Devil Dice
Score: 95% ESRB: Everyone Publisher: THQ Developer: SCi Entertainment Group Media: CD/1 Players: 1 - 2 (3 - 5 Multitap) Genre: Puzzle/ Action
Graphics & Sound: Devil Dice defines minimalist graphics. The character design is clean and crisp, with little baby ‘devils’ running around flipping dice, but the boards and dice are flat-textured and offer little eye-candy. The backdrop images must be won in Puzzle mode, which means that if you successfully complete all the puzzles in a 10-set, you have a new picture to look at while you play. Whee. Not much incentive. The sound is also pretty basic. The music is the same generic techno stuff that you hear in pretty much every game coming out nowadays, and is immediately tuned out when the gameplay gets fierce (which is often and fast). The sound effects are cute, but they are just the basics needed to help the player understand what’s going on. It seems like all the development time was spent perfecting the gameplay instead of bothering with prettifying the game. In other words, Devil Dice is pretty standard puzzle-game fare.
Gameplay: One word: addictive. This is a game that will pick you up halfway through a lazy afternoon and not let you go until the night -- the next night. Especially in the Puzzle mode, there’s always a feeling of ‘one more time’ that almost obligates you to spend hours and hours playing this game. In the multiplayer modes, when you have up to five (!) people playing via the Multitap in a battle to see who the best dice-roller is, the gameplay just doesn’t let up. A word of warning, though: since Devil Dice IS a puzzle game, and considerably more complex than the typical Tetris clone, some people might just not get it. When you play, you’re rolling dice to match pips and get points -- roll three three’s together, four four’s, and so on. You have to keep track of where all the numbers are, so you can roll the dice correctly, and some may not be able to handle that. There are four main modes of play -- Trial, where you play until the board fills up; Battle, where you go head-to-head against the computer or a friend; War, where it’s five-player mayhem as people compete to get the most combos; and Puzzle, where you test your skills against pre-made puzzles with a certain number of moves to complete. All are very fun, and the War sticks out as absolutely insane.
Difficulty: This depends. The A.I. is good, but it’s not the best, and can be beaten with perseverance. The real fun of DD comes from playing with four of your friends, and if they’re good, the game is HARD. People fight for ‘terrain’ on the battlefield, rolling dice away from their enemies and using them in their own combinations. The stealing of combos adds a whole new backstabbing element to the game. The Puzzle mode starts off easy and gets hard FAST. Be forewarned.
Game Mechanics: The controls take a little time to get used to in Devil Dice. Expect to accidentally fall off of the dice rather often when you first start playing, and you have to memorize just where all the pips are on the dice before you can get really good. Once you’ve got it down, though, the controls are spot-on. Digital control is perfect for this game, as you need high precision when it comes to moving the dice around and making combinations. Rent this game before you buy it, though. The mechanics may not ‘click’ with you, and you’ll be stuck with a game that you just won’t enjoy. If you pick them up, though, buy it immediately. Puzzle gaming has rarely been so fun.
-Sunfall to-Ennien, GameVortex Communications AKA Phil Bordelon
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