Crimson Alliance

Crimson Alliance
Crimson Alliance's cover artwork depicting the game's character classes:
(from left to right) Assassin, Mercenary and Wizard.
Developer(s)Certain Affinity
Publisher(s)Microsoft Studios
Producer(s)Tom Potter
Designer(s)Mark Tucker
Platform(s)Xbox 360
ReleaseSeptember 7, 2011[1]
Genre(s)Action role-playing
Mode(s)Single-player, Multi-player

Crimson Alliance is a co-op action role-playing game developed by Certain Affinity and published by Microsoft Studios. The game was first announced at RTX 2011 and was available for demo at E3, ComicCon and PAX Prime,[2] with the press release being announced on May 31, 2011.[3]

Crimson Alliance was released on September 7, 2011 on Xbox LIVE Arcade for free as a freemium. Player can choose to pay between 800 Microsoft Points for one character class or 1200 Microsoft Points for all three character classes.[4] The game was also offered as a free bonus code download for those who purchased all five of the fourth annual Xbox Live Summer of Arcade titles before August 23, 2011.[5]

Plot

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Once a thriving empire, Byzan has faced dark times with survivors living a meager existence while a cruel goddess, the Soul Siren, rules with an iron fist and is not afraid to have her minions do her dirty work. Direwolf, Moonshade and Gnox – the wizard, assassin and mercenary – dive into the primitive world to stop the Soul Siren from unleashing her ultimate weapon. But these three have their own sordid pasts to deal with as well.

Gameplay

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Crimson Alliance is an action RPG that uses gold to upgrade characters weapons and armor. Each character has a special fighting style which players can equip to match their play style. There are three equipment slots for each character. Direwolf, the wizard, uses long range attacks to defeat his enemies while Gnox the mercenary has a melee fighting style. Moonshade, the assassin, is a hybrid of the two, using both melee and long range shots to bring down her attackers. Each character is equipped with a basic attack and a heavy attack and can also stun their enemies and dash throughout the levels.

In each level there are secret areas to find as well as class specific areas where characters can open chests that contain items to upgrade their weaponry and armor. Merchants are available to improve items. Also throughout the game are challenge maps where players will have to defeat hordes of enemies.

The leaderboard system takes advantage of the hack and slash style of play. As the player kills more enemies without being hit, the player's score multiplier increases, resulting in higher overall scores. Higher difficulty settings also increases the points earned.

Reception

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At E3, Crimson Alliance was a nominee of Game Informer's and G4TV's "Best Of" awards as well as 1UP.com's "Top 10 Sleepers of E3 2011."[citation needed] On release, the game received "average" reviews according to the review aggregation website Metacritic.[6]

The Observer gave it an average review and stated, "Once past the hackneyed presentation of this co-op dungeon crawler there is a real meaty, moreish pleasure to be had. The key is solid combat – each of the three characters has basic, heavy and stun attacks, with special moves and collectible extras such as deployable turrets, which add to a contained but tactical system."[19] The Digital Fix gave it seven out of ten, stating, "Leave your traditional RPG expectations at the door, jump in with some friends and for 800 points you will find a great little arcade dungeon crawler."[17] Metro gave it six out of ten, calling it "Derivative, shallow and ruthlessly unambitious, but as Diablo clones go this is still one of the best and most addictive on consoles."[18]

On September 27, 2011 Certain Affinity announced the release of the Vengeance Pack for Crimson Alliance, which became available on October 12, 2011. The pack was reported to contain 4 levels, new monsters, new treasures, a new challenge type, and 3 new achievements. Sales at year's-end 2011 are approximated at 116,000 units.[20]

References

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  1. ^ obi1mccarthy (July 18, 2011). "Certification? Nailed it". Crimson Alliance. Certain Affinity. Archived from the original on March 24, 2012. Retrieved October 24, 2019.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  2. ^ "Crimson Alliance Announced!". Certain Affinity. May 27, 2011. Archived from the original on September 20, 2011. Retrieved September 7, 2011.
  3. ^ "Official Crimson Alliance Announcement Press". Certain Affinity. May 31, 2011. Archived from the original on September 30, 2011. Retrieved September 7, 2011.
  4. ^ Fletcher, JC (September 7, 2011). "PSA: 'Free' Crimson Alliance download isn't the full game". Engadget (Joystiq). Oath Inc. Retrieved October 24, 2019.
  5. ^ "Free Crimson Alliance Offer". Xbox.com. Microsoft. Archived from the original on January 26, 2012. Retrieved August 24, 2011.
  6. ^ a b "Crimson Alliance for Xbox 360 Reviews". Metacritic. CBS Interactive. Retrieved October 24, 2019.
  7. ^ Sterling, Jim (September 6, 2011). "Review: Crimson Alliance". Destructoid. Enthusiast Gaming. Retrieved October 24, 2019.
  8. ^ Miller, Matt (September 6, 2011). "Crimson Alliance". Game Informer. GameStop. Archived from the original on October 8, 2011. Retrieved October 24, 2019.
  9. ^ Reboucas, Eduardo (September 14, 2011). "Crimson Alliance Review". Game Revolution. CraveOnline. Archived from the original on September 17, 2014. Retrieved October 24, 2019.
  10. ^ Haske, Steve (September 8, 2011). "Review: Crimson Alliance (360)". GamePro. GamePro Media. Archived from the original on September 25, 2011. Retrieved October 24, 2019.
  11. ^ McGee, Maxwell (September 8, 2011). "Crimson Alliance Review". GameSpot. CBS Interactive. Retrieved October 24, 2019.
  12. ^ "Crimson Alliance Review". GameTrailers. Viacom. September 12, 2011. Archived from the original on March 7, 2012. Retrieved October 24, 2019.
  13. ^ Workman, Robert (September 12, 2011). "Crimson Alliance Review". GameZone. Archived from the original on March 29, 2012. Retrieved October 24, 2019.
  14. ^ Sliwinski, Alexander (September 6, 2011). "Crimson Alliance review: Born-again gauntlet". Engadget (Joystiq). Oath Inc. Retrieved October 24, 2019.
  15. ^ Lewis, Cameron (September 6, 2011). "Crimson Alliance review". Official Xbox Magazine. Future US. Archived from the original on November 13, 2011. Retrieved October 24, 2019.
  16. ^ Marchello, Sam (September 7, 2011). "Crimson Alliance - Staff Review". RPGamer. Retrieved October 24, 2019.
  17. ^ a b Phillips, Andrew (October 10, 2011). "Crimson Alliance Review". The Digital Fix. Poisonous Monkey. Archived from the original on November 13, 2011. Retrieved October 24, 2019.
  18. ^ a b Hargreaves, Roger (September 8, 2011). "Crimson Alliance review - in the red". Metro. DMG Media. Retrieved October 24, 2019.
  19. ^ Ditum, Nathan (September 17, 2011). "Crimson Alliance - review". The Observer. Guardian Media Group. Retrieved October 24, 2019.
  20. ^ Langley, Ryan (January 20, 2012). "Xbox Live Arcade by the numbers - the 2011 year in review". Gamasutra. UBM plc. Retrieved January 23, 2012.
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