Maroc - 3RD-STRIKE.COM - A La Une - 30/Jan 03:20

Heroes Battle Awakening – Review

Remember Plants vs. Zombies? It’s back, in fantasy form! Okay, maybe that’s oversimplifying things a little, but it’s hard to deny the similarities between PopCap Games’ classic tower defense title and Heroes Battle Awakening. Just look at the screenshots attached to this review! As the saying goes: “Good artists copy, great artists steal.”, so the question at hand is simple. Can Heroes Battle Awakening offer something more than a retread of 2009’s most popular tower defense game? Story You’d expect Heroes Battle Awakening’s fantasy setting to provide fertile ground for a narrative, but unfortunately, the game fails to deliver. There is no actual story in the traditional sense here, although the game uses a chapter-based structure as its framework. This serves as little more than a way to provide a sense of progress and context for the gameplay. Heroes Battle Awakening happily taps into fantasy archetypes, so whether or not it really needs that story beyond a good vs. evil conflict is up for debate. Orcs or skeleton warriors being the bad guys is something that is universally understandable after all. Still, it would’ve been nice if the game at least explained what made its titular heroes, well, heroes. Graphics Legibility, rather than visual spectacle, is the main focus when it comes to Heroes Battle Awakening’s graphics. The battlefield is a simple, five-lane grid. It’s clean and readable, with no cluttered UI or visual confusion, even when multiple lanes are under pressure. Enemy movement, unit placement and lane states are always clear, supporting the game’s puzzle-like tactical feel. While this approach is definitely appreciated from a gameplay perspective, it clashes with the game’s fantasy setting. Not only do the game’s monster designs come across as generic, but the game’s entire aesthetic feels sterile. Environments do change between the chapters, but the monsters don’t feel like they are “in” the world. For a game where minotaurs and golems supposedly beat the snot out of one another, Heroes Battle Awakening lacks tactileness. We wouldn’t go so far as to say that the game doesn’t have a visual identity of its own, but its monsters aren’t particularly memorable either. Sound When it comes to its soundscape, Heroes Battle Awakening remains consistent in how utilitarian it is. Music provides a functional, pleasant backdrop but doesn’t stand out or linger after playing. Sound effects clearly communicate attacks, unit placement and enemy movement, albeit without flair or complexity. Voice acting and ambience are absent, further enhancing the feeling that audio design focuses on clarity and feedback, rather than immersion or mood-building. Gameplay The core gameplay experience of Heroes Battle Awakening is a carbon copy of the Plants vs. Zombies formula. What you’re getting here is a top-down tower defense tactics game. You’re in control of fantasy-themed monster units across a five-lane grid as waves of enemies march toward your base. Gameplay revolves around real-time coin collection, careful unit placement and balancing early economy with defense, using clearly defined melee, ranged and resource-generation units. The campaign is split into four themed chapters, each offering ten levels. The game isn’t shy about where it copied its homework from. Far from it, in fact. Heroes Battle Awakening knows what made Plants vs. Zombies so addictive and fully leans into it, hoping to entice players with familiarity rather than reinventing the genre. That doesn’t mean that veterans of Plants vs. Zombies will have an easy time. Difficulty is front-loaded. Early moments in a level can be quite punishing, as specific lanes are overwhelmed, forcing quick adaptation. As you learn enemy patterns and counters, however, a reliable formula starts to emerge. Later stages become easier in turn, especially once you establish a stronger economy and gain access to more powerful late-game units. There is a satisfying learning curve hiding in plain sight here, backed by an approachable and strategically engaging gameplay loop. The game teaches its mechanics gradually, encouraging learning through failure and experimentation. When a lane collapses, it’s usually clear why, making retries feel like actual puzzle solving, rather than enduring punishment and having to brute force your way through. While Heroes Battle Awakening boasts four chapters with ten levels each, for a grand total of forty levels, it’s still a relatively short, compact game. There is no deep meta progression here, nor are there branching paths or alternate modes to extend playtime beyond the campaign itself. That means that Heroes Battle Awakening has little to no replay value. We’d still say that you’re getting plenty of bang for your buck here, but that’s because the game boasts a very low price tag in the first place. To get the most out of that €4.99 RRP, we’re also going to recommend savouring it. The game is at its best if you play it over multiple short pick-up-and-play bursts, rather than in a single, prolonged session. Conclusion What Heroes Battle Awakening lacks in depth or even originality, it makes up for in sheer efficiency. This is the kind of game that knows exactly what it wants to be and doesn’t stray even one inch from that baseline. Both from a technical perspective and in terms of value, Heroes Battle Awakening does exceedingly well. Even so, we can’t help but point out that its presentation would have benefited from some rough edges, if only so that the game would be a bit more memorable overall.