izigame.me

"The OVERLY negative reviews for this game are not entirely correct"

I didn't want to write a review for this, I typically just sit back and enjoy these games only really commenting when things are unfun, rather than "bad", like the DLC's for OMD!3. However the people commenting below are just plain wrong on this being a "terrible game". It is certainly not the strongest in the series, that's a given, but the majority of problems they claim to have with it are non existent. such as:
"The game is not balanced for solo play"
I mostly played solo so far, and not once have I had an issue with clearing a map. I have passed every run bar 1 (in which I picked double barricade and forgot to replace a barricade it sold) but prior to forgetting it was wave 4, with no signs of cracks in the defence. Its one thing for the game to be "too difficult" for solo play, that's based on an individual, but the game is more than possible to clear every map solo.
"Melee is bad and dumb it holds you in place"
Did you play the melee characters IN GAME rather than just the hub? Yes, the animation holds you in place, but that's because it literally HOMES you in to enemies, lunging incredibly far and requiring no other inputs from you aside from mouse 1 to literally lock on to anything in front of you, flying enemies included. Yes, if the flying enemy is TOO high its not reachable, but I have had literally 1 instance of it being too high to reach, every other time I have launched in the air and taken out the flying enemy with no issue. If you think melee is "bad", you didn't play it. With that being said it IS boring to play melee because it is TOO "hold M1" for me, but very far from "weak". (Granted the bears damage could be better it gets pretty abysmal trying to kill anything with no upgrades a few maps in)
"The characters are too woke"
The character design is a little blander than those found in unchained, I will agree. But what about a giant bear with a staff screams woke to you? Is a cat assassin woke? Is it just the hairstyles, the fact that there's a character of colour? Whats the argument here? I'm not a FAN of the new characters, but that's because they don't seem distinct enough to LOVE them.
"The new barricade limit mechanics suck","There will be a barricade meta as a result"
I couldn't disagree more that they're a bad idea. In the other orcs games, the first few rounds typically involve spending ALL money to barricade as much as possible, and as the game goes on you end up making an unbeatable killbox funnel, as you have optimally locked off the entire map, spending 10k on barricades alone. I think the new mechanics not only streamline the early game barricade placement, as you would do the exact same in the old games (just costing coin instead) but cause the late game to be MORE interesting, as having a limit causes you to have to a semi-optimal layout, forcing you to play different each time. There is set layouts in EVERY orcs map in the old games, and that's because you CAN lock off literally every corridor optimally. On top of that, you can unlock threads mid-run that let you place more if you're someone who needs the extras, but I assure you, the extras are not NEEDED. The "Barricade meta layouts" have always existed. If that's a reason to not play this game, its also a reason to not play the old ones.
I had a run where myself and a friend played and I picked 2 cards, one that gave me double barricades, and one that gave me 10 more barricades but my traps cost 10x. This lead to me basically only picking weapon increases and building the mazes while he built the traps. The mazes can still be built, granted they're cards I wouldn't make in solo as it would surely lead to a loss.
"The random cards take away customisable upgrades from OMD(x)"
This is surely an intentional way to make you play every map differently. Having 2x1 barricades locked in a card means that the maps you don't get it, you are going to be playing a less barricade focused strategy, that's it. It doesn't ruin the game to not get these cards, sometimes you'll only get offered cards that offer % damage increases (more on that soon) and nothing to develop a DIFFERENT build. But that's the point. You're not supposed to play the same way every time. If that's not for you, that's fair enough, but that's literally what the advertised rogue-like cards elements is.
There are, however, VERY valid negatives this game has:
"The performance"
The game has some pretty nasty FPS drops for seemingly no reason at random intervals. The game runs well for me personally on medium settings on a 2060 Super at 1920x1080 but people have mentioned it running pretty terribly even on low settings. This is an obvious issue worth at least pointing out, and an understandable negative review until fixed.
"The UI"
I'll be honest, there's not much to redeem the UI. Its not BAD for me on my native resolution, its just a little ugly to look at; Cartoon-y, almost "mobile game-esque". However I've seen screenshots of the UI on an ultra widescreen ratio and its honestly horrifically bad. It does its job, fine, but its not very nice to look at.
"No Re-roll mechanic"
Sometimes, you just wanna play a map, but it has THE WORST thread active that completely screws your build up to this point over. In OMD!3's scramble you had the possibility for 1 re-roll, and that made it more fun. I'm not talking about mid-run re-rolls, because the fact it gives you 3 you can always take SOMETHING, even if its just a bonus for something you're not using. But even a single map re-roll per run would be nice.
"The balance"
My god are some of the characters really bad with no upgrades. Like, unusable bad. I know I mentioned the melee being just fine, but I feel like the melee characters are worse by the fact that they have to be WAY more mobile to keep up with the others. I haven't played a 4 player game, so maybe they can do more position holding rather than running around, but you really cannot leave your choke-points as the melee characters. Also, some of the traps are not good. But, that's something that can balance out with patches/ presumed upgrades, its too early to tell yet.
"Thread Descriptions"
The thread descriptions can be....flimsy at best. For example, the card "We Must Go Faster" says "Spike Trap triggers 3x faster for half damage." Does this mean that the trap has less of a delay when an enemy walks over it (i.e. it would help with kobolds etc)? Does it mean it resets faster? Still don't actually know when looking back on it. Or "On The Ropes" that says "Kalos can deal additional 15% damage to an enemy before they Enrage." What does any of that mean? I CAN deal and additional 15% damage, but doesn't explain how I CAN deal it. Is it random chance, does it always passively trigger? And what the hell does it mean "before they enrage"? I do not know what the enrage effect is, and I cannot look up in-game what that means. Would be nice to have more accurate and specific card descriptions when highlighting them (think the hover popup descriptions, like keywords in hearthstone).
"The maps are too open"
They really are. I don't mind the large courtyards as long as you give me some areas that I can turn into small killboxes. However practically NONE of the maps do this right. I don't think the maps are "impossible" as the negative reviews seem to claim, just that I would like the occasional corridors map to spice it up instead of just wide open spaces everywhere.
I have a LOT of good to say about the game, but reviews have a character limit and I had to point out where the borderline negative spam is wrong. All in all its actually a 7/10 game that's being dragged for...seemingly little reason. It is not a trash heap that the other reviews are claiming it to be. Its got bad parts, but so does every game. Give it a go.