Long, long, ago, in a faraway land begins the story behind this game.  Literally the game starts with a woman narrating the story, I assume a mother reading to her child.  Anyway, it goes like this, after raiding a tomb and unleashing an imprisoned entity known as "The Black Plague", Conan is knocked unconscious and stripped of his magical armour. He finds himself floating in the sea a while later and goes on a quest to find out what happened to him and what the monster he unleashed was.

Well start off though with the game options, which I’ll be honest there isn’t many of.  You’ve got the basic on/off functions to fade the HUD, the vibration and gore, though as its 18 rated, why would you want the gore turning off?  Maybe just me though.  You’ve also got the usual audio/visual tweaks and subtitles if required.  In the ‘Extras’ section, you get full game statistics, including favourite combo and number of limbs removed!  There are also, 46 unlockable video clips and images, cheats to “Master all moves”; “Armour power mode”; “Song of Death mode” and “Invulnerability mode”.  Now, I’m no fan of using cheats in games, especially not globally like these, but each to their own.  This is one of those games that if you die, you just go back to the last check point, which does question the need for these cheats.  To finish it off, there’s 49 achievements possible and an online leader board.

Anyway, I don’t like to start being negative too early into any review, but the first thing you notice about this game is the more than ordinary graphics.  They remind me of Farcry Predator, really bordering on disappointing for a next generation game.  You do start to get in the story mode though from the outset, as it starts with a woman reading the story, much like a parent reading to a child.  You’re straight into the hack and slash action though from there and this is where another couple of things, metaphorically, spring out at you.  Firstly, the camera angles in the game… they stay fixed, kind of a few paces behind the action and always facing straight forward.  Initially, it was a bit of a challenge getting used to the right thumb stick causing the character to roll, instead of moving the camera.  The second thing you notice is how easy the attacks are, pick up and play fits this ideally.  Even the extra moves you can learn as you go along are relatively easy to master and there are plenty of those throughout the game.

There are also plenty of weapons and shields to pick up as you go along.  When you defeat enemies, you generally get the chance to pick up what they drop, which means you can carry two swords (one on your back) and a shield.  Saying that, I only managed to carry the sword on my back once, I’m not sure how I managed it, so I guess it may have just been a fluke.  You can see what’s available to pick up easily enough, as when you’re over something; an icon appears in the corner of the screen.  The same goes for pots you can drink from to increase your health, a hand appears in the corner and using the action key does the rest.  You can also gain extra health (green runes) from pots, crates, etc. (depends on the level) by smashing them, so save the drinkable pots if you can.  There’s also chests knocking about, they’re usually off the beaten track, break these open to obtain red runes which accrue points to learn new moves.  I ought to mention that killing enemies can also produce red runes as well.  Use these new found skills often enough and you unlock achievements, which in all honesty is a doddle, it’s usually just a case of killing enough people with each one.

As you progress through the levels then, you do get to use other weapons like ballista’s to defeat ships and guard towers.  The good thing about this sort of weapon is, you’re also hassled by enemies attacking you while using these things, so naturally timing is everything.  Some of the bosses can be a challenge, but there’s plenty of save points throughout and if you lose a life, you just go back to the last checkpoint.  The cut scenes between levels just reinforce the story feel of the game, by being narrated all the time and showing video clips to back that narration up.  Now this may sound annoying, but it’s quite enjoyable, it gives the game a motion picture epic feel about it.  There’s also plenty of game time to be had, despite being tunnelled through levels.  By this I mean, you’re really limited to the area you can move around on screen, so despite the urge to roam around, the only real chance to go “off the beaten track” is to find treasure chests.  I’m going to leave it at that though, because to be brutally honest there isn’t anything really different to tell you about.  OK, there’ll be bits and pieces that I’ve missed, but nothing that are really going to swing the vote either way.