Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance

Dark Alliance is an action packed brawler with RPG elements. Icewind Dale has never looked so stunning. Gameplay is fast paced and the combat is rewarding.

Fairly average on many points, Dungeons & Dragons - Dark Alliance is actually quite pleasant to play. The world created by R.A. Salvatore is only used as a base, the graphics could be more detailed, and the RPG side is limited to the characters' statistics, but the title is not without charm and benefits from an efficient soundtrack. The fights are also pleasant even if the targeting can be a bit difficult to handle. It benefits from some good ideas and a good replayability, but also from small recurring flaws. And the cooperative multiplayer is a definite plus, especially between friends. Still, those looking for a real challenge may be disappointed.

Dark Alliance is an action game with a fiery soul and brave ambitions, whose gameplay is a little bit undermined by some naive choices and a lackluster balance. It's fun in co-op and depicts with joy the D&D universe, but at day one it's still too unpolished to achieve the glory of the top action RPGs.

Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance is much better with friends. There's loads of loot and fun to be had, but combat is quite sluggish.

Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance is a wonderful counter to games like Baldur's Gate 3, thanks to its focus on action, co-op and replayability. It's straight to the point with its arcade action, endlessly fun combat, and well-crafted levels that beg to be explored. Although it's good when playing solo, it really comes alive when playing with friends, and brings back memories of playing games like The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King on the Nintendo GameCube. Seriously, don't sleep on this one.

Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance delivers a solid D&D adventure, with exciting combat and a slew of monsters to take down. Though my experience was a bit dulled by crashes and some minor bugs, it certainly didn’t ruin the game for me. Dark Alliance fits in nicely in the pantheon of Dungeons and Dragons games.

Tuque Games must have rolled a natural 20 on their saving throw, because none of Dark Alliance's faults are able to bring the action-RPG down. It’s a solid cooperative dungeon crawler that’s positively dripping with D&D’s iconic Companions of the Hall setting and lore. The combat may take some getting used to, and putting your party together is more fiddly than it needs to be, yet Dark Alliance remains an entertaining adventure from beginning to end.

With some friends, you can have a lot of fun exploring Dungeons and Dragons: Dark Alliance without needing to roll any dice, but inconsistent combat and frustrating bosses make the experience more of an ordeal than it should be, not to mention unenjoyable by yourself.

Dark Alliance is not a failure just as it is not a masterpiece, it is a game that will need support and work, that must take strength from the excellent ideas shown and improve its deficits by aiming for the release of the first expansion.

Dungeons and Dragons: Dark Alliance is a double-edged sword. The setting and the characters are sure to appeal to an R. A. Salvatore fan, and there are hints of a fun, entertaining game here and there. But they are often overshadowed by the many issues, such as extremely poor enemy AI and questionable design choices.

Dark Alliance is a disappointingly run-of-the-mill action RPG whose most distinctive features are bugs and connection issues. Solid combat and levelling systems are not enough to outweigh repetitive, boring environments and the lack of decent endgame content. [09/2021, p.44]

Dark Alliance has some really good ideas, but the AI and the camera needs to improve to make this game more enjoyable.

Infested with bugs from start to finish, Dark Alliance is a button mashing affair that drops the 5E rules in favor of flash. The bosses are great, but the parts in between less so. Here’s hoping developer Tuque can pull this out of the Deep Wastes with their post-launch plans.

Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance is a decent brawler if you're looking for casual fun while chatting with your friends on Discord. If you're expecting much depth from the plot or combat mechanics, you'll likely be disappointed.

Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance isn't a bad game, but it is also far away from being a good one. Probably it's a little bit better, if you play it in co-op mode with your friends, what we couldn't check yet. But we are sure also then nothing will change something about the middle-rate quality in almost any aspect.

Moderately entertaining third-person hack 'n' slash with lousy AI, camera issues and too many goblins.

Hopefully the team in charge of the project will improve this perfectible recipe, but full of potential, over the updates.

In theory, D&D: Dark Alliance is a decent action rpg with hack&slay appeal. But server problems and bugs are annoying while the chracter development is rather puristic.

This is not the D.

