With just a few days to back this Kickstarter, is it too late for Liminal’s debut?
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Kickstarter, the proving grounds for many a game has another hopeful recruit. Enter The Memory of Eldurim, the debut project of indie company Liminal Games. This small, Utah based company, is developing something that promises to be a mix of free roaming RPG fun and uncompromising combat. Not unlike some sort of Dark Souls and Skyrim lovechild. With only a few days to conquer their monolithic target of $150,000, I’m left to wonder whether they will continue to try to make such an epic dream a reality.

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You could be mistaken, looking at these screenshots, for thinking that Bethesda had a hand in making the the landscapes. These beautiful scenic environments are stunning to behold at this stage of development, and I’m sure Liminal Games will be improving and building upon such solid foundation blocks. During the demo you get free roam of a small portion of what is planned, an isolated island that really showcases how they will be developing their environments.

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A little more work is needed on character renders, as good as this pre-alpha is, it still needs a little more work. The character’s neck looks a little out of place and the lack of intractable items can leave you unenthusiastic about exploring. The same goes for enemy AI. When battling in hand to hand combat they can definitely hold their own, however, when faced with fire spells, they do little but stand and take it, (which made me feel unduly godly and brought out the worst in me, I did have a wicked good time frying people in their armour). It would also be nice if there were some variety with the enemies encountered in the demo. It’s as much to be expected from a game that is still so very young, and despite needing that essential polish, The Memory of Eldurim has what it takes to become a very good game, with a little more time and hard work.

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The music, from what I’ve heard so far lends to its epic feel. The soundtrack is something so often that games do not utilise properly, The Memory of Eldurim manages to find the balance between providing good music that’s still a pleasure to listen to, whilst not being immersion breaking.

Combat and controls are easily acclimatised to, despite its bugs it’s fun to play and I can see that, if it manages to grow into the game that it aspires to be, people will be playing hours into the triple figures.

Having managed to get a hold of the CryTek engine gives me a lot of hope for the future of this project, it’s certainly something not easily acquired, and I can only hope that Liminal will use this to their advantage. I’d hate to see such an ambitious dream die, so they’ve got my backing. I will look forward to witnessing a more complete version of The Memory of Eldurim, and I hope it rises to the challenge, just to keep the big boys on their toes.

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Thoughts? Comments? Counting the days ’till Dark Souls 2?
Use that comment box below.
Escapingirl.

Mentioned on Episode 19 of the Ready Player 2 podcast : http://readyplayertwo.co.uk/episode-19-the-microwave-of-malice/
Kickstarter page can be found here: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/liminalgames/the-memory-of-eldurim
Greenlight them on steam: http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=192707607
Images courtesy of Liminal games : http://liminalgames.com/
Finally, go follow them on twitter. They deserve far more followers than they have right now: https://twitter.com/LiminalGames