My feelings on Champions: Return to Arms are the most complicated of any game in this Hack & Slash RPG saga. Rather than attempt to be a "larger Champions of Norrath", Snowblind Studios opted for a mission-based approach, reducing the story to a simple MacGuffin hunt. I actually love this change for it resulted in a game that's tighter paced than any of its predecessors. Fight monsters, collect loot, level-up, build the ideal champion; there's nothing else to the game, and that's exactly what I want. The bulk of the maps have also been designed to be less meandering. There isn't a giant ant tunnel that takes an hour to hack through, nor are hallways stacked on top of hallways to give the illusion of a grand epic. Everything that works was refined, and everything that doesn't work was removed... erm... most of it at least. The engine used to construct all these games is showing its age, and its faults are more apparent than ever, but it's also not the source of my complicated feelings.
What keeps me from ever truly enjoying this game is that it doesn't appreciate the time I give it. Undivided attention, sleepless nights, nothing seems to matter. My heartfelt investment is rewarded with pain, and not just a slight "Be serious now!" flick on the wrist either. I am struck in my most delicate regions with something deep and bitter. Simultaneously, it's as if I've given too much of my time and not enough. To put it in practical terms, this is a game that's difficult for the wrong reasons. Deaths are frequent but rarely earned. Failure is most prevalent in circumstances that are intentionally designed to be out of the player's control. I love a good shmup, and a good shmup won't make me fly through a straw and then fill it with bullets. It's by this logic that I start questioning if Champions: Return to Arms is actually a good Action RPG. What good is the "Action" if I can't avoid imminent death and what good is the "RPG" if I can't adequately build my hero to survive it?
This time around, we're following the trials of two champions: Flandre and Reika. Flandre is a Shadow Knight under the employ of Natasla, working in concert with her army of darkness to conquer the disparate planes that make up Norrath's world. Reika is a Barbarian serving Firiona Vie, fighting to protect those same planes from evil influence. There is a morality system to this game, and it's about as deep as Natasla appearing less than a minute into the first dungeon and asking if you want to be evil. The side you choose to align with will affect which missions you take on, and that leads to different dungeons to explore. Playing both routes isn't required, but it does add to the replay-value. Bear in mind though that each side has its share of annoying missions. Flandre's first boss battle is a four-against-one trainwreck while Reika has to spend a few dungeons pushing a block around. There's even a stealth mission. It was the 2000s, so you weren't allowed to make a game without one.
After the catastrophic decision to roll a Wizard in Champions of Norrath, I figured melee-based classes were the way to go. Spells are still limited by the fact that none of the caster's equipment affects their damage output. If you want to get technical, then increased intelligence means more mana, more uninterrupted casting time, and arguably a higher DPS, but that's a lot of fuss when all the fighter needs is a shinier sword. Most of the Shadow Knight's capability is in having a great weapon to slice through opposition, though they also benefit from disease-spreading tertiary skills. Disease is a great ailment since it stuns enemies occasionally, interrupting their attacks. Shame it doesn't work on everything. Barbarians have multiple build options, and I opted for Slam + Critical Hit to crush foes with overwhelming numbers. Both classes are great at their intended purpose, especially if you can get a powerful weapon in their hands.
However, if I want a class that doesn't have the durability of a grape, my options are limited to... maybe a Cleric. In the previous game, someone could be taken from full health to death in less than five seconds. It's less than three seconds this time around. Needless to say, if you haven't already mastered the essentials - blocking and backstepping - then you're guaranteed a horrible time. Adversity is distributed in a 60/30/10 split. That means the bulk of foes rush in and start pounding until there's nothing left. Archers and the like set up ambushes in open areas but can be thwarted by luring them around corners or blocking their arrows. Spellcasters and other unique enemies provide support or deadly spells from far away. Since any combination of monsters can erase a hero in seconds, the most viable strategy is erasing them first.
While I think the defensive maneuvers the developers came up with are well-realized, they're still quite inadequate. First off, enemies can and will mash away at excessive speeds the instant they get close. You can't block and wait for an opportunity to counterattack. Even if an enemy whiffs entirely, their next swing occurs within the millisecond. Not only do you have to get the first strike, but that strike also has to kill them, otherwise you're getting hurt. Even that isn't enough sometimes, because certain enemy attacks - such as from the tongue-lashing vampires - can have "phantom range". This is a limitation of an engine that's past its prime. When you're close enough to an enemy or object, you're essentially locked to it, so your attack will strike it and nothing else. This means even if it looks like your sword swing collides with multiple foes, only one will take damage. Naturally, getting surrounded is a death sentence for anyone who doesn't have an AOE they sunk a ton of skill points in. Again, get the first strike, or suffer and die.
