Disciples II: Rise of the Elves review (PC)

All in all, Disciples II fans should have fun learning the nuances of this new race. Apart from the obvious superficial distinctions, the differences between all Disciples II factions have always been quite subtle, and the elves are no exception. These differences are meaningful in practice and are interesting to learn. You'll get to pit this new faction against all the others, thus creating new game combinations and strategies.

The campaign, or "saga," in Rise of the Elves consists of eight lengthy scenarios that ought to give even experienced Disciples II players a hearty challenge. These scenarios are filled with simple, scripted sequences, which move the story along and also force you to advance cautiously through each map. The story of Rise of the Elves directly continues the storyline of Disciples II and is conveyed via spoken narration between the campaign missions as well as through text-based dialogue in the missions themselves. It's not terribly coherent, but that's fine, since the Disciples games have always had a surreal quality to them that's equally intact in Rise of the Elves.

Considering it's based on a two-year-old game, Rise of the Elves still looks surprisingly good. As with the earlier expansion packs, this one supports resolutions of up to 1280x1024, which makes the maps look even denser, though in some ways it's even harder to scrutinize for such important details as enemy units or wandering monsters. The audio also holds up rather well, and, as mentioned, the new music sounds very good. On the other hand, much like how some of the new elf units don't look that good, they don't sound that good either. However, many of the new sounds are well done, and the narrator for the campaign, who isn't the same ominous narrator of Disciples II but is ominous nonetheless, also does a good job. For good measure, Rise of the Elves packs in an updated version of the scenario editor/random map generator included with the previous expansions. It's not an ideal random scenario generator, but it does allow you to easily build the framework for a respectable custom map.

Rise of the Elves retails for more than the earlier expansion packs, but it offers a lot more. Though fans of Disciples II must be anxious for a true third installment in the series, for now, this is the closest thing they'll get. The new faction introduced in Rise of the Elves, while not quite as visually stunning or likable as the four main forces of the Disciples universe, is still appealing enough to carry this expansion pack, and this new faction makes it recommendable to both general fans of fantasy-themed turn-based strategy games and fans of Disciples.