Demigod

FrankCavil is Godlike? Doubt it.

Source // Steam

The one video game genre I've avoided the most probably has to be the Multiplayer Online Battle Arena. It's not just that I prefer to play single-player games, or shy away from team-based offerings - hundreds of hours spread across a few Battlefield titles will tell you that I'm not averse to this sort of thing at all - but because of the two big MOBA titles being so impossibly big and alien to me that no amount of free-to-play introductions would convince me that it was worth all the effort to learn umpteen characters inside and out just to compete.

I should probably roll the clock back a bit and tell you what a MOBA is, and what better game to do that with than one that's old, has a single-player version to get to grips with, and was hit by so many problems at launch that most people would have been put off from playing it in the first place.

That's right, it's Demigod.

Fun Times

Through some sort of event we simply don't need to know or care about, eight demigods are entering a tournament to prove their worth and become a God proper. They'll be tasked with the kind of challenges Gods face all the time: capturing flags, destroying fortresses, and killing each other. You know, important God stuff.

There are two types of demigod to choose from, Assassins, which do a lot of the legwork themselves and are experts at destroying stuff, and Generals, who are more of a support class but no less capable (even if they're far more scantily clad).

Naturally, I learned of these distinctions after four hours of playing Demigod as this chap, cover star The Rook, a giant lumbering tower of stone with a bloody big hammer and a desire to use it. Knowing I wasn't going to be the speediest on the battlefield, I took on more of a support role by instinct, and The Rook served me well. On easy mode, admittedly, but we've got to start somewhere - I don't even know the ins and outs of a MOBA yet, and neither might you.

A tournament consists of eight rounds, pitting four demigods of Light against four of Darkness, each round with a specific goal. To kick things off, that goal was straight to the point: destroy the enemy Citadel, their base of operations.

This map is one of the smaller ones but gets the point across nicely. With a load of holes in the middle of the level, players are funnelled into lanes, with the strategy hinging on what a lane contains, how well it is defended, whether you can exploit it for a tactical advantage...

Basically, which way are you and your team going to go to get the job done, and the answer is probably all of them, to some degree, until you find a weak point.

I'm surely the slowest character in the game, but presumably the heaviest hitter, so I set to work destroying the enemy infrastructure to give my buddies an easier approach. The levels are full of towers that zap the crap out of anyone who strays too close, so knocking them out of the way will not only help my team push further into the enemy territory but will keep them alive for longer as well.

To be effective at smashing through defences, I need to level up, which thankfully happens at a slick pace and will happen quicker the more you get up to in the game, swatting away enemy grunts, defeating opposition demigods and so on.

The Rook can increase his health and damage, can create defensive structures from the Earth beneath his feet, can hurl boulders to stun the enemy for a short time, and can even suck the life out of defensive structures to absorb as health - a perfect ability for someone who wants to smash defensive structures wherever he sees them.

As you can see on the minimap, the levels also contain flags to capture, each flag giving your team a certain small buff, but also access to gold mines to farm some cash, and shops to spend your wealth in, full of items which double or triple your base health, and chuck huge numbers of extra damage and speed and all sorts your way.

You can equip loads of these items, some with passive abilities, others with effects that you can fire off when you like, like a circle of flame that surrounds you for a short while. Some will work better with your character than others, but if it's there and you can afford it, Demigod wants you to make use of it. Don't mind if I do.

Deciding that I'm well enough equipped and levelled to get to the point, I start absolutely wailing on the enemy citadel. It takes an age to fall as a slam my hammer, suck up some health, smash it a bit more, and wait for some mana to regenerate before doing it all over again.

I'd cleared out many of the defences beforehand, too, so my team was able to join in the fun, destroying demigods and grunts around my feet as I destroyed the target itself. It was a sight to behold, even though I wasn't doing a whole lot other than clicking every now and then.

I was the only player on my team to die and did that five times, but I think my damage output more than makes up for that. The goal is to be at the top of the table after 8 events, so if I keep plugging away at the objective, I should be golden.

