Review - Dishonored

- An action/assassination hybrid from Arkane Studios.

INTRO

Dishonored is billed as a stealth game. However, it is not. Rather, stealth is simply one of the many powers that the main character has at his disposal with which to dispatch enemies, generally en masse. It is not needed - at all - in order to complete the game. On the highest difficulty setting, at one point I faced off against 9 enemies...and won. And that's without using any of the myriad powers at my disposal, such as time stop, which would have allowed me to slaughter them while they stood still. I did use a potion at one point towards the end when I was low on health, but it was unnecessary as I was never hit again and thus would have won even if I didn't use it.

The entire game can be completed without stealthing once, even on the highest difficulty. And while that is billed as player choice, it does cause one important effect - stealth, the core concept of the stealth genre, is unnecessary. And if the core concept of stealth games is stealth (and I hope we can all simply agree that that's true), but your "stealth" game doesn't ever require the use of the core concept of a stealth game, then you haven't made a stealth game. In order for a game to be of a particular genre, it must actually require the use of the core concepts of that genre.

And thus, Dishonored is not a stealth game. Ipso facto. It is, rather, an action game where stealth is one of the many, many powers at the main character's disposal. And as that is the case, the four rating categories of Dishonored will be Action, Equipment, Level Design, and Story. However, I will touch upon Stealth, since this was billed as a Stealth game and Stealth games are important to a lot people, though Stealth will not be a factor in the overall rating.

Stealth

This is not a rated category in Dishonored, because stealth is not one of the major components of the game. It is in the game, but as one of the powers that the main character has, and he never has to use it to complete the game. While this does allow the player to play the game however they want, it is impossible to call a game that never requires the use of stealth a stealth game.

For a game to be of a particular genre, the core element of that genre needs to exist in the game, and that core element needs to be integral to the gameplay. A "stealth" game where you never sneak cannot be called a stealth game. A "platformer" where you never have to jump platforms cannot be called a platformer. It's in the very name.

But, Dishonored does have stealth in it. It is one of the myriad of powers that the main character has at his disposal with which to dispatch enemies. You can shoot them with one bullet from your pistol, you can shoot them with your crossbow, you can teleport above them and insta-kill them with a drop-kill animation, you can throw them around into walls or off ledges or into electric walls with your wind power, you can cause them to be devoured by summoned rats, you can knock them unconscious with sleep-arrows and then throw their body somewhere that damages it, you can cast timestop and kill them however you want, you can time stop after they shoot at you and then posses them and walk their body around in front of their bullet and watch them kill themselves, and you can just confront them directly and slay them with your infinite-block ability and your dagger. And that's all on top of your stealth-attack insta-kill animation power. You are a god, able to destroy mere mortals at your whim.

One can stealth around in Dishonored, but with the ability to teleport and stop time at your fingertips, there's never any real reason to. Using teleport or stop time, one can easily get a "stealth" kill anytime, anywhere, and against anyone. Well, except cutscene bosses. While it is true that those powers cost mana, teleport is not a permanent drain on your mana pool if you take it slow, and time stop does take a lot of mana, but there are plenty of mana vials strewn about everywhere that you'll never run out. The only reason to actually sneak is for the self-imposed challenge, or just because you like sneaking.

Should you decide you want the challenge, one can ignore the powers and actually sneak around. The main character's penchant for attempting "stealth" missions during the daylight hours doesn't exactly make this a simple task. However, the environment is strewn about with a lot of debris, small structures, and chest-high walls, all of which can easily be hid behind. One can even lean around corners, and the enemy cannot spot a leaning character as long as the character's main body is blocked by a wall - as many jokes about "You can't see me, I'm leaning!" have noted. The enemy also don't have much of penchant for looking up, though on Very High they will look a little bit upwards. Between that fact and the ability to teleport, there is rarely any enemy threat that can't be instantly gotten away from just by teleporting upwards, and then it's merely a wait for the enemy to calm down and go back to their routines.

The enemy AI is reportedly not particularly aware until the Very High difficulty setting. On Very High, they are ready to go on alert on a second's notice. One can see their alert status, too, as a large series of lines glowing above their heads. When all the lines fill, that enemy is fully alert. On Very High, they fill really quick, but if you've got split-second reaction time, you can duck back into cover before they become fully alert. And as long as they aren't fully alerted, they will soon go back to doing their normal routine.

