Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance

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Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance
Dark Alliance cover art.jpg
Developer(s) Tuque Games
Publisher(s) Wizards of the Coast
Composer(s) Vibe Avenue
Series Dark Alliance
Engine Unreal Engine 4
Platform(s)
Release22 June 2021
Genre(s) Action role-playing
Mode(s) Single-player, multiplayer

Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance is a third-person action role-playing game published by Wizards of the Coast and developed by its subsidiary Tuque Games. Based on the Dungeons & Dragons tabletop role-playing system, the title of the game alludes to Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance and Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance II , although its story and gameplay are not related to those earlier titles. The game was released in June 2021 for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.

Contents

Gameplay

Dark Alliance is set in the tundra region of Icewind Dale, [1] and features characters from R. A. Salvatore's novel series The Legend of Drizzt , including the four playable characters: Drizzt Do'Urden, Catti-brie, Bruenor Battlehammer, and Wulfgar. [2] [1] The game includes both single-player and multiplayer modes. In the single-player mode, the player can choose any of the four characters to control, and swap between them. [2] The multiplayer mode allows for online co-op for up to four players. [3] [1]

Development

In 2019, Tuque Games was developing a Dungeons & Dragons game in partnership with Wizards of the Coast. Wizards of the Coast acquired Tuque Games that October. [4] Salvatore assisted the game's development and has been involved in the game's production since its inception. [5] Local cooperative multiplayer was initially announced, though the feature was subsequently dropped by the developer, until it was confirmed that the feature would be available via a post-release patch. [6] Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance was officially announced with a teaser trailer shown during The Game Awards 2019 in December. [7] The game was originally slated for release in 2020, [8] [9] but was later delayed to 2021. [10] The game was released for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S on 22 June 2021 and was simultaneously released on the Xbox Game Pass service. [11] [12] Koch Media published the retail version of the game. [13]

Setting

In the Forgotten Realms campaign setting, Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance is set after the 1988 novel The Crystal Shard , [14] the first book in Salvatore's The Icewind Dale Trilogy , and the fourth book in the Legend of Drizzt series. The game takes place in the Icewind Dale region of Faerûn. [15] [16] On the connection, Salvatore said: "First of all, if you've read the books and you play the game, you'll probably get a more satisfying experience out of the game. [...] [The] game will bring more to the story than you've gotten from the books now. [...] If you're doing a video game, you're going to have to take some literary license and maybe not stick completely with it. [...] Little things like that don't bother me at all when you're talking about a video game—because your job, when you're making the video game, first and foremost, is to make sure that players are having fun, and they're writing their own story". [17]

Both Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance and Icewind Dale: Rime of the Frostmaiden (2020) are set in the Icewind Dale region, but in the canon timeline, the video game occurs before the tabletop adventure module. [15] According to Dungeons & Dragons principal writer Chris Perkins: "We sat down with narrative designers for Dark Alliance, and we basically opened up a toy box, pulled out all the toys, and figured out how we were going to play with same toys. And so, there are places and foes and places that appear in Rime of the Frostmaiden that if you play Dark Alliance, see echoes of/similarities to. Each story is separate — the story of Rime of the Frost Maiden is completely separate from Dark Alliance, just using same locations. You get a sense of real history to this place [...]. Together, when you take the two things combined, you get bigger painting of Icewind Dale". [15]

Reception

Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance received "mixed or average reviews" according to review aggregator Metacritic. [18] [19] [20] IGN's Travis Northup stated:

But in all my years, I've seldom seen anyone roll a critical failure quite like Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance, which manages to take all that potential and turn it into a joyless labor that's mind-numbingly repetitive, deeply lacking in storytelling, and absolutely overflowing with bugs. [22]

— Travis Northup, Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance Review, IGN

