Publisher: Got Game
Price: $39.99
Genre: Action Real Time Strategy
Verdict: Save your money – League of Legends is free right now and people are playing that.
Pros: Awesome blending of the Sci-Fi and Fantasy genres. Runs well, and looks superb. Action packed fun.
Cons: Terrible sound design, inconsistent plot, unbalanced single player campaign, encountered bugs right out of the box.
Acquired: Developer Provided Review Copy
In this day and age, Sci-Fi games are becoming a dime a dozen, while fantasy games flow freely from the developer abyss. Combining Sci-Fi and Fantasy games, now that is a hybrid that is rarely ever seen. WorldShift manages to successfully do just that. The game treads a glorious line while mixing the two genres together, but trips over the crack that is gameplay and logic.
One of the biggest things players will notice about WorldShift are the interesting results that come from blending Fantasy and Sci-Fi together. There might not be robot elves or mutated dwarfs, but there is magic and a very fantasy heavy story line. At first this might feel like an odd mixture, but it works as well as cookie dough and ice cream. One world could have the action taking place in some forest packed with alien looking vegetation, and the next will switch it up with familiar earthly flora.
The downfall to this setting is in how the single player experience is delivered. Players are dropped into a battle and spoon fed a storyline. It feels as though your showing up to a party, only to find the cops there breaking it up. Sure, there has got to be some great story behind it all, but you’re never really clued into the specifics, other than all of your friends are face down in the grass, handcuffed, slurring out something that resembles either an obscenity or compliment aimed in the direction of the arresting officer’s mother. As the game progresses this story telling does not get much better, as there are often points that will make very little sense and go in several different directions at once. There is lore here, but sadly it is never delivered well enough to really draw your interest.
As is commonly the case, are three races to play. Of course, there is the obligatory human race, that comes packing battle robots and armored troops. Is it just me, or do humans normally tend to come packing robotics of some sort, in games set in a future time line? Next up are the Tribes faction, which are essentially humans who have been mutated over time. Unlike normal humans, Tribes are the ever familiar “magic using spear-chuckers” of the game. Lastly there is The Cult, consisting of an alien cyborg type race than can shape-shift and packs some neat futuristic weapons.
All in all, the three races feel balanced enough, but there are not a wide variety of units available. To me this was nice, as it was fast and easy to learn all the units’ strengths and weaknesses. It also kept units from feeling repackaged with one or two slight differences.
When it comes right down to it, this game is all about the action. As such, traditional RTS base builders should know that there is no base building in this game. Sure, there is a small home base where units are produced, but in depth resource management is not part of this game. That’s right, no oil refineries or barracks to manage here. The base is merely there to produce army units and provide a starting point for the battle ahead. Other games have taken this approach and it has worked with varying amounts of success, but in WorldShift, it feels like a pain to only go back to the base to order up units.
Unit control is a bit obtuse as well. There are no unit formations, so setting up a wall of big burly hulks won’t come into play here unless it is done manually. Most units have to be controlled manually as they tend to have a chronic case of the “short bus syndrome”, resulting in them not doing a whole lot in an automatic fashion. Some sort of AI would have been greatly appreciated, as most of the fights feel as though you’re dragging around a heavily armed classroom of “special” children and telling them what to do, only to have them sit in the grass, soil themselves, and stare vacantly at the “pretty flowers…”
The inclusion of a small skill tree is here as well, allowing for the configuration, and ultimately, the boosting of commander unit abilities. This is nothing mind blowing from what we have already seen in numerous other games. The difference lies in the fact that skill points can be spent any way your little heart desires. Playing humans and want to invest some points into the Tribes? Feel free. It is a small thing, but it is nice to be able to grow the strengths of the race you enjoy most, while still playing a race you’re not so keen on.
Items picked up during play can be used in other sessions. Playing as the humans and get a Tribe item? No problem, as that item will carry over and be available for them to use when you switch factions. This is great, as one can get quite the inventory during practice games with bots. There is no shortage of items, that is for sure.
At the beginning of a battle, players choose their faction and what units they will take with them into battle. There are a limited number of slots, so making sure the units complement one another is important. Also, the more badass a unit is, the more expensive it to use. Often times it is just easier to pull a Zerg rush with smaller, more disposable, units, rather than saving up for the bigger beasts.
The world detail does a lot to draw the player in. This is in stark contrast to the craptastic voice and sound work. Stages are fun and enjoyable to explore. On top of that, WorldShift does well in making all three factions look and feel different. There is never a doubt over who is playing what race. It’s nice to be able to easily identify who is on the battle field and how to best approach them.
Overall the game runs well, even while playing on a laptop. It is a pleasant surprise to see a decent looking game run well on average hardware. However, the experience was varied while playing online. Some matches played through with little to no lag, in others, the lag got so bad that I ended up just logging off the game. Further confusing the issue was the fact that there was never a really solid reason why some matches were significantly more laggy than others.
Jumping online was a less than exciting experience and would yield maybe a single game to join. At peak playing times, this might bump up to three or four games. Thank goodness for bots! During most online games, the fun flowed like a chocolate river in the Wonka’s factory. Games were fast paced, and the action was intense. Often, battles would start out within a matter of moments. Enemies would come at the “base” from all directions. This game was built around the online experience and it showed when you could play online…with real people.
While the game looks good and runs like a champ, the voice work is nothing short of the worst B movie you can imagine. No really, it is that bad… The part that really takes the biggest hit is that a majority of the story is delivered with voice acting. A little more effort put forth here could have taken this game up a notch.
I need to rant a bit now. I might be a smaller portion of the PC crowd, with my Windows 7 x64 operating system, but including DRM that is not updated with your software, just shows that you’re not paying attention to the market you are about to sell to. In order for me to play this game, I had to read forums and do some Googling, just to find out that I needed to download the DRM software myself and install it… manually! I hate DRM to start, and here I have to go out and download the latest version, just so I can play the game. That is more hassle than any PC gamer should have to go through. If you are including DRM in your software, at least make sure it is up to date.
Once I had gotten the DRM installed, I could finally launch the game. This led me to find out I had to download patches for the game, as it was not updated to the most recent version. I can let this one slip a bit, but come on. No auto updater and defunct DRM. This did not start out well. If I were a lesser person, this would have stopped me from ever touching the game.
I really enjoyed the blending of my two favorite genres in this game. In the end though, the barren online environment, fighting with DRM, and unbalanced missions really did me in. Save your $40 and get League of Legends. It is free, has an online community and is fun. If this ever gets a demo, give it a try then. Until that happens, it is just not worth your time or money.
Popularity: unranked [?]
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