Crimson Alliance - Xbox 360 Arcade

    Crimson Alliance is a Cooperative Action/RPG developed by Certain Affinity and published by Microsoft Studios. Released in 2011, Crimson Alliance has caused a lot of confusion on the Xbox Live Marketplace. The game uses the Freemium model of sales in which you can download the game for free, though with limited gameplay. Gameplay time and level limits keep the free game from having full functionality. For a price, you can download one or all three of the game's characters, fully unlocking the game for that class. A huge number of online message board topics have been created since the games release saying that "Microsoft messed up! Crimson Alliance is accidentally listed as free! Download it before they notice!" Sorry pal, while it is free, it is meant to be, and only offers a taste of the full game.

    Crimson Alliance tells the tale of three warriors on a quest to take back the city of Byzan from the evil queen, Soul Siren. Once a great city, Byzan is now overrun by the queen's evil minions. The three must fight their way through the city and confront Soul Siren and restore the city to its once great state.

    The three warriors fall into the three major RPG classes. You have Moonshade, the rogue assassin who fights with short-swords and throwing daggers, Direwolf, the ancient wizard who harnesses the power of the elements, and Gnox, who utilizes a classic warrior's sword and shield. Each character has his or her own back story, though nothing extremely deep.

So uhh, where are the bad guys? I told you we should have turned right at the dark tower!

    As previously mentioned, Crimson Alliance is a cooperative game, allowing up to four players to work together against Soul Siren's hordes of demonic minions. Yes, I said four people, and yes, I'm aware that there are only three characters. You can play as any combination of the three characters, including multiple versions of the same character. Lets just pretend that all three of the classes are part of a quadruplet family. Luckily the game allows for a decent bit of customization so that there aren't 4 clones on the screen.

    When you begin the game, you are given the ability to customize your chosen character's color palette. This makes your choice seem a bit more unique, especially if you're playing in a game that has multiple people playing the same warrior. The other major customization comes into play with choosing which equipment to use. Each character has three equipment slots in which they can use armor, a main weapon, and an offhand weapon. Each character has his or her own unique weapons to equip, depending on class. In an interesting spin on the RPG genre, your character's stats are completely dependent on your equipped gear. Different gear gives different bonuses to your attack and health skills. Each character has three main attack skills, and by carefully choosing your equipment, you can customize your character's strengths to your gameplay style. Additionally, each character has a special move that is usable after a certain number of enemies are defeated.

Direwolf likes to re-enact Ben Franklin's kite experiment, and provides his own lightning.

    Crimson Alliance plays out level to level via a map screen. Players select the level they would like to play next from the map and then enter the mission. Each mission is basically a top-down dungeon crawl with numerous enemies to fight as well as secret areas to find. Collectable items in the form of heart containers and Soul Anchors can be found throughout each level. Heart containers increase your maximum health when you find four, and Soul Anchors increase the level of your special abilities. At the end of each level your score is tallied up and a medal is awarded for high scores. These high scores are based on factors such as enemy kills, time it took to beat the level, and secret areas found. The medals are only really there for bragging rights though, as I never found any benefit to getting gold medals other than achievements.

    I found Crimson Alliance to be a very enjoyable game to play with my wife. I can only imagine that as you add more players to the mix that things would get even more hectic and fun. On the flipside, I can definitely see how the game might not be as fun if you're playing by yourself. Luckily, the game allows you to join up with other players online on Xbox Live.

Icy what you did there.

    I found the game's graphic style to be pleasant. The enemies and characters have an almost cartoon quality to them which fits the somewhat silly tone of the game. Gameplay-wise I never ran into any glitches or problems, though I found the game's story to be pretty thin. Clearly the game is more about fighting the hordes than telling you a memorable story.

    I have seen Crimson Alliance on sale multiple times on the Xbox Live Marketplace, so I'd highly recommend you pick it up and give it a shot at a reduced price. At full price the trial game is free, but you can buy each character one at a time for $10, or all three at once for $15 (clearly the better deal).

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