Related Research Articles

Forgotten Realms is a campaign setting for the Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) fantasy role-playing game. Commonly referred to by players and game designers as "The Realms", it was created by game designer Ed Greenwood around 1967 as a setting for his childhood stories. Several years later, it was published for the D&D game as a series of magazine articles, and the first Realms game products were released in 1987. Role-playing game products have been produced for the setting ever since, in addition to novels, role-playing video game adaptations, comic books, and the film Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Drow</span> Dungeons & Dragons fictional creature

The drow or dark elves are a dark-skinned and white-haired subrace of elves connected to the subterranean Underdark in the Dungeons & Dragons fantasy roleplaying game. The drow have traditionally been portrayed as generally evil and connected to the evil spider goddess Lolth. However, later editions of Dungeons & Dragons have moved away from this portrayal and preassigned alignment. More recent publications have explored drow societies unconnected to Lolth.

<i>Baldurs Gate</i> Franchise of fantasy role-playing video games

Baldur's Gate is a series of role-playing video games set in the Forgotten Realms Dungeons & Dragons campaign setting. The series has been divided into two sub-series, known as the Bhaalspawn Saga and the Dark Alliance, both taking place mostly within the Western Heartlands, but the Bhaalspawn Saga extends to Amn and Tethyr. The Dark Alliance series was released for consoles and was critically and commercially successful. The Bhaalspawn Saga was critically acclaimed for using pausable realtime gameplay, which is credited with revitalizing the computer role-playing game (CRPG) genre.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Drizzt Do'Urden</span> Fictional character from Dungeons & Dragons

Drizzt Do'Urden is a fictional character appearing in the Forgotten Realms campaign setting for the Dungeons & Dragons fantasy role-playing game. Drizzt was created by author R. A. Salvatore as a supporting character in the Icewind Dale Trilogy. Salvatore created him on a whim when his publisher needed him to replace one of the characters in an early version of the first book, The Crystal Shard. Drizzt has since become a popular heroic character of the Forgotten Realms setting, and has been featured as the main character of a long series of books, starting chronologically with The Dark Elf Trilogy. As an atypical drow, Drizzt has forsaken both the evil ways of his people and their home in the Underdark, in the drow city of Menzoberranzan.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Menzoberranzan</span> Fictional setting in Dungeons & Dragons

Menzoberranzan, the "City of Spiders", is a fictional city-state in the world of the Forgotten Realms, a Dungeons & Dragons campaign setting. The city is located in the Upper Northdark, about two miles below the Surbrin Vale, between the Moonwood and the Frost Hills. It is famed as the birthplace of Drizzt Do'Urden, the protagonist of several series of best-selling novels by noted fantasy author R. A. Salvatore. Menzoberranzan has been developed into a video game and a tabletop RPG setting.

Faerûn is a fictional continent and the primary setting of the Dungeons & Dragons world of Forgotten Realms. It is described in detail in several editions of the Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting with the most recent being the 5th edition from Wizards of the Coast, and various locales and aspects are described in more depth in separate campaign setting books. Around a hundred novels, several computer and video games and a film use Faerûn as the setting.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">R. A. Salvatore</span> American writer

Robert Anthony Salvatore is an American author best known for The Legend of Drizzt, a series of fantasy novels set in the Forgotten Realms and starring the character Drizzt Do'Urden. He has also written The DemonWars Saga, a series of high fantasy novels; several other Forgotten Realms novels; and Vector Prime, the first novel in the Star Wars: The New Jedi Order series. He has sold more than 15 million copies of his books in the United States alone, and 22 of his titles have been New York Times best-sellers.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Catti-brie</span> Fictional character from Dungeons & Dragons

Catti-brie is a fictional character in the Forgotten Realms setting, based on the Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game. The creation of American author R.A. Salvatore, she is primarily known as the love interest of the drow ranger Drizzt Do'Urden and has appeared in multiple media alongside Drizzt.