What's more, there are alarms that the enemy can ring. But, despite being very loud, these are only localized alarms. Leave the area, and you'll discover that no one else in the complex has been alerted to your misdeeds. Other than the last level, there aren't any alarm levels, either, so there's no real consequence for skipping loudly around out in the open, causing multiple alerts everywhere you go.

In many cases, stealth is also the easiest way to play the game. Many locations have multiple points of ingress. But each point generally is tasked with one method of entry, so there is often one stealth entry accessible by using powers and sneak, and that entry bypasses all of the challenges of the area, thus making an easy game even easier. So, it is balance issue. One only uses sneak for the challenge of sneaking, but sneaking often takes you on a path that lightens the challenge of the game - a game without much challenge even on Very Hard.

STORY  ●○○○ (poor)

The story of Dishonored is mediocre at its best, and it isn't often at its best.

The weaknesses start with the overall concept - as weak stories so often do. The main character is imprisoned for a crime he didn't commit. But before he is executed for that crime, he escapes the prison, and returning to a world much changed in his absence. A nice enough concept. Unfortunately, the main characters has only been sequestered for all of six months. Not much should have really changed in that span of time. Yet, the changes that the city have undergone are sweeping. For instance, a skyscraper-sized building made of metal is planned, organized, and built all within that 6-month span of time. A shocking change, to be sure. And not just because of the usual issues of building time and people, but also because the city was under quarantine during that time, which means no supply sips.

Okay, so in the midst of a plague in a quarantined city that has gone broke because of plague and isolation, the materials for steel girders were purchased, gathered together, transported to the city, and assembled into a massive structure - all within six months. Sure, buddy.

There are many other such headscratching instances that leave one wondering if the main character wasn't at one point going to be imprisoned for a much longer time. 20 years, for instance. And then he wins free and starts to exact his revenge after everyone has forgotten him, Monte Cristo style. Now, that would have been something. But instead, it's six months. Must be magic.

Except only the main character and a few other have magic, and it is largely hated and mistrusted by those in power. So, yeah...

And then there the fact that the main character goes from being a loyal guardsman to a master assassin at the drop of a hat. Was he always an immoral individual, that he could instantly take up that sort of job? Is he a psychopath? Does he enjoy killing people? Well, there's no answer to those questions, as Mr. Main Character a silent protagonist. Lots of game characters talk at you, but you never say anything in return. Just like Master Sergeant of HALO fame and fortune.

Actually, it a lot more like the Chosen One silent protagonists of RPGs, as there is a lot of other RPG stylings found in Dishonored. And here, I speak not just of the leveling up of gear and spells., I speak instead mainly of the structure of the missions. The main character, or the Chosen One if you will, is an assassin who takes jobs for the Resistance rather than a man seeking revenge (as is sometimes suggested). The Chosen One simply follows orders, like any good Chosen One. But he doesn't just follow orders to complete assassinations; he also takes on side quests for the various members of the city. Sometimes quite elaborate side quests.

So, the main character is an assassin in a city with some really dire stuff going on and who is killing for the Resistance in order to save the city and restore the throne to the rightful Empress, and he takes time out to do odd jobs to earn coin and other rewards from the locals. Yep, very video game RPG.

That structure does quite a disservice to the overall narrative. You're meant to be going out and slaughtering some rather vicious individuals, not for coin, but for justice. Which means, you're supposed to be focused on getting the job done. And you, the Player, are supposed to care about getting the job done. The game's story calls out to you to care over and over with (admittedly a bit hamfisted) attempts to tug at your heartstrings. But you spend so much time committing yourself to various side-quests that you end up forgetting what your actual goal is, what they represent, and why you're supposed to care about killing them. Your targets are just a picture on a loading screen. A job. A task to complete to move the story along.

A fate that is not helped by the lackluster introductions to each mission. The (shall we call them quest givers? yes, we shall) quest givers tell you the target, and say that they're bad. Yes, they say that they're "a bad guy" that needs to die - direct quote. And then the quest giver will give a simple explanation of why the target has to do die to help the cause. Not what the target has done to make them bad, but how the cause of the Resistance will be helped by the target's death. Then the mission starts, and there is a short paragraph in plain text on the loading screen explaining a little about what makes the person bad. So, no real character development here. Nothing to actually move you to wanting to complete your mission. And then you go off on your side quests, so to end up forgetting with thin motivation was handed to you.

