Dungeons & Dragons Tactics - hands-on

Even though it has the word "tactics" in the title, even though it's packed with familiar-looking grid-based strategy, there's no other portable game quite like Dungeons & Dragons Tactics. Meticulous enough for the most hardcore D&D fans, Tactics squeezes in several books' worth of rulemongering tabletop knowledge while still managing to be accessible for fans who just want to roll up some barbarians and kill some monsters already.

We've already talked up D&D Tactics' extensive features and interfaces in earlier previews, so we'll just cut straight to the experience of playing the game. Tactics is fairly deep as a strategy game, but don't expect something on par with the Neverwinter Nights series. Instead, Tactics will take you straight from one turn-based battle to the next, with minimal story in between; fans of Final Fantasy Tactics and its ilk should be right at home.

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Mikel Reparaz
After graduating from college in 2000 with a BA in journalism, I worked for five years as a copy editor, page designer and videogame-review columnist at a couple of mid-sized newspapers you've never heard of. My column eventually got me a freelancing gig with GMR magazine, which folded a few months later. I was hired on full-time by GamesRadar in late 2005, and have since been paid actual money to write silly articles about lovable blobs.