are executed via combinations of buttons and direction keys, much like a beat'em-up game. Some of these special attacks are weapon-specific and can deal huge amounts of damage or hit multiple foes at one time. The game features a relatively advanced body slash system. Once severed, body parts from enemies can be picked up and used as weapons. The game was shipped with a level editor, which enabled fans to create custom levels and modifications to the game. Development According to lead designer Jose Luis Vaello, the initial concept for Severance was to make a game that borrowed "sword and sorcery" elements found in movies like Conan the Barbarian, and mythical literature as The Lord of the Rings. The game was developed by 20 people. An Xbox enhanced port directly by Rebel Act was in development, with working title Ultimate Blade of Darkness, but the project was scrapped during early stages due to poor sales of the original Windows version. Reception The game received "generally favorable reviews" according to the review aggregation website Metacritic. Jim Preston of NextGen called it "the kind of fun that only comes from kicking an orc's ass, once you've sliced it off." It received high marks for its graphics, particularly the lighting effects of real-time shadows. Character animation was done via motion capture. The texturing was very well done, although the game does not utilize larger texture sizes (anything above 256x256, whereas other games already used 1024x1024 resolution with texture compression in 2000-2001). The soundtrack of the game allegedly contains non-copyrighted samples, which were also used in many commercials, soap operas and other media worldwide. Overall, a relatively powerful computer for its time (the minimum requirements were a P2 400 MHz and 64MB of RAM) was required to fully experience all of the features. This game is the first and only game that can perform water reflection wave effects only using DirectX 7.0 hardware (Geforce 2 or Radeon 7500; perhaps even Nvidia RIVA TNT is enough to perform water effects at the same quality level like in DirectX 8 or higher). The game launched with a shipment of 20,000 units to retailers in Spain and 250,000 in the rest of Europe, a record for a Spanish game. While the game reached global sales above 300,000 units by 2001, and ultimately surpassed 500,000 sales, it fell below Rebel Act's expectations. It was unsuccessful in the U.S.