Written by Anthony L. Cuaycong
Title: Make War
Developer: Deqaf Studio
Publisher: No Gravity Games
Genre: Strategy, Simulation, Action, Arcade
Price: $9.99
Also Available On: Steam
Make War, from independent publisher No Gravity Games, is exactly what its title says. It gameplay is based on, well, making war, but with a twist. Players, counted as part of an alien species, are thrust in the middle of markedly bloody battles across the history of mankind. Tasked to meet a specific objective (kill, or, as the case may be, keep alive a certain number of protagonists from one side, for instance) at a time, they are provided the opportunity to place units and advanced weaponry and traps on the fields of combat, and then watch as their plans unfold. Success will bring about another objective. Failure will necessitate a do-over. Rinse and repeat until all goals for the particular theater of skirmish are met. And then it's on to the next.
Make War's sandbox setup, presented in pixel art and oddly appropriate heavy-metal music, makes for interesting dynamics. Tactics are required, as not everything — and almost nothing at the start — goes according to plan. Trial and error is a necessity, but rewards come with ample investment of time. More future-tech playthings become available with every achievement, thus expanding options. As anything unfamiliar becomes the first target of either side, alien units can even be used to influence action; dropped at a certain area, they become bait to ensure compliance from would-be victims. Meanwhile, experience makes for a good teacher; soon enough, players are able to make optimal use of the tools at hand.
Make War does its best in wanting things to stay interesting throughout, and, in this regard, the variations help. Up to 45 weapons and 35 units are on tap to keep players engrossed through 160 missions. At some point, the battles progress to a cyberpunk future where even more unknowns await. Before then, though, players will have to stay involved while putting up with technical issues. And while accepting instructions and goals in grammatically incorrect English is one thing, trying to implement plans using a challenging interface is quite another.
Indeed, Make War falters in the translation to the Nintendo Switch. Developer Deqaf Studio ported it over from its outstanding personal computer version with command over the cursor merely transferred to the analog stick of the left Joy-Con — good in theory but serviceable at best in practice. The stilted movement makes for exceedingly slow placement of troops and items. And while touchscreen controls are present, they register only for specific actions. In other words, a neither-here-nor-there setup that requires no small measure of patience is in place.
Thankfully, Make War has enough going for it for players to stay immersed for hours on end. They shouldn't expect any overarching narrative to tie their efforts together, however. The game is best appreciated in bits and pieces, with each skirmish disjointed from the previous and next ones. For a strategy title bent on underscoring the there and then, the need to focus on the here and now may be a paradox. Outside of that, and, yes, of the technical hurdles, it proves to be worth its $9.99 price tag.
THE GOOD
- Unique presentation
- Compelling gameplay
- Long on tactics and puzzle solving
THE BAD
- Broken text
- No overarching narrative
- Technical issues abound
RATING: 7/10
No comments:
Post a Comment