Dark Alliance lacks in diversity, with bugs littered throughout making it near impossible to remain immersed for more than 10 minutes at a time, if that. You will undoubtedly expect either a successful homage to Dungeons and Dragons or a high-quality action RPG with influence from that scene - at this stage, it does not quite deliver either.

Dungeons & Dragons Dark Alliance fails to captivate despite its efforts, clogged by too many problems, and the sheer repetitiveness of the game is overwhelming.

A cheeky take on Dungeons & Dragons lore isn't enough to carry the lacklustre combat, sluggish controls, and dodgy enemy hitboxes.

Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance isn’t a bad game, but it does feel insubstantial at the moment. The lack of character development, plot or world-building will probably turn away hardcore D&D fans. As for the fans of multiplayer action games, while the core of the experience is fairly solid, the lack of technical polish, repetitive structure and unexciting loot system will likely not satisfy for long. Hopefully over time, patches and additional content can flesh out the experience and make it the rollicking fantasy hack and slash multiplayer funfest it has the potential to be. Just make sure you don’t forget to bring a friend or three.

I have not given up on Dark Alliance, and I hope they continue to improve and change the game into something great. With some variety, the combat could get better. With some balancing changes or NPC companions, solo play could become viable and fun. Some adjustments to the gear drops and mechanics could deepen that system and improve upon what they started with. I was left frustrated and disappointed with Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance, but I will keep coming back to see how it grows in the coming months, and hope to be able to love it in the future.

I wrack my brain trying to figure out Dark Alliance’s strengths, and I’m not coming up with much. The level design works surprisingly well for multiplayer. I was afraid looting would fall by the wayside, but every time a fight would wrap up, everyone would run off in different directions and grab chests before finally moving on. I didn’t feel like things were getting missed. Well, except for the shoes that would pop out of chests some other player would open. Those just rot, forgotten on the ground.

There are a few positives, but the failures are far too many and break the game at its fundamental core. Don’t play this.

Dark Alliance is a dull and unpolished multiplayer action RPG with repetitive and glitchy combat, broken online connectivity, unbalanced solo play, and more than enough technical issues to put off anyone even slightly interested in checking it out.

The best thing I can say about Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance is, that the game feels like one of these titles, you rented from the Videostore in the early 2000s to play through on a weekend. Which probably tells you, that you shouldn't pay full price for it. Should the developers at Tuque succeed in patching the bugs and putting more meat on this dragon's bones, then Dark Alliance could over time become a fun Multiplayer-title. Until then, there are a lot of better alternatives for a co-op-adventure.

Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance can’t stop getting in its own way. Whether it’s the brutality of playing in single-player, the disappointing progression or the buggy combat, the game is more of an uninspiring shrug than anything else, although fans of the franchise will find reasons to enjoy themselves.

There’s a tendency to recommend bad games to the most devoted fans, but I think fans of Drizzt and Co. will hate this game even more than the uninitiated. The saving grace is that Dark Alliance is included with Game Pass, so it won’t cost you anything to check back in from time to time and see how it’s doing. There is an enjoyable game buried here, I just wouldn’t expect to see it anytime soon.

Dull and clunky, this is one hell of a weak, uninspired action game that's plagued with poor design choices and technical issues.

You know that a cooperative game is stillborn when you spend several minutes looking for random players to team up with even on a launch week. Probably because it’s one of the worst D&D games in ages.

Dungeons & Dragons Dark Alliance is a blemish on a franchise that is always fondly remembered by its fan base. None of its features is up to the series and doesn't even allow us to fulfill the role-playing fantasies that Dungeons & Dragons has given us for so many decades.

It's difficult to recommend Dark Alliance to anyone else than biggest fans of Forgotten Realms's lore. The game definitely lacks of polish and doesn't shine at all when you talk about its gameplay, graphics or even its multiplayer options.

Dungeons and Dragons: Dark Alliance has good ideas, but poor enemy variety, samey levels, bad puzzles, a shockingly poor story, the lack of local co-op, several quality-of-life issues, and numerous bugs that affect every aspect of the game make it hard to recommend to anyone, no matter how much they like the source material.