If you need more evidence, then let's look at all of the adversaries that can break through your defenses. As early as the first dungeon, evil gladiators can go into frenzies that'll throw heroes to the ground even if they're blocking. Champions: Return to Arms loves knocking players flat on their backs and leaving them at the mercy of the merciless. I've had the pleasure of getting stun-locked by an archer with exploding arrows. Where it gets into the "Why am I still playing this shit?" territory is in the Plane of Torment. The first half of the mission takes place over several bridges, leaving very little room to avoid the Giant Demons and their unblockable charges. Between all of the cheap deaths and weak puzzles, I have to wonder who on the dev team had a grudge with the world.
In case you're feeling underequipped, replaying missions is made very simple by just going back to previously cleared planes. However, the early planes don't offer much experience or decent gear, so Plane of Torment strugglers will just have to endure somehow. The other reason to head back is to take on optional missions. These often feature special objectives like protecting gnomes, getting through a dungeon without any equipment, or uh... Pac-Man. Clearing these will provide additional stats and skill points, as well as unlock additional dungeons. Champions: Return to Arms is actually at its best in the mid to late-game, when players have found something that works for them and is able to employ it in a variety of locales. The later missions have multiple objectives and get really creative, all while hoovering your free time like thin mints. However, I don't recommend taking on the additional dungeons unless you have a party to help you along. Saving is disabled and it's impossible to port back to the hub to restock on potions. After exploring a labyrinth of timed-door puzzles for 30+ minutes, I bumped into a minotaur that killed me and my progress in a second. This fucking game.
After collecting all of the meaningless shards, Flandre must deal with the final challenge. Mithaniel Marr is the culmination of all the misery in Flan's last 12 hours. He's a tank with a plethora of attacks that can't be defended against, let alone dodged. He's also capable of killing a reasonably armored villain in a couple hits, but that's not a unique quality if I'm being honest. Every boss in the game is capable of destroying the player in 1 to 4 hits. This can be overcome, but only if your armor and HP drastically outclass their damage output. Honestly, I'm not quite sure how Flandre managed to defeat Mithaniel. Pretty much all she had available to her was disease bolt and riposte, which has a 10% chance of damaging an attacker. Landing uncontested hits with her sword felt next to impossible. Maybe backstepping was the key, and I just never considered it because the game put so much effort into burying its effectiveness elsewhere.
Completing the game unlocks the next difficulty setting, which requires a character at level 25 to make anything resembling progress. It's a great feature, or at least it would be for someone else. Part of the issue is that for some weird reason, the shop only carries the worst healing potions, yet charges 1,000 gold a pop. Potion money is never hard to come by, but this is such a baffling decision, especially when monsters are hitting harder than they ever were on the previous setting. It's not just that they're hitting harder either. Their ability to soak up damage has also increased substantially. Even the lowliest goons were taking several hits to put down. Going through the entire game again, Plane of Torment included, but with a giant multiplier tacked on feels like something only groups or the most dedicated individuals would be willing to put up with.
I'm afraid Reika's story didn't even get that far. Admittedly, there's a lot of joy in eliminating a boss with one critical slam, but I have to think of the big picture. Even in the best of circumstances, I'm still in control of a hero who gets knocked over by a swift breeze. Pressing their thumb against the wrong end of a mechanical pencil could spell the end of their entire existence. Just because she's capable of big numbers doesn't make her a powerful barbarian. Because of the nature of the game, she's forced into hit & run tactics like some rogue with points in the wrong armor proficiency. Hell, I can't even call it "hit & run" because everyone jogs like it's a Sunday afternoon at the park. For all its faults, Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance 2 gifted almost everyone a cheap and effective sprint skill, ensuring a baseline level of agency. Agency is what keeps these Action RPGs from ever devolving to winners being determined by whoever's number is highest.
Obviously, it never happened, but I couldn't imagine scrounging up the patience for a fifth game that succeeded where every other entry in the Champions of Dark Alliance series faltered. Snowblind's third outing with the formula is their best yet, but it still depends heavily on factors that are out of the player's control. Sadly, one of those factors is getting and holding onto friends. Without them, the full potential and enjoyment in this game just isn't going to be found. If you're like me and always on your own, then it's going to take a ton of work to wring any enjoyment out of an adventure that gets its jollies from creating insufferable situations that must be constantly retried. I'd like to think you're more valuable than that.
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