Review by Gianluca “DottorKillex” Arena
After the recent landing on the console of ShadowWarrior 2, reviewed only a few days ago on our pages, it is also time to another IP so far exclusive to PC, namely Victor Vran of the Bulgarians of Haemimont Games, a small but prolific team based in Sofia, best known for their work on turn-based and real-time strategy.
This time, however, we are talking about a hack'n'slash with an isometric view in pure Diablo style, which, in reaching the console shores, earned the suffix Overkill Edition, which denotes the presence of the two downloadable contents launched in the months following the release of the base game. Let's see how the Xbox One version of this action RPG came out.
Demons, monsters and the more you have, the more you put
As often happens with this type of product, Victor Vran's narrative depth varies from nonexistent to barely acceptable, with a storyline that smacks of already seen after a few hours and a cast of characters that you will struggle to remember once the console is turned off.
One notable exception is the protagonist, with a personality that fluctuates from self-deprecating to terribly serious, and a large amount of inner monologues that the player participates in while gutting thousands of enemies: the choice to bet strongly on such a charismatic character turns out to be a winner, because, together with a tested gameplay and a good amount of content, it manages to make you forget the paucity of the writing level.
The icing on the cake is represented by the presence, in the dubbing, of a myth like Doug Cockle, who even the less informed will immediately recognize as the voice of Geralt of Rivia: the experience and professionalism of the American voice actor add depth to Victor Vran, the absolute protagonist of the events that will take place in Zagoravia, an imaginary city with Central European architecture, victim of an unprecedented demonic invasion.
The world in which the events are set is dark and hopeless, with ordinary people forced to rely on the skills of demon hunters (whose number, however, is dwindling more and more) to survive, given the amount of monsters that wander as much outside the few remaining cities as, often, inside, taking advantage of some breach in the walls.
Those who have already played one or more titles belonging to this genre will grasp a series of references (not too veiled, in some cases) to Diablo and many other similar products: on the other hand, offering valid reasons to justify a continuous massacre of monsters, zombies, giant spiders is not easy, given that this particular subgenre of action RPGs has been on the crest of the wave for over twenty years ...
In any case, some of the jokes and situations in which the unflappable demon hunter will find himself will be enough to snatch a few smiles, and the narrative development will never get in the way of the player and the fun.
First of all, approachability
Haemimont Games' approach to a totally new genre for them has been quite different from that of those who have been developing hack'n'slash for several years: the Bulgarian team has staked everything on the ease of use and versatility of the game system, sacrificing, in the process, some of the depth and management of the equipment that are hallmarks of the genre.
Although you cannot choose the starting class for Victor, and upon leveling up you don't get bonus points to distribute on base stats, the gameplay experience is still largely customizable in another way.
In addition to a large amount of loot (whose quality, however, does not compare with the best of the genre), there are many other ways to shape your demon hunter to your liking: it is possible to equip special cards that bring as a dowry when passive bonuses, when special abilities, when even handicaps, offset by a greater amount of experience and money obtained by defeating enemies.
Victor can also switch from one set of weapons to another at the simple press of one of the Xbox One backbones, and this possibility, together with the fact that he can equip any weapon and item of clothing found, make him an extremely versatile character, capable of navigating many situations, although rarely lethal in a specific skill
Here, this, perhaps, is the major limit of the product: the player can do whatever he wants with his avatar, but this lack of predefined and canonized roles threatens to trivialize the gaming experience a bit, not favoring, at the same time, the replayability of the product, in the absence of the possibility of opting for a totally different class.
Perhaps also for this reason, in this Overkill Edition the development team has decided to include both downloadable content already released for PC, one of which is Motorhead-themed, with Victor transported to an unlikely alternate twentieth century where the Nazis have enlisted among their own also the monsters, and the other containing four randomly generated dungeons every twenty-four hours, so as to lengthen the gaming experience.
It goes without saying that fans of the hard rock group will appreciate the first one, but, for our part, without detracting from the long career of Motorhead, we preferred Fractured Worlds, because the random generation of the contents goes particularly well with this videogame genre, and it is was useful to extend the stay of the disc in the player of our Xbox One.
On balance, therefore, also in this Overkill Edition, Victor Vran proves to be more of a viable alternative to such sacred monsters than a real competitor, configuring itself as a good choice especially for the less experienced in action RPG.
A good port
When it comes to ports coming from PC, console users often have to compromise with even heavy compromises due to the hardware limitations of current generation machines. but the guys at Haemimont Games have done a good job, on the whole, even on the Microsoft flagship, generally penalized for cross-platform games.
Of course, especially in the presence of a large number of enemies on the screen at the same time, the framerate, otherwise solid at sixty frames per second, falters, even if never in such a way as to jeopardize the execution of the moves or the outcome of the fights.
In the face of a decent but not exceptional level of general detail (and it was so already two years ago, at its debut on PC), we must also report a general qualitative loss in case of opting for the local cooperative, which, on the other hand, exponentially increases the fun and general chaos.
The overall duration, which already stood between ten and twelve hours for the main adventure only, it is further extended by the aforementioned presence of both DLCs released so far and this element takes on even more value if you consider that this Overkill Edition is sold for less than forty euros at launch, an honest price considering the amount of content.
Summing up, those who love this genre and have already stripped the sacred monsters of the genre, from Diablo III down, can therefore do serenely more than a little thought to this package made in Bulgaria.
Final comment
The development team's different approach, the amount of content, the excellent dubbing of the protagonist and a hyperkinetic combat system these are just some of the merits of this Overkill Edition by Victor Vran, which is proposed as a valid alternative to the most famous titles on Xbox One, Diablo III in the first place.
Especially if you are new to the genre but this type of product has always intrigued you, Haemimont Games' latest effort could really be for you, as long as you are ready to sacrifice some depth and settle for only sketchy role-playing elements.
