GB Feature: Hard to be a God Review

This video game adaptation of one of Russia’s most popular sci-fi novels is celebrated in its home country, but how does the English translation fare? Check out our new four-page review to find out.

Combat is simple and easy, but can be very challenging due to the frustrating design. Whatever weapon you choose, you can block with spacebar, attack with the left-mouse button for up to three-hit combinations (depending on your timing), do a special move with the right mouse button and finish off knocked-down opponents with the third mouse-button. The differences between the 3 different weapon skills play out very well, for example in the fact that heavier weapons have a better chance of knocking someone down, but finishing off someone with a heavy weapon also takes a longer time leaving you exposed to attacks for a longer time. Blocking of arrows is impossible unless you have a shield.

The problem with combat is not in the concept but like so many things in this game in the execution. Combat happens with an awkward combination of WASD and mouse, in which several fighters all step forward and form a straight line while attacking. A number of the monster creatures do this, but human fighters especially those armed with light weapons (including the PC) also step forwards a lot. This means that if you want to keep attacking, you’ll end up swinging the camera around quite a lot in a very disorienting manner.

This leads to a certain rinse-and-repeat strategy regardless of what weapon set you have: do a special move to start, block, do another special move, run away or block until your special moves recharge. This prevents disorienting circling combat, while allowing you to do maximum damage while taking minimum damage.