Oct. 15, 2007

If you've seen footage and screenshots of Too Human up to this point, chances are you got the impression that it's a traditional hack-and-slash action game, perhaps with some light RPG elements. The difference between this notion and reality could be measured in light years.

We got to lay hands on Baldur himself at the developer's headquarters in Ontario, and were shocked to find a ludicrously deep RPG character development system that features five different character classes. The Berserker dual-wields his way to the damage-per-second throne, the Defender serves as an effective aggro management tank, the Commando provides ranged dominance with explosive ordnance, the Champion excels at zipping between enemies in mid-air, and the Bio Engineer maxes out on cybernetics while keeping everyone healed.

In a wonderful move that many split-personality MMOs would do well to emulate, not one of these character types is turned into a tissue-paper wimp or a spam-healing tag-along. Every class serves a clear but flexible role in a group, but each is also a formidable killing machine in its own right. Indeed, only by consistently damaging the machine herds that infest each darkly handsome world can you fill the combination counter that provides the equivalent of mana for special attacks, elaborate finishers, and smart bomb "ruiners."