Before embarking on the expansion, you must own a copy of – and have completed - Dungeon Siege II. The setting is one year following the events leading to the second great cataclysm: a magic-wrought disaster of colossal proportions, for which your party was largely - if unwittingly - responsible. Valdis may be gone, but entire villages lie in ruins, countless innocent lives have been lost, and those who escaped with their lives find refuge where they can. It is a miserable existence indeed for the few survivors who remain.

What's worse, the Overlord of the Dark Wizards, who orchestrated the whole scheme and betrayed you, remains at large, free to pursue his twisted schemes while you shoulder the blame for this broken world. Not quite what your party had envisioned when they set out on their original quest. However, they now have an opportunity to redeem themselves as they hunt down a promising lead on their elusive nemesis.

Dungeon Siege II veterans will have no trouble jumping in, boots and all, since gameplay is the same and the story picks up pretty much where it left off. Several familiar faces from the original game reprise their roles, providing continuity and filling you in on events of the past year. Of course, the demeanour of many of them has changed considerably, and your party must not only fight hostile creatures, but also the prejudice of many NPCs they encounter.

As far as basic gameplay and technical details are concerned, the expansion is no different to Dungeon Siege II, the review for which can be found here. Rather than revisit the same old territory, we thought we would concentrate instead on the new features to be found in Dungeon Siege II: Broken World.

Top of the list is the extra race, dwarves. Yes, these short and stocky fellows form the mainstay of many an adventuring group, and are back by popular demand. We are also introduced to two new multi-class character archetypes: the Fist of Stone and the Blood Assassin. The former is essentially a blend of Fighter and Nature Mage; the latter are basically rangers who specialise in the darker side of combat magic. Both classes come with their own set of skills and powers, and while we found these to be welcome additions they were not reason enough to buy the expansion.

You can't create a new character from scratch; however you can either choose from one of the six pre-generated characters or import your characters from Dungeon Siege II. If your original characters' levels were around the mid-high 40s, it certainly wouldn't hurt to bring back a few of them, since every enemy you meet is at least 39th level. Encountered individually they are easily overcome, but a mob of such critters can quickly overwhelm an unprepared party. We found ourselves having to rethink the combat techniques and equipment we'd employed in Dungeon Siege II, because they aren't always so effective against some of the tougher creatures found in the expansion.

One extremely useful feature is the ability to reset your skills with the weapons trainer. If you've ever frittered away those precious points on certain skills, only to regret it later, this is your chance to change your characters' career paths - for a small fee, of course. We were reluctant to take the plunge at first, but after encountering a few tricky bosses and doing a little homework, we were able to tailor a party more suited to the high level mobs further into the game.

Those with a penchant for collecting reagents, dabbling in alchemy and creating their own magical items will be pleased to hear there are a number of new reagent recipes that will enable you to create some unique and often powerful items. There is also a fine selection of new weapons, armour and other items. The only problem with these is, if your imported characters were upwards of 45^th level upon completing the original game, they are likely to have some fantastic kit already, and you will be hard pressed to find anything to match it – at least to begin with.

There are no surprises as far as graphics and sound are concerned; it's pretty much more of the same we'd encountered in Dungeon Siege II. Even though the visuals are beginning to look a bit dated, with blocky characters no longer at the forefront of technology, the spell and combat effects and environmental graphics still rate highly.

This, combined with another excellent score from composer extraordinaire Jeremy Soule, goes a long way towards creating that all-important ambience. There's a palpable sense of foreboding as your path leads you through a gloomy jungle or a series of caverns, and the music swells or fades smoothly, depending on the situation.

With plenty of opportunity for dialogue such as the intra-party banter, cut scenes and chatting with NPCs, voice talent needs to be spot-on - and it is. The only disappointing moment we encountered was when one of the tradesmen we were bartering with suddenly began pitching the PSP version of the game (Dungeon Siege:Throne of Agony), complete with certain technical details. We do like to keep informed about other such titles, and we know in-game advertising is a sign of the times, but where such advertising is at odds with a game's setting - which in this case is low tech, high fantasy, it should be restricted to the manual or the media.