There are ways of finding out about the "evilness" of the targets during the mission, generally through studying the "lore" in books and notes scattered about the premises, and there's often a short cutscene when spotting the target to add some poignancy to the character and the kill. But that's all after the fact. At the beginning, there's just rote job-like motivation - much as an RPG side quest. Kill these 20 wolves for me because they're bad. Or in this case, kill these two men for me because they're bad.

It's not terrible setup, just empty. Lacking in depth. As is the story of the city. There is an attempt - and a decent one - to create a decadent Victorian noirish atmosphere here in the setting and lore. But the attempt is marred by a lack of feeling in the story and characters, but most of all in the city itself. The city doesn't brood. There are no menacing characters. There is no threat (at least, not to the main character, who can slaughter everything that stands before him). No femme fatale. No dark places. No mood.

In a city beset by a zombie plague, there isn't even any fear of the plague. That particular little aspect moves a few things at the beginning, and then is largely written out of the story. The zombies provide an occasional change-up of enemies for a short stint, but the issues of the plague and zombies wandering about the city are never brought up again. And since that was technically one of the things that got the Empress removed from the throne in the first place (specifically her refusal to deal with the zombies as an enemy threat instead of treating the victims as innocents), the dropping of that element of the story is a grating loss of detail.

And really, that's the overall feeling of the story - that it is a mash-up of ideas that were thrown together over several rewrites, and which ideas never really gel together into a cohesive whole.

That mash-up of ideas is a huge issue in another, perhaps even more important, way. There's just too much story here for the running time. Dishonored is not a long game, any way you cit it. It's actually fairly short. But there's a plague, a stifling of the economy by uncaring foreigners, murder and revenge, issues of a totalitarian rule crackdown, a civil war, a resistance group willing to take extreme measures to win the day, and a decadent aristocracy ruling a besieged and belittled people who are ripe for revolution. And then there's zombies and deadly rats on the loose.

That's all too much - way too much - for the game's running time. With all of that story, none of those aspects gets dealt with fully, or even at all in many cases. Which is really unprofessional storytelling. If an important issue is introduced, you're supposed to at least have it be a part of the story. Even better if you the telling of the story examines that issue in some way, hopefully profound. But instead, the story of Dishonored is all a bunch of teases.

And that isn't just unprofessional, it is also unfulfilling. The players gets interested in some part of the story, and it gets dropped. They get interested in another facet of the story, and that gets dropped as well. And thus, the player is left in a constant state of unfulfillment. That is, if they listen to the story instead of simply being overawed at the nifty death animations (of which there are many).

Having one of those story elements in the story does not make the story about those elements. Just mentioning them doesn't get you any points. A theme like that actually has to be woven into the story, into the city and the motivations of the people within it, for the story to be about that theme. To do what Dishonored has done is the same as namedropping in polite conversation. It's empty and a bit rude.

The actual day-to-day writing of Dishonored is decent, if uninspired. The conversations of the various inhabitants fits, even if it mostly just rote material However, the uninspired writing mixes with the lackluster feeling of the writing to make more of a plodding story experience than a dark, decadent, brooding one. Which is not good for a noir story. Hell, the daylight setting probably wasn't a good choice for noir, either. A strange choice, then, all around. A stealth game and a noir story set during daylight hours.

It all leads to a lackluster story that is easily forgettable. In fact, I've already forgotten most of it.

EQUIPMENT ●●○○ (mediocre)

Dishonored has way too much equipment. Now, before anyone jumps down my throat, having lots of equipment is a good thing, if all of that equipment has some use or there is a tradeoff between different items, thus making all of that equipment useful in some way. In Dishonored, though, there is no use for anything. Without any equipment but your knife, you're already a killing machine. Equipment just allows you to kill things in more fantastic ways.

Specifically, the main character gets access to a wide array of gadgets, from an insta-kill, heat-seeking pistol (that's not what it says on the box, but that's what it is in practice), to insta-drop sleep quarrels and a crossbow, to insta-kill sticky traps. All of these allow you to dish out death quickly and easily in a myriad of ways (as the "instas" suggest).

And then you start getting super powers.

Yes, you're already a killing machine by yourself, with just a dagger. Not only that, though, you're a killing machine with access to a bunch of gadgets that would make James Bond proud. And then you get super powers.

You don't need super powers. You're already way more powerful than anyone you meet in the game, even on the Very Hard difficult setting. But still you get them on top of everything else. And they allow you to stop time (and kill enemies at your leisure), teleport a short distance (and get behind or above enemies to kill them at your leisure), summon a horde of killer rats (which can consume enemies in a disturbingly short time), wind wall (allowing you to knockdown enemies at will, or throw them into various environmental hazards that instantly kill them), amongst other powers.

