"Made by many of the original creators of Diablo and Diablo 2" are big words for an action RPG, but the Steam Next Fest demo for Darkhaven feels like sampling bread by eating raw flour

What am I to make of Darkhaven, a still-Kickstarter-ing action RPG "made by many of the original creators of Diablo and Diablo 2" that's now gotten an "intentionally unconventional" demo as part of Steam Next Fest? The demo is so unconventional, I fear, that it isn't very compelling, and so this question's been weighing on me after reaching the "thanks for playing" stage of this primordial vertical slice.

Dropped unceremoniously into a rocky camp in a grassy field, I start the Darkhaven demo as I mean to go on: as a witch whose favorite spell is stabbing things. I choose the lunging basic attack and, armed with itty bitty daggers, grow to regret it as my squishy witch spends a concerning amount of time in enemy melee range, hampered by a cooldown-based dodge roll that moves me in my hard-to-see cursor's direction and not the direction I am currently running.

Unlocking a proper ranged spell improves the combat immensely, in large part because it makes all the goblins and treants and giant roaches explode. But the mana cost is severe, and I haven't found a way to replenish my Recognizable Blue Orb apart from resting at camp or breaking mana crystals, which in the din of combat feels like John Wick pausing his shootout to search for discarded pennies.

Within minutes, I start to problem solve through itemization and upgrades, spending technique points on mana refunds for my spell, and bulking up through the standard suite of armor and accessory slots. Eventually I find a healing flask, which, after several deaths, felt like discovering a fireproof ring after walking across a hot bed of coals.

Darkhaven Gameplay Announce Trailer - YouTube

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"What you're playing now is the beginning of that vision," the demo's Steam page insists. "It's ambitious, it's evolving. And it's still being built. We're sharing it early because we know the game will get better with real player feedback."

The Darkhaven demo is pre-alpha, fabulously unfinished, and spectacularly limited. I can, I foolishly want to believe, see what the folks at developer Moonbeast Productions are shooting for: a procedurally generated ARPG with destructible, unpredictable environments and 3D movement (that is, a double jump). That said, I have no idea what its "massively interconnected, MMO-scale network of realms" might look like, having only piddled around in single-player. It's also difficult to find a use case for the ability to build and level terrain; I could plonk down a platform to fight on, I suppose, but good luck getting those goblins to chill out while I draw up a blueprint.

I can't assess what a game like this might be any more than I can offer feedback on a statue yet to be carved from a block of marble. There is only what a game is, and my acid test for Steam Next Fest demos is always the same: do I want to play more of this? For Darkhaven, the answer is no. This? This right here? This is not very good. But it feels like that's sort of the point, and so a second question emerges: do I want to see more of this game? Yes, actually. The demo didn't grab me, but it didn't punch me in the nose and insult my mother either. By the time I see it again perhaps it will feel more like an ARPG and less like the pitch for one.

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