izigame.me

So, Helldorado... You can call it Desperados 2.5 because, well, that's what it is. Comes with a pretty funny story, though. See, at some point Spellbound Entertainment ended up being so obsessed with making Commandos clones that one of them (Chicago 1930) failed pretty hard. Why? Well, for many reasons, I guess. It didn't get enough press, it was far from being the best game from Spellbound (even though it sure had a certain charm and came with a bunch of fresh ideas, it was still the worst in my opinion), while there were already too many of such games on market. As funny as it sounds nowadays (the entire sub-genre pretty much died with Spellbound, until Mimimi picked it up and gave it a new life in their Shadow Tactics: Blades of the Shōgun), Spellbound alone used to produce a new game of that kind every bloody year, while there were also PYRO, who started the entire thing and some other minor games. Like KOREA: Forgotten Conflict. It was like with all those games from Ubisoft nowadays. At some point people were like “Seriously? Another one of those? Seriously?”. It was also somewhat buggy, so... yeah. It failed. And when it did, Spellbound started to fire people.
Unfortunately, with a brand new team behind Desperados 2, they also lost the only thing that used to make their games so cool. I mean, seriously. The original Desperados team? The guys knew what they were doin'. They loved Commandos and they wanted to improve it and explore the new horizons. Like, personally, I really wanted Vampire Hunter game to happen. All that while Desperados 2 team just... blew it. They've ruined pretty much everything that the original Desperados did right, while the new game turned out so cheap and ugly that it felt unfinished. So, naturally, even though Spellbound already worked on the expansion and almost finished it, ATARI said “Nope, we don't need any more of that! Thank you very much.” What did Spellbound do? Well, they tried to save the project. The best they can. They eventually found the publisher and released the expansion as a stand-alone game called Helldorado. Because why the hell not.
So, that's pretty much the story here. It's called Helldorado, but all in all, it's an expansion to Desperados 2. Or Desperados 2.5, call it any way you want. But enough about that. Already wasted quite a lot of time on that, so... let's look at the game itself, shall we? Well, we shall, but... the funniest thing is – there isn't much to talk about here. I mean, what do you expect? The game started as a bloody expansion and, well, it feels that way too. For both good and bad (mostly bad, though, mostly bad...) it's still Desperados 2. Can't say nothing's changed, though. Quite the opposite. The character models were heavily improved and are now highlighted in the way similar to the first game (which is a good thing since it makes them easier to see and control), the goals are way better explained now and even have marks on the ground to make things easier for you, while the new “combo” system that allows you to give the same task for all the characters who can perform it is pretty cool and useful. Just select all the guys and send them to kick the heck out of the bandits. Then just sit back and enjoy the brawl. Like I said, useful.
Aside from that, though, what we have here is pretty much the same Desperados 2... thing. The story picks up right when Desperados 2 ended (yes, it begins with that weird scene about the Doc), but it's still cheesy as heck and absolutely terribly written, while gameplay still feels cheap and rough. Heck, they even forgot to put one of the important libraries on disc! Not really a problem with the Steam version (you may still need to install the legacy PhysX drivers, though), but I still remember the day when I tried to launch the game from disc for the very first time. I mean, come on! How many games miss the important libraries on physical media? Did you even test the bloody thing, Spellbound?
Sure, the game is totally playable in its current state, but, like with the original Desperados 2, you'll hardly want to waste your time on it. You like the genre and already finished everything else from PYRO, Spellbound and Mimimi? Then, and only then, you may consider wasting your time on this game. Otherwise, pick up anything else (literally, anything, even Chicago 1930) and it'll be much better than this. Dixi.