Here’s the real problem I have with Viking – it’s attempts to provide everything we’ve asked for in the last 12 months of gaming, which ultimately causes it to come unstuck in all the wrong places. Is it the fault of developer Creative Assembly? Well, yes, but it’d very clear what they’ve tried to accomplish, and an “A for effort” must certainly be awarded, even if the end result is a pandering, over-simplified mish-mash of unintelligent button thraping.

Cast as a gigantic, mute, blandly heroic and bustlingly muscular Viking champion, what initially appears to be a free roaming fighter or adventuring hack’n’slash ultimately turns out to be more of an RPG, with elements of the aforementioned dribbled on top. I’m as guilty as anyone for demanding games make an attempt to cross genre boundaries, though in this case it seems the hybrid is lesser than the equal of its parts. That’s not to say that when approached in a more dismissive, casual manner there isn’t still a worthwhile game at the core of Battle for Asgard, so if you harboured high hopes for this game, keeping it light and breezy will reward you with a good few hours escapism.

The Viking homeland is overrun with the demon legions of Hel’s armies when the warriors return home from war. Getting immediately to work in thwarting these netherworld inhabitants is your unfortunate task, and a series of gopher jobs and rescue missions gradually rebuild your army to get you ready for the larger showdowns between forces. Where Viking does succeed is in the mission structure, which seamlessly progresses the overall storyline without ever creating the usual kind of plot-based gulf between side-quests and instanced events.

Wandering the impressive Norse landscapes, collecting gold, reefing comrades and attacking Hel’s strongholds quickly form the crux of gameplay, and the initially apparent depth of storyline does taper out into more shallow waters. By attempting to make Viking as accessible as possible to all kinds of players, the resulting action is very easy, and once the button mashing fighting controls are fathomed (which are gratefully simplistic) there’s little more to do than simply going through the motions and moving on to each new branch of the plot.

Again, this is only as negative as the individual gamer makes it; expectations are the enemy when it comes to Viking, so if you’re the kind of player who can happily meander through a suitably diverse and winding plot, while ignoring the holes and putting up with the often lacklustre gameplay, this could be a very enjoyable experience. Unfortunately, this kind of placid and happy apathy isn’t generally a trait of the seasoned RPG’er, so unlocking the casual enjoyment of Viking might prove to be a difficult task for many.

As an introduction to the RPG genre, however, Viking is currently unrivalled. A simplistic initiation to things like experience points and levelling up, which for the most part are handled by purchases rather than accomplishments (another matter that might make the serious role player balk a bit). This does surmount mainly to wandering around gathering up caches of abandoned gold, opening chests and smashing urns, but at least it’s easy to do.

Even when the armies are gathered in significant numbers, however, the battle-based gameplay doesn’t entirely feel like a hand-to-hand field of war between two powerful factions, but a cacophony of random action you push through to find – and easily defeat - the end of level boss. Since so much of the well-told storyline builds up to these moments, the randomness of the fighting is something of a damp squib.

Graphically Viking is quite superb, and the first moment when you stand before the enormous, rolling majesty of the ocean is one to remember. The waves are huge and vaguely transparent – stretching back as far as the eye can see without obvious repetition. Really quite remarkable. The camera can get a little annoying, as it employs a self centring system; so attempting to look to the side becomes jerky and unclear as the camera constantly attempts to return to looking at the back of the main character’s head.

The voice acting is also very reasonable (although quite why an eclectic mix of British Isles accents has been chosen to represent the Northmen I couldn’t quite say), while the music is suitably rustic, yet simultaneously auspicious.

All in all, Viking presents itself as the atypical Jack of all trades, and with overly easy gameplay and a lack of genuine depth it fails to recapture the essential glory we expect of the Viking age. For the casual gamer looking for a more lengthy epic to get lost in without too much in the way of cerebral or dexterous challenges, Viking could really provide. I would suggest it’d make the ideal RPG introduction for younger gamers, but for some reason it seems to have an 18 certificate, so that whole deomographic’s left out, too.