However, there are some problems. The biggest problem with game play is that it is all far too easy. An individual fight may be difficult, but if you manage to win, all you have to do is cast a spell to create a portal leading back to your hometown. Once there, you can rejuvenate completely, then go back to the dungeon through the portal. This removes all the fear involved with going into a dungeon too hard for your characters. You can burn all your energy on the first fight, go home to rejuvenate, and return at full strength ready for the next monster. This turns the entirety of Darkstone into a cakewalk and destroys any sense of a job well done. Also, a lesser quibble, because all levels are designed randomly when you start a new game, there is a distinct lack of style and purpose to all the level designs. We all know how important the design of a dungeon is in games like Quake, and while it is not as important as in Darkstone, human designed levels would have add a lot.

The controls of Darkstone are well thought out, but flawed. You control your characters' movement with the mouse by clicking where you want them to go. You interact with objects by clicking on them. If you want to pull a lever, simply click and your character will walk over and pull it. If you want to attack a creature, just click on them repeatedly. The faster you click, the better your characters performance. You control your viewpoint with the keyboard arrow buttons. The fatal flaw of this system is that the pointer is not accurate. You will often end up clicking on the wrong thing, and that can lead to some weird results. We've run into several situations where we were fighting a creature in a doorway. When we tried to attack the creature by clicking on it repeatedly, we ended up opening and closing the door half a dozen times. This all makes for an intuitive and simple system of control that requires too much of your attention to make things work right.

In addition to controlling your characters, you have some control over the viewpoint. The viewpoint automatically tracks your characters, and with the arrows you can zoom and rotate. Unfortunately, you have to constantly change your viewpoint in order to see around walls, debris, and to get a clear view of where your characters are going. Other games don't require nearly as much fiddling with viewpoints, and we think Delphine could have done a better job here. They should at least have provided elevation controls, and it would be a lot of fun to have a first-person viewpoint as well.

One of the best things about Diablo is the character building aspect. You always want to go one level deeper and open one more chest in search of that awesome sword or wand. Darkstone has that aspect as well. As your characters advance, you get to put points into their various attributes to change them into the kind of character you want. They can learn skills, acquire more spells and improve their equipment. Darkstone brings up the same addictive feeling EverQuest players get. "I just need to gain one more level of experience, then I'll go to bed!" Six hours later the rooster crows, your character has advanced five levels, and you've got to go to work. It's all in good fun. Due to the ease of play and the speed of advancement, Darkstone is actually not quite as addictive as EverQuest or Diablo II, but it is still fun and addictive.