I don't mind game clones as long as they're done well. On the surface, Harbinger appears to be a halfway decent copy of Diablo II, set in a sci-fi universe. Unfortunately, the game falls short on a number of different levels, which makes for a generally unworthy experience.

The story, however convoluted, takes place aboard a giant warship that roams the stars and destroys entire worlds. Survivors from these worlds are taken aboard, where they are used by the ship's controller, the Overlord, as slave labor or lab experiments. Escapees find themselves living in the forgotten corners of this behemoth, forming small communities that are willing to do anything to survive. Recently, the Overlord's power is waning, leaving room for opportunistic factions to rise up and claim control. Your character, part of a small raider party, is caught up amidst the chaos and will battle for your own survival and fate of Harbinger.

Now, even though all this exposition seems very exciting, it is actually as interesting as the game gets. The game itself takes place in the standard 45-degree isometric view that all Diablo players have grown accustomed to. The story is told in a comic book fashion (complete with speech bubbles), accompanied by ominous (though sparse) narration from your character. Players get to choose between three different species: Human, Gladiator, or Culibine. Of these three, only the Human and Gladiator are capable of melee combat. The Gladiator is a giant robot with a transferred living consciousness in it, and is the heartiest of the bunch. It would be best compared to Barbarian from Diablo II, with just a little bit more personality. The Human isn't as physically strong as the Gladiator, and must rely heavily on gadgets and long-range weapons, similar to the Rogue or Amazon. Finally, the most unique character, the Culibine, is a female alien who has the ability to perform a "radial" attack, meaning that she can create a circle of psionic energy around her to cause damage to enemies. Leveling up and purchasing amplifier upgrades will enlarge the radius of this attack. In other words, we have the sci-fi equivalent of a sorcerer. She is the weakest out of all the characters, and the most difficult to use. However, she benefits in that she can self-heal, instead of having to rely on health injectors or batteries like the other two character types.

After selecting a character, you enter a relatively hum-drum affair of taking on arbitrary missions, killing aliens, and collecting loot and upgrades. Then you level up and do it all some more. The graphics aren't bad, but certainly not the best. Luckily, that means this game will run well on a pretty modest computer. The minimum system requirements ask for a PIII 500Mhz CPU with 128Mb RAM and 650Mb hard drive space. However, the levels are very drab and boring. Most of it is darkened, and extremely repetitive. Not to mention, some of the levels are absolutely humungous and littered with dangerous, irradiated areas, which incidentally look very much like the safe healing areas. Exploring these dark, boring environments is not fun, and oftentimes felt like a chore. The ambient light surrounding your characters is often inadequate, and enemy aliens usually have better sight than you, so you can expect to be shot at from the dark quite often. Exploration has to be supplemented by the use of gadgets like mobile cameras or bombs, but they're not especially useful either, since enemies can spot them easily and destroy them right away. Luckily, most enemies aren't smart enough to search out and find whoever sent the camera or bomb their way. Not that it matters anyway, since most of the projectiles they shoot at you are slow, as are the enemies themselves.

One of the only things I liked about exploring Harbinger was the EZ-Stash system, which is a sort of universal storage closet. Should you come across one of these EZ-Stash boxes while wandering around, you can clear out your inventory to be accessed later from a different location. This is MUCH better than having to run back and forth from the main town just to clear out the things you want to sell. It even beats out the pack animal from Dungeon Siege.

The aliens, like the environments, quickly become tiresome and repetitive. There is very little variety in alien species, other than changing their color, and none of them look especially noteworthy. The only challenge comes from the fact that there are hordes of enemies and only one of you. There are, of course, special circumstances where you'll be attacked by hulking bosses, but the old hack 'n slash / run 'n gun system of solving all your problems quickly becomes old. At least Diablo II was able to mix things up a bit with spells and auras; the only things Harbinger has to offer are the standard upgradeable stats and items.

A character's stats include upgrading melee, ranged attacks, use of gadgetry, and for the Culibine, proficiency in radial attacks. Upgrades include armor for the human class, new torsos and weapons for the Gladiator, and new amplifiers for the Culibine. Generally, the weapon selection is pretty slim, and the weapon effects appear to be very similar - as do the armor - save for perhaps a change of color. Sure, you can select weapons that are charged with EMP, and specialize either against mechanical or organic enemies - you can even equip your character so that one hand has a melee weapon and the other hand has a ranged weapon - but in the end, it doesn't matter. We've seen it all before. There isn't anything spectacular about this game. It seems programmed with just enough features to get by, but has nothing that makes it stand out, or for that matter... fun.

Control can also be a difficult factor, especially after being accustomed to the controls from Diablo. The same button used to fire is also the same button used to walk, so, it can become frustrating when a enemy suddenly moves and you miss a click, causing you to walk toward the enemy instead of shooting it. That is, unless you really search through the manual. All those gamers who believe that they're too hardcore to open a manual are out of luck, because only by reading the section regarding ranged combat will you learn that holding down the SHIFT key will allow you to stand still while shooting. Don't be fooled by the quick-key reference sheet listed on the back cover of the manual, because for some strange reason, the SHIFT key is not listed.

Finally, the biggest failing of this game, and perhaps the one feature that could have redeemed this title, is the lack of any multiplayer. Part of the reason games like Diablo became so popular was because of their ability to go online, or have friends join in a party via LAN. This allows a game to take advantage of the strengths of all the different character classes. In the very least, it would give weaker characters like the Culibine a better chance at survival. Perhaps it might not be that great of a loss, though, considering the characters aren't really designed to compliment each other. However, you have to take into consideration that the one player game gets old very quickly. Couple that with the fact that the levels aren't randomly generated - they're the same each time - and you have a game that has absolutely no replay value whatsoever. True, each character has his/her own storyline that coincides with the main storyline, and sometimes these stories overlap, but I find it difficult to imagine that anyone would want to play through the different classes, essentially killing the same old aliens in the same ways in the same boring spaces, just to get a slightly different point of view.

This game is currently in the bargain bin, but I find it hard to recommend even as a discount title, especially when it is outclassed by much older titles like Diablo II and Dungeon Siege. Give this one a pass, and let Harbinger drift out to the deepest, darkest, depths of space.