Faction Wars

[h1]IN A WORD: [b]LACKING[/b][/h1] [h1]IN A NUTSHELL:[/h1] [quote=] [b]WHAT TO EXPECT:[/b] Turn-based strategy. Basic army building. Basic economy. Simple combat mechanics. Uses IGOUGO. Two factions, same type. Focused unit roster. Medieval setting. Uses a single gameboard. Random boosters can be picked up. Local multi-player and single-player support. [b]ACHIEVEMENTS:[/b] NONE. [b]STATUS:[/b] COMPLETE. [b]WHEN TO BUY:[/b] EXPECT TO PICK IT UP IN A BUNDLE.[/quote] [i]More info below....[/i] https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2503336428 [h1]THE LOWDOWN:[/h1] Faction Wars (FW) is a basic strategy game with simple mechanics played on an equally simple 5x13 grid. It very much takes its inspiration from the game of Chess but with obvious differences in its play-style and medieval setting. The game's premise continues the theme of 'simplicity;' which sees players achieve victory by slaying their king. While defending theirs. However unlike its timeless inspiration (Chess) it is played in sequential turns using WEGOUGO. During these turns players can recruit different classes of units from infantry, archers and magic users. As their income allows. Villages are purchased and place on the grid. Each one contributing income per turn towards the player's funds to increase their army even more. Recruited units are placed on the player's own side of the board. They can be moved during their turn, towards the enemy, on the other side. Up to their movement range. Combat occurs when the units of the attacking side move into range of the enemy where they can attack. Depending on their class they can execute a melee or ranged attack. Visuals are pretty, while the audio is rudimentary. The appearance of units can be customised. Using 150 ot so options, which a fair amount must be unlocked as rewards. The game can be played in single-player and local multi-player is also supported. https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2503337689 [h1]THE GOOD:[/h1] + Games are short and to the point. + Chess-style WEGOUGO gameplay. + Decent collection of units. + 150x customisable options to personalise your army. [h1]THE BAD:[/h1] - Needs more board types. - Needs more factions. - Needs more building types. - Needs alternative objectives. - Needs a few more booster types. - Could do with alternative rule-sets/options. - Animation speed is slow. Could do with a x2/x4 speed dial. - Customising unit appearances is confusing or does not work, when they are placed in-game. Reverts to default. - BUG: Can lose purchased unit if it is not placed directly on the board, at time of purchase. - BUG: Random booster items can spawn in tiles that cannot be entered. [h1]AND THE REST:[/h1] * Board game style strategy. * 2x factions with distinct art style and colours. * Battlefields are randomly populated with obstacles. * Has local multi-player support. * Decent well draw graphics but basic. * Items that boost units damage or give extra gold can spawn in tiles randomly. * Decent tune and death sound-effects. https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2503335930 [h1]ANALYSIS:[/h1] FW demonstrated capable game design. Played like a board game. Providing limited tactical challenge. Yet possessing good game balance. Games were fairly short in length. Ten minutes or less. As expected with its simple layout and rules, FW was incredibly easy to pick up. There was a short tutorial of help screens providing instruction if required. Gameplay was fun if unremarkable, limiting actions to recruitment, deployment, simple movement and attacks. If games like Warcraft or Command & Conquer were turn-based they would probably be similar to FW. (Use your imagination.) A lack of content and a depth of mechanics to vary game setup and army make-up hurt it alot. With only a handful of unit types and one game board, the depth of strategy may not have been as much as the dev alluded to. At least the randomly spawning booster items that could be collected on the board were present. More content would have been welcome for sure. However it was replayable to a point. At a minimum, additional units would be a good place to start. Differently shaped game boards too. Unique factions with their own units would added an extra level of variety. Additional building types to provide unit combat bonuses would have bought upgrading priorisation. Perhaps even something similar for kings. Having variable victory conditions would another welcome change. Like getting x kills before your opponent. Buidlings could not be ransacked. If they could that would certainly have created a extra dilemma. The two (potentially three) issues were found after a few games. Losing newly recruited units if not placed directly on the map was the biggest concern. Having booster items drop onto obstacle spaces, stopping them from being picked up by either side another. Maybe it was as designed. Receiving new unit customisation options was a little confusing. Setting appearance either does not work at all, or the items that can customised are not that apparent. [h1]VERDICT:[/h1] Overall Faction Wars was not a bad game. Offering a basic strategy experience with some of the simplest mechanics that can be imagined. It was playable and to a degree enjoyable. There is a nugget of a game in the making here but with such a lack of content, other games will be more attractive for sure. The dev needs to increase content. To enlarge the range of strategy possibilities. Fix the few issues the current build has. Things that would justify playing it. As it stand its fair to predict that it is likely to appear in a future game bundle somewhere. Therefore with a heavy heart I cannot recommend it. But if Steam had a neutral score, that's what I would give it. [quote=]Thank you for reading. | Follow my curator[url=https://store.steampowered.com/curator/40556040-The-Irregular-Gamer/] here[/url]. | Key provided by [url=https://steamcommunity.com/groups/tbtactics]Turn-Based Tactics[/url][/quote]