You have so much insta-death equipment that when you meet an enemy, you have to decide how you feel like slaughtering them today, not consider carefully how you're going to get to them to kill them. No, they're dead as soon as they come into your line of sight. It's just a matter of deciding how you want to do it. You become, literally, a god amongst men.

You're so super-powered that there is absolutely no challenge to the game. Dishonored can be won on Very Hard as easily as if it was a grade-school learning game. Nothing stops you, nothing challenges you, nothing threatens you - ever. In the entirety of a single run through the game on Very Hard (and the only run through ever made), I chalked up only two deaths. The first was when I was testing a trap wall that they said would instantly kill you if you touched it, which I did in order to see if it would actually instantly kill you (it does). The second was when I went out into the open to see how many people I could kill without ever using tactics, powers, gadgets, or potions, just button mashing (answer: 6).

Dishonored is so light on challenge that it is ridiculous. A setting of Very Hard implies that it should be at least hard. But nothing impedes your godlike progress. The only reason a competent action-game player needs ever to even contemplate reloading the game is if they're looking to get a clean run. That, or they're obsessive and won't use potions or powers (because those cost mana, which requires potions to replenish).

All that said, the powers are a joy to use, and it's a pleasure to pull out an old-school pistol and blast away with its single shot. Everything feels great to use, and it looks even better in action. The trouble is only how terribly overpowered everything is. After all, when did muskets become smart weapons (which is the only way I can think of that a shot from the hip fired merely in the general direction of an opponent always results in a shot to the heart and an install kill, and that on Very Hard).

It's all just plain ridiculous. And that sucks all of the joy out of the gameplay for anyone who is actually looking for a any sort challenge. On the other hand. those who are looking to fulfill their dreams of being a demi-god, Spartan, power-suited Master Sergeant, they will be overjoyed at what Dishonored has to offer them.

ACTION ●○○○ (poor)

The action of Dishonored is strangely absent. Well, not so strange, really. Without challenge there is no real action. Without challenge there is no hook with which to heighten the tension. Without challenge there is no substance upon which to build a foundation of excitement.

Without challenge there is just an empty hollow where a game should be.

Using your powers and gadgets is easy and exciting, and stealthing around has its usually thrilling charm. But none of it matters, since you're just playpenning with it all. And soon enough, the lack of challenge drains the excitement out of even the most fantastic powers. Being able to cast time stop and do anything you want to the enemy is thrilling a couple of times just for the sheer novelty of it. And then the fact that you're hitting unmoving objects begins to take its toll.

What sense of victory can there truly be if the enemy never stood a chance in hell? In Dishonored, you are Superman, flying around beating up on civilians. There's nothing much here but ego-tripping.

The only challenge that exists is in the rare boss fight. And that is when Dishonored is at its best - dueling against another opponent who also has magic. Those opponents can face you on something like your own terms, even if they don't have as many powers as you do and have no support gadgets. Those people, and only those people, have a chance of killing you. (At least they do on the Very Hard difficulty setting. It's doubtful they're much of a threat on lower settings.) What's more, those battles are the most well-thought-out. They are compelling, since you know these people and what they stand for and their place in the world long before you ever confront them. They fight with unique abilities, making them interesting and at least challenging in having to adapt to their fresh abilities. And they fight you in a unique location that is adapted to their particular skills. All that makes for good and compelling combat.

On the other hand, Boss Fights and Stealth are anathema. Stealth and mandatory fights or pretty much anathema. Thank god Dishonored isn't a Stealth game. As an action/assassin game, there is no reason at all why it can't have boss fights. And as the only remotely challenging part of the game, they would be sorely missed if they were removed.

Of course, if the rest of the gameplay were made at all compelling, I might change my tune on that particular aspect of the game.

LEVEL-DESIGN ●●○○ (mediocre)

The locations of Dishonored are often inventive. Maybe not inventive in choice of locale, which is pretty bog standard, but in the interpretation of that locale. Each location has its own unique take on the classic locales. Such as a bridge that must be crossed being a giant drawbridge with the ability to walk under, over, above, or on it.

But level design is much more than fanciful fantastic scenery. Though I was often impressed with the sights before my eyes, I was not impressed with the rest of the level design.  Though I enjoyed the fact the most locations had multiple points of ingress, good open level design is more than just slapping multiple entrances onto a location.

