While War of the Vikings doesn't offer players much in terms of storyline, it makes up for it in authenticity. The title offers players to take up arms and battle as the Saxtons or Vikings in a historic war for the ages. Fatshark did their homework with the new release and have made weapons, armor and locations feel authentic to the era. History buffs are sure to enjoy the game's fine attention to detail. While most weapons, armor and other items feature different descriptive text and skins, they all work about the same in combat to keep players who have spent a lot of time with the game from being too overpowered. Still, there are some really cool designs for items in the game that fans of the series will enjoy reading about and unlocking for themselves.
One big change for War of the Vikings is in the scale of battles. Where similar titles offer smaller matches for around ten players in a single match, War of the Vikings allows for some massive battles to take place with up to 32 different players on a single server. As such, the game requires a good Internet connection and ping with other players, and this can cause some latency issues to occur, but it's hardly a gamebreaking problem. The large scale battles can be very chaotic, especially during the opening moments of battle as all players typically rush to the middle of the map in something that looks similar to schools letting out for Summer Break. Rounds in the game typically only last two to three minutes, so even if players die right at the start of battle, there isn't much waiting time between new rounds and matches.
Gameplay in War of the Vikings is simple enough for any gamer to understand but features enough intricacies for veteran players to still be able to put a hurting on newcomers. Players will have a choice from one of several classes on either side of the war. Each class has its own strengths and weaknesses and will come equipped with different weapons and equipment. There are lighter Scout classes for quickly getting onto the battlefield and uses a longbow to deal damage from afar, heavier classes such as the Huscarl that wields a two-handed axe and can deal heavy damage with slow charging attacks and more unique classes such as a spear wielding character that has obvious reach advantages. Each class typically has at least two types of weapons, one for ranged attacks and one for melee encounters, and there are obvious advantages and disadvantages to each weapon and class that makes War of the Vikings a balancing act in each match.
Players will only need to land a few blows with any weapon to deal enough damage to down an opponent, and another quick execution attack will finish enemy players off for good. It is possible to heal once after taking damage, use a medkit to heal injured teammates even quicker or revive fallen teammates that are not completely dead. Most game modes gives players only one life per round, so it's always important to prioritize healing and sticking together with teammates for the best chance at survival. With quick deaths comes some annoyances such as getting picked off afar with ranged weapons before ever reaching an enemy to fight though, so not every round will lead to exciting showdowns with enemies, and many matches seem to end with one person remaining on a team facing off with three or more opponents at once to create even more frustrating experiences.
Players can customize their loadouts in War of the Vikings similar to what gamers would expect from a first-person shooter. There are plenty of different weapons and some character customization options as well. More unlockables can be earned through playing the game and earning in-game experience and gold to unlock and purchase new items. Additionally, players can customize their characters with perk like abilities that do things such as shorten the amount of time to fully charge an attack or allow players to hold a full charge longer. There are even better perks unlocked later in the game such as flaming arrows that can be a real pain for lower level players, but it hardly seems unfair with the amount of time that much be sunk into the game to unlock the perk in the first place.
War of the Vikings is a pretty good looking game featuring nice character models and better animations. Tackles, executions and other attacks look especially good, though they look pretty silly when the game doesn't sync players to the server perfectly. There are a good variety of game modes available in War of the Vikings from the smaller confines of Arena matches to the impressive large scale battles of Team Deathmatch. It's easy to find matches to join in War of the Vikings, but loading times are a bit of a hassle, especially when considering some rounds during matches are shorter than the wait for the match to begin. War of the Vikings still has a mostly good presentation fans of the series will enjoy though, and it's a lot of fun when a good match comes along.
War of the Vikings is currently available on Steam for $24.99, a fairly decent price for an addictive online multiplayer only title. Not every gamer will be interested in the type of gameplay offered by the title, while other may be turned off by the lack of much of a storyline or single player experience, but for gamers that are interested and fans of the series, Paradox Interactive and Fatshark are offering several different versions of the game available for purchase that includes the Blood Eagle and Valhalla Editions of the game. Blood Eagle comes with a digital art book, soundtrack, exclusive Viking and Saxon helmets, the first DLC expansion and some other unlockables, while the Valhalla Edition packs all of the above content plus a strategy guide, novel, all future DLC packages, exclusive helmets and more, so both are pretty good values depending on how much money players have available to spend on the new release. Check out War of the Vikings on Steam today!
War of the Vikings is now available exclusively for PC and can be purchased on Steam for $24.99. For more information on the game, check out the official War of the Vikings website.
Game Features:
- Online Multiplayer 1-32
- Play as Vikings or Saxons
- Special Editions include additional costumes, official soundtrack and more
- Steam Trading Card Support
- Achievement Support
Game Information:
Developer: Fatshark
Publisher: Paradox Interactive
Available exclusively for PC (reviewed)
Release Date: April 15, 2014