At the start of a level, if you've got favour points to spend, you can cash them in on yet more ways to slightly customize and modify your character's attributes. I was dying a lot, especially in the early game, mostly because I couldn't be bothered to withdraw from a fight and slowly heal up in safety, so anything to give me a little health boost was something to look out for.

This level had us destroy four fortresses, which are basically mini citadels scattered across the stage. Destroy the enemies' structures before they destroy yours, and that's a win.

There wasn't much difference in this level, to be honest. The citadel was miles away, so reinforcements for both sides would have to make their way to the front lines the long way around, and as before, the less my team had to deal with, the more likely they were to be able to make progress towards the goal, so I just carried on smashing, zooming out every now and then to admire the stage design, which was a giant snake attacking a God, presumably.

Frustrations

The next stage was one of the largest in Demigod, and the challenge was to score ten kills as a team. I was an Assassin, so I should have been good at this, but on a massive stage like this, lumbering my way to the front lines only to be destroyed by a defensive tower wasn't terribly fun, but that's what happened because I was stuck in my ways of supporting the team by establishing a bit of safety further up the field.

In an actual multiplayer game, I guess I would have buddied up with some other characters and worked even more as a team, but with AI support, I just sucked it up and hoped they'd do what they needed to do before I fell victim to any more silly deaths.

As it happened, my efforts to capture flags and destroy towers would see me level up nicely, equip items that allow me to tank my way through fights, and ended up getting the game-winning final kill. Was I actually starting to understand Demigod and MOBA's?

Whether I was getting it or not, the next few rounds would unfortunately show me that it doesn't take long for Demigod to get a little repetitive.

It started off back on the first level with a round of domination, the more flags you capture, the more points you acquire. We took hold of so many flags that all that was left to do was crush the citadel, so that's what I did until we finally won that.

Then we were on the exact same level again, this time knocking out fortresses, mini-citadels, remember, so there wasn't much going on there either. Fun, I suppose, because The Rook would cause the entire screen to shake with each devastating smash of his hammer, but that was pretty much all I was doing for fifteen minutes at a time.

We did go elsewhere for another deathmatch, my team absolutely crushing the opposition 10-0, which means I actually bothered to not put myself in harms way so much and risk any stupid deaths. I really was starting to learn.

But then we were right back to this stage in another domination round, so once again we took all the flags and stormed the citadel. 

Demigod was definitely showing some promise, more than I thought it would, and I was enjoying it, though perhaps should have opted to play on a higher difficulty. We were now facing the final battle, on a new, bigger map, where we could put all our knowledge into play and destroy the enemy citadel to win.

It's a team game but there can be only one victor at the end of the tournament, and I made sure it was me. The only fanfare you get is a circling camera around your character on a plinth, but apparently you're a God now, so good for you.

Want to do it all over again?

Final Word

I actually did, and I'm probably going to do it some more with a few different characters to see how they fare compared to The Rook, or even up against him. But will I play multiplayer, as intended?

That's going to be a no. I'm comfortable playing Demigod on my own, even knowing that the whole point is to team up while you need to and forge ahead alone when the time is right. Working to your strengths and working as a team is absolutely essential to a successful Demigod or MOBA tournament, but you just don't get a sense of that in a single-player game.

The history of the MOBA doesn't quite begin with Demigod, but it serves as an excellent entry point to those who are fearful of what a MOBA is, like me.

I do wish there were a few more level designs, or that tournaments made more use of the ones available. There's replayability here, but there is repetition too. That's how it goes, I guess.

The characters are a bit bland, even if they come in a few unusual styles, but Demigod is definitely one to have a look at.

Fun Facts

A rocky start would see players able to play the game, illegally or not, before the launch date, but not online, and when the servers were turned on there were connectivity issues for a couple of months until the first patch was released.

Demigod, developed by Gas Powered Games, first released in 2009.

Version played: PC, 2009.