First off, the goal for a location with multiple points of ingress should be to have each entrance have its own challenge to achieve, each in its own unique way. But with Dishonored, the stealth entrance to a complex generally allows one to bypass all of the challenges of that area of a level. You evade all of the enemies, not just by sneaking by them, but by moving outside of their range of sight completely. When traversing that path, you are never at any risk of being spotted (or almost never on Very Hard), and since you teleport around, there's never any risk of falling or missing a difficult jump in order to reach a difficult entry point. Instead, the stealth entrance is the easy entrance. The only difficulty is in spotting the path to reach it.

The challenging path is to simply charge in, guns blazing. And it's not that challenging. Particularly with time stop and an insta-kill gun. And then there's often the true challenging path, which is using stealth to sneak along the ground. But you do that only by self-limitation, not because the game asks you to.

And on the other side of things, the enemy aren't all that astute, which becomes a problem because there aren't enough of them. Maybe there would be plenty if they were tougher, better armed, and/or more astute. Or if they could work together. As it is, though, they are usually thin on the ground and easily avoided even if you don't use powers. If you do use powers, they are often easily avoided so far out of their range of sight that they have no chance of ever even spotting you.

There isn't a lot of variety of enemies, either. So, it's not like there are later enemies with better eyesight. There are guards with sword and pistol, and on the criminal side there are thugs and then there are tough thugs. All of those being slight variations on Fighter. Then there are zombies, who are just what they sound like, though there aren't many of them in the game. Hordes of rats are very occasionally run into, but aren't really a challenge. Maybe if you cause more chaos than I did (which causes more rats to appear), enough would gather to make a viable opponent. Maybe. And there are some piranhas-like creatures in the water, not usually encountered unless you choose the water entrance as a route. And that's it for the bulk of the game.

Look at that list of enemies again. They're all normal creatures. Not a one has any defense against magic. And that list of enemies is what you run into for the bulk of the game. Thus, you are a god amongst mortals. There aren't even any regular variations, like archer or rogue to change things up. In an odd choice, it isn't until near the very end of the game that two new enemies are introduced - the only two special units that require a change-up of tactics. But even then, these two special units are few and placed such that they can be completely avoided. Not avoided as in being sneaked by; avoided as in moving so far around them that they are never encountered, only seen at a distance.

Much could have been done with those enemies, utilizing their powers and inventive level design to create interesting challenges for the player. But, as is the case for the entirety of Dishonored, the game carefully avoids presenting any challenge whatsoever by placing these new enemies where they are easily avoided. The only way the player must face them is if the player chooses to face them.

Traps do make an (exceedingly rare) appearance, but there is only one type of trap - tripe-wire launchers, or should I say, trip-rope. Yes, the traps use a nice, thick rope that is easily spotted. And that is the only trap in the game. Stationary turrets and electrified walls could be considered traps, or even opponents, but they are large, glowing, obvious, and also slow (in the case of the turret, as the wall is, of course, unmoving). The turret is no more a threat than the stationary wall is, and is usually even more easily dispatched since the wall is often placed in a guarded position, unlike the turrets.

A lot has been done to make the appearance of each location unique and decadently beautiful - a stunning feat considering what appears to have been a limited building palette. I was frequently impressed with the interesting take the developers had on what would otherwise be the same-old, same-old locations. It is only too bad that there was very little gameplay across all of these stunning locations.

The best and most memorable level turned out to be the aristocratic party. Most people would say it was the whorehouse, which has some interesting scenes, to be sure. But the whorehouse is remembered for its shock value, which isn't all that shocking with the limited palette and limited animations on show. The party, in contrast, is the only level the tells you about the world intrinsically in the way that it is built. You actually learn about the people of the city, and even do it by interacting with them in their own abode. And you interact with them not just for the sake of interacting, but with multiple level-based goals in mind. Everything in the level channels in towards the assassination of the target, even the sub quests. And the locked upstairs remains locked to even someone of your powers, and thus must be approached through alternative means. Not particularly challenging alternative means, to be sure. But still.

This was a cohesive and coherent level that actually said something about the world that we are interacting with.  Out of all of the levels after the first prison level, this is the one that said - you are here in this city and this is why you are here to do the deed. The level could have used more reliance on stealth and stiffer resistance from the enemy. But that can be said of all of the levels, even the ostensible last (but not final) level.

