The Legacy of Kain games have always filled a niche in the action landscape with their unique blend of exploration and exposition. The long-running stories of Kain and Raziel, while at times bordering on pretentious, have nonetheless thrilled game players with their upscale tales of vampire lore in the fictional realm of Nosgoth. Legacy of Kain: Defiance is the fifth game in Crystal Dynamic's sophisticated vampire saga, and with it the developers have promised to bring some closure to the often meandering storyline. It also marks the first time that players can take control of both Raziel and Kain in the same adventure. With a strong premise and past successes backing it up, Defiance should be one of the better games of 2003. I'm sad to say though that the game has taken several steps backwards in terms of game design, and is ultimately the most disappointing game I've played this year.

Defiance is divided into chapters, during each of which you will alternately play as either the flesh-and-blood vampire Kain or the soul-sucking wraith Raziel. Both characters possess similar abilities that should be familiar if you've played any of the previous Soul Reaver or Blood Omen games. They can run, jump, float, climb walls, use telekinesis and hack their opponents to pieces, though only Raziel can swim. Both wield the legendary Soul Reaver blade, Kain using its material form and Raziel taking up its spirit form. And as you would expect, both vampire characters need to feed to keep their health from depleting. Kain can do so from up close and afar, chomping down on a victim's neck or sucking blood through the air from a distant opponent. It's gruesome and cool. Raziel has a similar mechanic that allows him to consume the souls of his opponents. Most feeding comes by defeating enemies, though there are "troughs" scattered about each level that you can use to replenish your health.

Defiance features a more robust combat scheme than its predecessors that allows you to string moves together into combos. Kain and Raziel can slash at their enemies, toss them into the air, and execute a number of ground- and air-based special maneuvers that are unlocked as you progress through the game. You can juggle airborne enemies and even knock them around using your telekinesis powers, making for some interesting (and bloody) encounters. It's a little disappointing that you can no longer use other weapons (like swords and flaming torches), though you can still use torches and spikes in the environment to kill your enemies. And unlike Soul Reaver 2, you can attack multiple enemies by making use of the left analog stick in combat, so you're never completely powerless against multiple foes. You can also acquire elemental powers for the reaver, though this factors into puzzles more so than actual combat.

You initially take control of Kain as he sets out to find the double-crossing time-streamer Moebius, and right from the start the problems that plague the game are readily evident. Instead of using the free-roaming, over the shoulder camera system seen in previous games, Crystal Dynamics has curiously chosen to implement a "cinematic" camera. Similar to Devil May Cry, this system uses pre-determined camera placement intended to show you the best angle of the action. It rarely does, however, and most of the time you'll find yourself moving in odd directions because of the camera shifts. It is very easy to lose your bearings while navigating the games' many nearly identical corridors, and the lack of a map only adds to the confusion. It's a problem that players simply shouldn't have to deal with in a fourth-generation software title, especially considering that Crystal Dynamics should have the game-making experience to avoid such obvious pitfalls.

There are other game-busting problems as well. In most games, objects that come between you and the camera grow translucent to allow you to see what's going on, but not here. Foreground objects will routinely obscure your vision, forcing you to "play blind". Adding to the frustration is that you'll often be required to manipulate objects through telekinesis, but these objects are only accessible from the right camera perspective. There is no first-person aiming ability like there was in Soul Reaver 2, and hunting around for the right spot to use these abilities is not my idea of fun. And while the combat is a notch better than previous games, the placement and appearance of enemies is cheap and frustrating. You will many times clear a room of enemies and collect a key of some sort, only to find the return route re-populated with more adversaries who have appeared out of thin air. It gets very old very quickly.

Puzzle design has also taken a few unfortunate steps backwards in Defiance. Raziel will still be required to shift between the spectral and material realms, but doing so is really only necessary when faced with an impasse in the environment. Shifting to spectral usually provides a platform or passage that allows you to proceed. Integration of this very cool mechanic into the core puzzle-solving gameplay could have been a lot tighter. The puzzles in Kain's chapters are even less compelling and usually amount to nothing more than fetch quests. The basic premise of nearly every level seems to be fight, find key, fight, use key, fight, find key, etc. The game becomes horribly repetitive and boring after only a few chapters, with little incentive to continue playing. There are some icons to find that will unlock concept art and the like, but I'm not sure these will be sufficient reason to continue playing this very mediocre action game.

Defiance fares pretty well in the graphics department, but this is primarily due to the games' excellent art direction. The world of Nosgoth is brought to life with fantastic architecture and beautiful countryside landscapes. Textures generally seem very blurry though, and make the game look dated compared to other software that has been released this year. The Kain and Raziel models are nicely detailed as always, though they show little improvement over their Blood Omen 2 and Soul Reaver 2 counterparts. Enemy characters are competently modeled and animated, but otherwise are nothing to write home about. Visual effects like blood spray, flames and reaver effects all look pretty cool, but the collision detection is very suspect and makes the game look cheap at times. The most noteworthy visual effect is the "blur" that permeates the spectral realm, which produces a suitable amount of disorientation and distortion. I only wish you could turn it off, as it does get tiresome after a while.

Despite Dolby Digital 5.1 support, Legacy of Kain: Defiance sounds as weak as it plays. The saga's famous gothic background music returns here, but it sounds almost exactly like it has in the past few games. There's very little that is new for fans of the series, and the fact that the same pounding battle track plays every time you get into a fight only adds to the repetitious feel of the game. The characters are once again expertly voiced by the likes of Michael Bell, Simon Templeman and Tony Jay, and their performances provide the only compelling reason to continue playing. In past games, the storyline was sufficiently engaging to keep me playing until the end, but these performances are mostly wasted on a very uninspired storyline that made me yawn more than it made me gasp. The only other positive I can mention concerning the sound is the ghostly wailing and crying in the spectral realm that makes it feel creepier than it actually is. This is a nice touch in a game that is in desperate need of more such flourishes.

Legacy of Kain: Defiance is not a poor game by any stretch, but it is a painfully mediocre title that fails to live up to the standards set by its predecessors. Repetitive combat, frustrating camera angles, poor puzzle design and an uninspired storyline all culminate in one of the most disappointing video games of the year. The ability to control both Raziel and Kain in the same adventure is a great concept on paper, but it's almost completely wasted on this by-the-numbers action game. Its minor annoyances might have been more easily overlooked had the game utilized a full 3D camera, and I'm absolutely shocked that Crystal Dynamics could be satisfied with the extremely difficult and frustrating title they've given us to play. Future titles in this series are no longer must-purchase games for me, and I'm seriously regretting my purchase of this one. Legacy of Kain fans might want to check it out, but they should take heed that this is nowhere near the level of the series' more compelling titles.