It’s good to be the king and it’s good to be the Overlord.
Sure your minions are little, ugly, noisy and smell funny, but hey, they’re loyal
and they like bringing you shiny things!
This is Overlord for PC.
Released in 2007, developed by Triumph Studios and published by Code Masters, Overlord is
a bit of mix when it comes to genre and play style.
You control the Overlord, stalking around, swing weapons and casting spells leaning toward
action-adventure, there also RPG elements with upgrades to your gear and stats, but
you will also simultaneously control a small horde of minions with an almost RST feel to
it.
Combine all of this with the satirical nature of the whole game makes for a good time of
tyrannical hack and slash.
Your objective is to reclaim dominance over the land and rebuild your tower taking your
rightful place as evil Overlord.
To do this you have your helpful servant Gnarl, pretty much leading you the whole way through
the game, a mistress to redecorate, and bunch of little germlin like minions.
Four different types are unlocked during your journey, tough brown melee ones, ranged red
fire guys, green stealthy minions and blue ones that can survive in water and heal.
Your minions will also help you get through certain obstacles as well, red for fire, blue
water and green poison for areas.
You can tell them what to do and where to go all while doing some damage yourself.
At first this was a bit awkward for me until I got used to sending the minions to attack
and taking out baddies myself at the same time.
You can send out sweeping movements and attacks with all of your minions at once also.
It’s pretty entertaining to see them go town on some barrels and run back to you with
the spoils.
So you’re pretty menacing looking and you might kick your jester on occasion, but actually
you don’t really have to be a bad guy.
The game gives you choices at times to be generous and merciful or just mean and violent.
Choosing the later will add to your corruption effecting your look and a few other aspects
of the game like villagers reactions to you.
This is one of a few similarities to Fable that kind of glared out to me.
There are morality choices woven into the game play and not only that, but the over
all style and presentation seems a lot like Fable.
Maybe it’s the accent of the townsfolk really...
I wouldn’t say they were necessarily stealing ideas from Fable, if anything the game is
poking fun the various genres mashed together in Overlord.
Luckily the parody enhances the whole experience and doesn’t get in the way of being a fun
and interesting game.
There are a few other options of playing besides the single player campaign, there are some
multiplayer options as well.
Now to my knowledge, the online version is no longer works, but you can still play over
a LAN or split screen as well to see who’s the best Overlord of them all.
There is an expansion “Raising Hell” which will add new levels as well as some new items
and upgrades.
There is a sequel, Overlord II, as well as a spin-off for Wii, which was reviewed here
on CGR Undertow and another one for DS.
The game is a bit dated now, but it is still a lot of fun to play.
You can play Overlord on Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 or on PC which is available through Steam
that has an Overlord Complete Pack, giving you Both Overlord I and II as well as the
expansion for the first one.
So take a break from killing dragons and saving the day, let your evil overlord out for
a little bit.