Viking: Battle for Asgard
A Tsukianei Review.
Introduction/General Comments: A Tsukianei Review.
Most people that know me will realize that, most of the time, I'm always playing video games that they've never seen nor heard of. This is no different... Mostly.
Recently I got a Xbox 360 that was modded to play burned games. However, someone made the mistake of playing a burned game too early on it, so it no longer is able to get online. However, I did get a huge stack of burned games, and in this stack was this game. I popped it in, and decided to see if it was any good.
Now, this isn't a bad game, not at all. However, it isn't very good either. Combat and gameplay were solid, but the game was riddled with a few other things that just aren't right.
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Storyline:
To be quite honest, there isn't much of a story here. You play as a Viking that has what appears to be an angel or a demon inside of you. After getting owned by the Legion (enemies of the game), you wake up, somehow miraculously, and vow to take back your lands and free your peoples.
...That's about it.
There are a few other aspects there, but they come across later, and even then the plot is paper thin and has little depth at all. However, it's pretty accurate when it comes to Viking mythology.
6/10 - What you can pull out of the story is rather good. However, the lack thereof, is a major downside.
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Characters:
Also another depressing point. The only characters you need to know of are you, the main character, and Freya, the Viking Goddess. All of the other characters are rather non-existent, and aren't important at all.
Hell, even the main villain isn't important. There isn't enough in the story, or the cast of characters to make you care. All you end up wanting to do is randomly kill things, with is what you do.
4/10 - Practically non-existent characters in a game with a paper thin plot. It just isn't very good.
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Gameplay:
Now this is where it starts getting good. The game is a hack and slash of sorts, so what you'll be doing is beating the living shit out of the Legion. You go from Legion camp to Legion camp to free enough Viking brethren to strike against their main stronghold.
That's the general gist of it.
You'll be stringing combos like no one's business, and there are plenty of moves to master. Not only that, you'll also be running into lots of bad guys too. There are quite a few, and you can't really use the same tactic against multiple enemies. Even the most simple enemy can become quite dangerous in a group of 20 or so. So there is always somewhat of a challenge. However, once you have the controls down, and a good sense of timing, things get rather... easy.
Things start to get a little repetitive after a while though. You go from island, to island, to island, doing the same thing over again: freeing fellow Vikings in order to take back Asgard. However, if you can look past that, the epic wars and the end of each island are very fun.
8/10 – The gameplay is pretty solid, however, the more you play it, the easier it gets.
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Controls:
The control set up is pretty solid. “A” to jump, “X” for a light attack, “Y” for a heavy attack (with you being able to string attacks together), and “B” for a quick very light attack. Everything is pretty layed out, and very simple and easy to use. The controls, in my humble opinion, are quite good, and don't hinder gameplay at all.
10/10 – Everything is easy as pie to get to. Pretty solid.
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Graphics:
A little outdated now, but on an HDTV, the game looks amazing! The water, grass, trees, the copious amounts of blood, to the huge ass dragons flying in the sky, the game is stunning. There are times when I can just stop killing everything, sit back, and enjoy the sights. Hell, at one point, I caught myself walking just to look around and see what was what. The game really does have some sights to behold.
9/10 – A little outdated now. However, the game still looks great once plugged into an HDTV.
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Sound:
Very, VERY, little music. The lack of music is terrible. Sure, the natural sounds of the world around you are fantastic. However, without any music what-so-ever, you're going to get bored of screaming, birds, wind, and whatnot very quickly.
I just loaded up my music straight from the console and kept playing it. Who knew the Chrono Cross OST could go with a hack and slash? (Not really, but the boss battle songs were awesome when going against an army of 300+.
)5 – 10: The lack of music killed it. The sounds are great, but with no musical score behind it, the game suffers.
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Unique/Extra Features:
The game is unique in how it ties to Viking mythology, and does a somewhat accurate portrayal, yet still has Goddesses popping up all over the place. (Goddess Freya = Totally Hawt!) The epic war scenes are really fun as well. When you get to Asgard, you'll see many, MANY, people on screen, all just waiting for your sword and axe.
However, there are no extra features. Aside from exploring the land, killing baddies, and fighting epic-scale wars, you're not going to find much else to do.
6 – 10: While it has a few unique things in there, the game has literally no extra of anything to go around. Except for maybe bad guys to kill.
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Replay Value:
The gameplay was solid, but repetitive. If a game gets repetitive half way through the first play through, you can only imagine where I'll go with this. If you can find joy in senseless destruction, then you'll find replay value here. If not, then you'll get virtually none.
6 – 10: I, however, can find some joy in it. But I would only go back and play this maybe once a year. Even then, after beating it once, I probably wouldn't even finish it again.
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Overall Rating:
Although a solid game, with pretty fun gameplay, the game just has too many flaws for me to recommend a buy. If anything, go out and rent this. The game is short, so you'll be finishing it in a couple of days anyway.
6.5 – 10: Come for the action, leave for the lack of plot, and the repetitiveness.