Blast from the Past

Overlord

by Triumph Studios

It’s been a while, but I am finally adding some stuff to the “Blast from the Past segment of my blog! While Overlord was released only a few years ago, it’s not exactly new, right? Anyhow, the entire premise of Overlord is that you are the recently resurrected, well, overlord. You have been dormant for several years when a band of heroes locked you away. But now you’re back and ready to reign evil upon the land and rule with an iron fist!

I played this game on the PC and found the controls fit well and I can easily imagine the control scheme working on consoles too. Anyhow, Overlord has some pretty simple game mechanics. Most of the work is done via minions. There are a total of four minion types, each with their own respective color. You start out with only one minion type and gain the rest via exploration and puzzle solving. While each minion has only a couple of powers, some puzzles combine the use of multiple minion types and prove for an enjoyable challenge. Other puzzles also incorporate you having to send your minions to areas that are too small and inaccessible to yourself. However, sometimes the “sweeping” mechanic (i.e. controlling your minions manually) can be difficult. When “sweeping”, if you have to “sweep” over a good distance, you will most likely end up fighting the camera. Not to mention that minion movement is somewhat sluggish when “sweeping”.

The trailers lead you to believe that your entire purpose in the game is to be an “evil” ruler, however, you do not have to be completely evil! … or even be evil at all for that matter. The game has a corruption stat that lists how corrupt of a ruler you are. It is entirely possible to play through the entire game without actually doing a single evil deed. It is worth pointing out that all the evil deeds that you could possibly do are not pointed out to you. While a few are indicated to you, there are some other, clever deeds you can do. For instance, I released a group of elf slaves a bit prematurely and caused them to get eaten by giant slugs. In turn, I got corruption points saying “You fattened the giant slugs by letting them eat the elves.” So yes, you certainly can be the evil overlord you were dreaming to be, or you can be a good guy.

From a technical standpoint, Overlord is pretty damn good looking. Shiney-ness aside, Overlord has some pretty nice looking geometry.

Overlord is, for the most part, a light comedy. Most of the cutscenes are intended at some sort of humor. In general, they mock generic fantasy and evil stereotypes. Playing through the game reminded me of the Overlord List and the Dungeon List.

Summary⌗

In short, I enjoyed Overlord. While the game is not overly complicated, it sure is fun to play! It’s also nice if you’re looking for a bit of light humor. The game has a decent length. It took me three days of play to finish. Overlord is fairly cheap on GOG for $10.