Turn-Based Strategy Game [Posted on 2004-03-24]
As of this writing, this game is pretty old. However, I'd just like to add my two cents: This is a very good turn-based strategy game. You can play either the stand-alone scenarios or the story-based sagas (I played the latter). You can play through the sagas as any of the four races. And, since the sagas are different for each race, you really should play each race. Also, within each race's saga, you can play with a focus as a Warrior, a Magician, or the Guild (a Thief?). Each focus will add a different twist to the way you play. Plus, no matter what focus you choose, you can create and use five different types of heroes. Only three of them (Warrior, Magician, and Explorer) are really good for transferring from scenario to scenario. But, regardless, there's a huge replay value in this game.

The problems I have with this game are minor. The biggest problem is that when you transfer a hero to the next scenario, you can only transfer the HERO and five items. The party members you've spent all that time training don't transfer. Also, the spells that you've researched don't transfer either. This means that at the start of each scenario, you spend a lot of time just getting your party members up to a usable stage. Another problem is that you have to choose your upgrade path for your party members at a global level. It would have been really nice to have each city have its own upgrade path for the characters it generates. The last quibble that I'll talk about is that the cities themselves aren't of much use. Capturing a city doesn't give you any inherent income or resource streams. If there are sources of that stuff outside the city and within its area of influence, then you get those streams. The problem is that you can do the same thing by having a hero just plant rods at the resources.

I highly recommend this game. Old as it is, it's still fun to play.

Get this game! [Posted on 2004-11-29]
If you have money to buy ONLY one turn-based fantasy strategy game, there's only one that will suit your needs, Disciples II. The graphic, depth, artwork, gameplay and overall quality of this game is very high. I do not suggest you buy the two separate companion games, Guardian of Light and Servants of the Dark. They are each 1/2 of the original game. Instead, buy Disciples 2: Rise of the Elves. That game will include the core Disciple 2 game and the expansion, Rise of the Elves. Again, do NOT buy "Servants of the Dark" and "Guardian of Light."

Anyway, back to the game. In this game, simply choose one of the races (Demons, Dwarves, Human, Undead, and later Elves) and try to conquer the entire map. There are two main resources, gold and mana. You need the gold for buildings and hiring units. But you also need mana to cast some spells which can help turn the tide of battle. Remember, unlike Warcraft, gold and mana are in unlimited supply, so you do not have to worry about running out of resources.

Your units are grouped in a stack of 6 and get upgraded as you win battles. There are very different units for different races. For example, only humans have healer, while the dwarves and demons tend to have powerful melee fighters (like Giants and Greater Demons). Usually, you tend to have one very powerful stack and create a lot of weaker stacks for fodders. This is overall a very enjoyable game and quite addicting. Even if you can't find someone to play with in multiplayer mode, the campaign is fun and interesting. At the cost of this game selling today, get it now! You can thank me later.

I wouldnt call it "strategy" [Posted on 2005-03-22]
A few people think Disciples 2 is the apex of strategy- but here's why it isnt.

1. Placing your units within their group (each group has 6 spaces). The guy who wrote a review before said this is a strategic element. Here's the strategy- Put your archers in back. Put your melee guys in front... I hope i didnt spoil it for you.

2. Combat- Yeah, you have to make sure you attack certain guys in a certain order to get rid of as many as fast as possible, but its not tricky. In fact, its not any more than common sense.

3. Missions- They're all "different" but the same. You start with the same leader. You have to rebuild your army each mission- and its exactly the same everytime. There's no need to switch up tactics. Essentially- you play the same mission over and over and over. Except the mission just gets longer. Or perhaps thats just the monotony that makes me thing that.

4. On each mission you build up your base, which isnt strategic either. Each building gives you access to a unit upgrade. You get 4 kinds of units that arent your leader- Fighter, archer/mage, big monster(ie dragon) small monster (ie werewolf). If you want your fighters to deal more damage, you biuld one biulding. If instead you want them to deal less damage but be immune to the first fire attack, you build a different one. And if you dont like your choice, deal with it. You cant get both trees in a single mission. So you get a variety of 4 units. And usually, only 2 are even worth using.

There's no deep strategy- its all common sense. Just make sure you dont pay for this. If you want real strategy- try starcraft, or close combat, or tetris, or pacman. Whatever.

Fun Fun Fun [Posted on 2006-11-05]
This game is a great game for a turn based game. The graphics are pretty good. And the themes of the game are great choices. I would get this game again. Without a second thought.

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