Speaking of the ostensible final level, even on Very Hard difficulty, the final level, usually a bear of a level, in Dishonored is a breeze. In fact, it can even end up being shockingly short, if you do everything right. Which actually was a nice way to do it. This isn't a remarkable level, like the party was, but it was level made with a cohesive design, and one where your actions actually mattered to the coarse of the level. Not to mention, the level is the only stealth level in the entire game. Which is not to say that stealth is necessary to complete the level. It's not. But it is a level where stealth is challenging (to a degree) and it matters. This is a taste of real stealth. Unfortunately, it is too little, too late, coming as it does very near the end of the game.

The background level-design of Dishonored is often beautiful, and sometimes shows sparks of great inspiration. And the multiple methods of entering complexes are a joy to see and use. Would that the gameplay parts of the level design were equally as varied and inspired. Would that the level design also offered challenge. When the Very Hard difficulty setting offers no challenge whatsoever, there is something seriously wrong.

INTERFACE ●●●○ (good)

The appearance of the world of Dishonored is compelling. Some amount of artistry went into the world design. Similarly, the player's interface with the powers and abilities of the main character are smooth and simple. The game does use a console wheel, but there is also a key line for PC users, in addition.

Despite the game's console roots, there is no hiccup when using a mouse and keyboard here. Porting was very well done, generally speaking. The icons for the powers are interesting, but even moreso, the effects when using the powers not only alert you clearly to your use of the power, but add a great deal to the exciting feel of using the power. For instance, teleport could have felt remarkably bland, since it's just a disappear and reappear somewhere else on the map. But the graphic of Blink and the slow-to-rush-jolt of movement adds hugely to the experience.

All well and good. On the other hand, when the best thing about your game is the graphics and UI, you've got some issues.

The music and sound is the main weak point here. Neither of those aspects adds to the intended ambiance of the game. Both are merely utilitarian. Only during the final push does the sound ever rise to the occasion and help to give impetus to the melancholy feeling that the ending was intended to give. And even then, I wasn't sure that the sound actually struck the intended note and did not simply strike a note. 

When looked at overall, because of the weak gameplay, the fine interface simply adds to the feeling that Dishonored is a slick exterior over a hollow core. Which does not surprise me, as that is also the feeling that arises when attempting to eke out enjoyment while slaughtering nearly the defenseless, unintelligent mooks that are all the game has to offer as enemies.

ENJOYMENT 

Dishonored looks cool and feels cool in action. But it's all surface appearance. Like a shiny summer blockbuster, it's all flash, no substance. There is some style, a bit, hidden away here and there, and those flashes leave me feeling better about the game than I otherwise would so. However, in so many ways, Dishonored is a jumbled mess of ideas.

And I have my suspicions (wholly without documentation) that Dishonored is a game designed by committee or suit-dictate, throwing together whatever sounded cool at the time, altering the game's plot and levels as needed in order to accommodate the new additions of "coolness". Which usually leads to a jumbled hack of a mess that is quite uncool and unfun. But somehow, despite its unenlightened committee design process, Dishonored managed to retain some of the "cool" from its messy mass of "cool" features. At least, that's my suspicion.

For the Final Verdict here, the average is between two points, so - as always - I get to decide which direction to round in. The average is really close to the upper point, which I do take into consideration. Plus, I did finish the game, which does not usually happen for me with games with such poor gameplay. I play games to be challenged in some way, not to live out power fantasies. But I did finish it, and that would normally mean that I enjoyed it, at least a little. And that would mean going up to mediocre.

But here, I am not sure. The game is short. Short enough that it doesn't wear out its welcome despite its meager gameplay. Were it much longer, I'm not certain that I would have finished. The "coolness" did not have its intended awe-inspiring effect upon me. And thus, I am forced to round down - rounding down because of the sheer lack of gameplay.

It should be noted here, though, that most people will not be as mortally offended by that aspect (or rather its lack thereof), and would instead round up. In fact, enlivened by the "coolness" and the ego-trip of being a god amongst mortals, they are likely (as many have done) to round up an extra point or two. Because people like cool, just like they like slick summer blockbusters.

At least, they will round up extra for a while. Until time moves on and the graphics are no longer anywhere near the cutting edge, when the shiny cool fades away. Then it's back down to mediocre it goes, or even down to poor for those of us who want actual gameplay.

FINAL VERDICT ●○○○ (poor)

* this review was made after completing Dishonored on Very Hard difficulty on the PC