Diablo's unique style and engrossing gameplay helped make it one of the best selling and most loved titles of all time. The strange thing is that unlike most top selling games, Diablo has not had many clones to call its own which could be considered both a blessing and a curse. The developers of Lamentation Sword must have noticed this market ripe for exploitation when they decided to make their game, as it follows directly in the vein that Diablo created. With my hopes high and my anticipation great I delved into the remarkable realm of Lamentation Sword and found myself repeatedly returning to its enriched environments and superb animation. But wait a second you say how did such a remarkable title come out of nowhere? My answer to your simple but inquisitive question is simply that I just lied my ass off just to get you to read the rest of the review. Lamentation Sword (or LameSword as I like to call it) was the most pathetic excuse for a game I have played this year and my choice to review it has created a new definition of depression in my life (ok so I visited the hyper-bole recently but give me a break). My only consolidation is that by writing this review I can hopefully convince the majority of gamers to STAY AWAY!

There is no point with a pre-blurb here as we all know graphics and sound are the two most looked at elements in any computer game. When they suck, the game has to have killer gameplay to make up for its deficiencies in these areas. The graphics and sound are so primitive that I don't dare compare Lamentation Sword's multimedia elements with any other game lest I put that other, unsuspecting game down. To be courteous I will mention that the sound effects consist of about 4 different loops of sounds such as an owl hooting and crickets chirping (over and over and over and over again always the same tone and pitch). But let us not wallow in the downfalls of the sound effects; we should try and rejoice in what else this game has to offer. For those of you who own a PSX and have played silent hill, the voice acting in Lamentation Sword should be quite familiar, although much, much worse. The voice acting does not follow an rules of punctuation or conversational dialogue: it sounds as if the narrator is illiterate. I'm pretty sick of the sound already so I'll discuss the hand drawn backgrounds and deliciously disgusting sprites. Lamentation Sword tries to compare with Baldur's Gate's graphics but falls so short that the all mighty Gate didn't even flinch. The Sprites are bland and the animation for fighting and spells consists of approximately 3, no maybe 4 frames. The backgrounds are OK, and I stress that blandness to the largest possible degree. Unfortunately the rest of the terrible graphics, from the red blob fireball to the "I walk like I have a pole up my ass" animation, ruins the game completely.

Gameplay takes the simple point and click interface of Diablo and rips out the good and understandable story, the fun side quests and the simple complexity that made Diablo so famous. Instead Lamentation Sword brings boredom quicker (MUCH quicker) than flossing your teeth. The interface is point and click but there are also annoying key commands you must memorize and I didn't see any hot key mapping anywhere in the game. The story is about some devil being evil and you walking around beating up creatures to stop the evil devil from being his evil self. Sound repetitive enough yet? Artificial intelligence in games has advanced greatly over the past 5 years. But as I expected Lamentation Sword left me asking, "AI, what's that?" Other than that there is simply not much more to talk about other than the gameplay follows the rich tradition that Lamentation Sword has already shown for itself in its graphics and sound!

The so called "funfactor" rating is pretty damn subjective, but I can also pretty much guarantee that you won't even bring that phrase to mind when telling your characters to kill the next idiotic monster. I did have one person approach me saying (essentially) that Lamentation Sword was God's gift to man, but then again some people said that about 3D Railroad Master; enough said? I thought so.

I couldn't find anyone willing to test multiplayer with me (or anyone willing to even install this forsaken game) so I'll just leave this rating blank. But I highly doubt that the graphics, sound AND gameplay will suddenly leap to new heights once you take up the game with a friend. But that's just me.

Hmmmmm.. summation, what should I say. Quite frankly, nothing. Lamentation Sword can't even inspire a totally made up and BS’ed conclusion so there just ain't going to be one.