The Underdark is a fictional setting which has appeared in Dungeons & Dragons role-playing campaigns and Dungeons & Dragons-based fiction books, including the Legend of Drizzt series by R. A. Salvatore. It is described as a vast subterranean network of interconnected caverns and tunnels, stretching beneath entire continents and forming an underworld for surface settings. Polygon called it "one of D&D's most well-known realms".

<i>The Crystal Shard</i> 1988 novel by R. A. Salvatore

The Crystal Shard is a 1988 fantasy novel by American writer R. A. Salvatore. The first book in The Icewind Dale Trilogy, it was his first published novel.

<i>Homeland</i> (Forgotten Realms novel) 1990 novel by R. A. Salvatore

Homeland is a fantasy novel by American writer R. A. Salvatore, the first book in The Dark Elf Trilogy, a prequel to The Icewind Dale Trilogy. It follows the story of Drizzt Do'Urden from the time and circumstances of his birth and his upbringing amongst the drow.

The Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) fantasy role-playing game has been adapted into many related products, including magazines, films and video games.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Wulfgar (Forgotten Realms)</span> Fictional character

Wulfgar, son of Beornegar, is the barbarian hero of Icewind Dale in the Forgotten Realms campaign setting, and one of the Companions of the Hall along with Drizzt Do'Urden, Catti-brie, Regis the halfling, and Bruenor Battlehammer. He is the creation of R.A. Salvatore.

<i>Menzoberranzan</i> (video game) 1994 video game

Menzoberranzan is a 1994 role-playing video game created by Strategic Simulations (SSI) and DreamForge Intertainment. Menzoberranzan uses the same game engine as SSI's previous game, Ravenloft: Strahd's Possession (1994), and is set in the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons Forgotten Realms campaign setting.

<i>Neverwinter</i> (video game) 2013 video game

Neverwinter is a free-to-play massively multiplayer online role-playing game developed by Cryptic Studios for Microsoft Windows in 2013, Xbox One in 2015, and PlayStation 4 in 2016. Based on the fictional Forgotten Realms city of Neverwinter from Dungeons & Dragons, Neverwinter is a standalone game and not part of the previous Neverwinter Nights series.

<i>Dungeons & Dragons</i> (IDW Publishing) Comic book series by IDW Publishing

Dungeons & Dragons is a series of comic books published by IDW Publishing, under the license from Hasbro and Wizards of the Coast, based on the Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) fantasy role-playing game. From 2010 to 2024, IDW Publishing released two Dungeons & Dragons ongoing series, fifteen Dungeons & Dragons limited series, three crossover series, two annuals and a graphic novel.

This is a complete bibliography of the written works of American fantasy author R. A. Salvatore.

Invoke Studios, formerly Tuque Games, is a Canadian video game developer based in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The company was founded by Jeff Hattem, formerly of Ubisoft and Behaviour Interactive, in 2012. The company released its first game Livelock in partnership with publisher Perfect World Entertainment in 2016. Tuque Games released a Dungeons & Dragons game called Dark Alliance in 2021.

<i>Icewind Dale: Rime of the Frostmaiden</i> D&D 5e adventure module

Icewind Dale: Rime of the Frostmaiden is an adventure module with themes of survival, horror and fantasy for the 5th edition of the Dungeons & Dragons fantasy role-playing game.

