Thanks to the Castlevania franchise, there have been plenty of games that involved humans killing vampires. In fact, humans eliminating vampires is a horror plotline that's existed for hundreds of years. However, it wasn't until the 1980s and 90s that vampires actually started to become the heroes of their stories, mostly thanks to the books of Anne Rice starting with Interview with the Vampire. Silicon Knights, the developers who would later make Eternal Darkness and Too Human, also decided to make a vampire the hero with Blood Omen, the first of what would be five games in the Legacy of Kain series. While intriguing, the series was off to a rough start.
The center of the game (and, indeed, the whole series) is Kain, a murdered nobleman who is resurrected as a vampire by the necromancer Mortanius to get revenge on his killers. He gets his revenge early on only to discover his true calling. The Guardians of the world's most important structure, the Pillars of Nosgoth, have been murdered and/or corrupted, defiling the whole land in the process. Kain goes on his quest to restore balance to Nosgoth by killing the corrupted Guardians. The story is dripping with lore; the world's history was put together masterfully. They even created a runic language for the tombstones outside Kain's sanctuary! On top of that, the voicework is very well-done, especially for Kain himself; Simon Templeman provides Kain's voice in all five games.
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The game can best be described as "undead Zelda". Like the first and third Zelda games, the first Blood Omen is a top down action-RPG where Kain has his sword and a variety of powers for fighting foes. His magical powers and artifacts are fun to use and very grisly, from energy bolts that blast people into chunks to projectiles that turn enemies inside-out. He can even change forms. Of course, not all enemies can be blown apart. Being a vampire, Kain does have to drink the blood of some of his enemies to heal up. While it is cool to watch him suck blood from several feet away, there are a couple of recurring issues. First, enemies have to be weakened first, and it's too easy to kill enemies you intended to drain accidentally. Second, except in a few spots, enemies that were killed only show up as ghosts later, making it harder to heal up the longer the game goes on.
While the game does present some very nice 2D artwork and even some decent CG for the mid-90s, there are design problems that can be hard to stomach now. Like Zelda, certain powers are necessary to open up more of Nosgoth for exploration. The problem is that the game does a poor job of guiding you to what you need to move on. I found myself aimlessly wandering for hours trying to find the way to Nupraptor's Keep before I broke down and looked up a walkthrough. Also, be prepared to spend half your playtime looking at loading screens. Even when accessing a road sign, the game freezes to load. In fact, the load times when going in and out of the item and pause menus got really annoying. Playing my PlayStation disc on my PlayStation 3 helped speed up the loads somewhat, but they still got tiring.
The original Blood Omen was an outstanding story with an okay game attached to it. The plot and voicework were so good that it bugged me when the game's design and technical deficiencies got in the way. The gameplay is serviceable enough to power through, though a walkthrough is practically required. If you think you can handle the game's technical and design issues, you should give Kain's first adventure a stab. Vae victus!