References

  1. 1 2 3 Wilson, Jason (12 December 2019). "Dark Alliance is a new D&D action-RPG starring Drizzt Do'Urden and the Companions of the Hall". VentureBeat .
  2. 1 2 Whitten, Sarah (12 December 2019). "New 'Dungeons and Dragons' based on R.A. Salvatore characters is coming in 2020". CNBC . Retrieved 12 December 2019.
  3. ↑ Sheehan, Gavin (12 December 2019). "Tuque Games Announces "Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance"". Bleeding Cool . Retrieved 14 December 2019.
  4. ↑ Sinclair, Brendan (29 October 2019). "Wizards of the Coast acquires Tuque Games". GamesIndustry.biz .
  5. ↑ Hall, Charlie (18 June 2020). "D&D's new action RPG, Dark Alliance, is about what happens after players roll for initiative". Polygon . Retrieved 26 November 2020.
  6. ↑ "Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance will add local co-op after launch | Rock Paper Shotgun". Rock Paper Shotgun. June 2021.
  7. ↑ "Dark Alliance Official Announcement Trailer | Dungeons & Dragons". YouTube . 12 December 2019. Retrieved 14 December 2019.
  8. ↑ Whitbrook, James (12 December 2019). "The Team Behind Dark Alliance's Return Tell Us Why Now is the Time to Bring It Back". io9 . Gizmodo . Retrieved 14 December 2019.
  9. ↑ Purchese, Robert (13 December 2019). "D&D hack-and-slash series Dark Alliance is making a comeback". Eurogamer . Retrieved 14 December 2019.
  10. ↑ Mateș, Bogdan Robert. "Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance Release Date Set For 2021, Koch Media Handles Physical Publishing" . Retrieved 10 November 2020.
  11. ↑ Purchese, Robert (15 March 2021). "The new Dark Alliance game is out in June, and we've played it". Eurogamer . Retrieved 16 March 2021.
  12. ↑ "Dungeons & Dragons Dark Alliance is Coming to Xbox Game Pass on Day One". 13 May 2021.
  13. ↑ "Koch Media and Wizards of the Coast partner for Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance". Gamasutra . 11 May 2020. Retrieved 26 November 2020.
  14. ↑ Salvatore, R. A. (2005). The crystal shard. Renton, WA: Wizards of the coast. ISBN   0-7869-3613-4. OCLC   58470432.
  15. 1 2 3 "D&D's next storyline is Icewind Dale: Rime of the Frostmaiden, with small ties to Dark Alliance". VentureBeat. 18 June 2020. Retrieved 31 March 2021.
  16. ↑ "Is Dungeons & Dragons Dark Alliance A Remake, A Reboot, or A Sequel". ScreenRant. 30 March 2021. Retrieved 1 April 2021.
  17. ↑ Whitbrook, James (19 June 2020). "How R.A. Salvatore Helped Bring Icewind Dale to Games Again for Dark Alliance". io9. Archived from the original on 19 June 2020. Retrieved 1 April 2021.
  18. 1 2 "Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance for PC Reviews". Metacritic . Retrieved 26 June 2021.
  19. 1 2 "Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance for PlayStation 5 Reviews". Metacritic . Retrieved 21 June 2021.
  20. 1 2 "Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance for Xbox Series X Reviews". Metacritic . Retrieved 1 July 2021.
  21. ↑ Miller, Matt (12 September 2021). "Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance Review – Missing Ingredients". Game Informer . Archived from the original on 2 July 2021. Retrieved 12 September 2021.
  22. 1 2 Northup, Travis (21 June 2021). "Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance Review". IGN . Retrieved 21 June 2021.
  23. ↑ Kelly, Andy (21 June 2021). "Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance review". PC Gamer . Retrieved 21 June 2021.
  24. ↑ Boudreau, Ian (12 September 2021). "Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance review – hurt me plenty". PCGamesN . Retrieved 12 September 2021.
  25. ↑ "Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance Review (PS5) | Aces high". Push Square . 12 September 2021. Retrieved 12 September 2021.
  26. ↑ "Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance Review | Aces high". RPGamer. 12 September 2021. Retrieved 12 September 2021.
  27. ↑ Tischbein, Cory (12 September 2021). "Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance". RPGFan . Retrieved 12 September 2021.
  28. ↑ Tischbein, Cory (12 September 2021). "Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance review: New initiatives". Shacknews . Retrieved 12 September 2021.
  29. ↑ "Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance review: Epic story, so-so combat | Aces high". VentureBeat . 12 September 2021. Retrieved 12 September 2021.
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