Review of Vortex Wars (Beta)

[Zerieth]

Hello all, another great review from Zerieth.

MMO games are now the turn of the century. Who wants to play against a.i.'s all day when you can join your friends on the internet and play games with them? Human intellect is far superior to that of a computer. Also the genre's are just as large as console games. Shooters, fantasy, tactical war fare (my personal fave).

That brings me to this review. Vortex Wars, a up and coming new flash Tactics game that allows real players to fight each other, is a risk like online board game that features a random map gen system. The object is to conquer all the spaces on the board. Units are distributed every turn based on the number of territories you control. The max number you can have on a territory is 8 so you won't be sitting waiting for units on the front lines forever. Most of the game is totally risk except it isn't based off the world (Though they now have a risk map. Go Figure). My rating will be based on:

Playability
Player Community
Graphical/Audio Features

First off the Playability. This is a flash game and it's in beta so I can't say I was expecting much when I went into this. Sadly, what I found didn't surprise me one bit. While yes the random system looks cool at first it tends to make very unbalanced game maps. Further the random unit distribution has a nasty habit of placing units were they are not needed and can even lock players in corners for several turns. The dice aren't much better since they determine combat out comes and the remainder of units. As an example I have played a game were I was given great rolls so I could advance far and fast. Another player continually got bad rolls and couldn't expand very far if at all. In that instance it seemed as if the game had determined the winner even before the start. Since then I have seen multiple examples of this happening. The First Player Advantage is pretty ridiculous as well. This was addressed in a update so that all players get random starting spots. Except I have played first about 2 times outa 50 games. Not to mention all the large yet narrow maps that make for pretty unbalanced play. I want a burger shaped game, not a bloody hot dog.

Now for a saving grace. Work is being done to repair the evil dice roller. I have my doubts the work will be successful because computers today are not capable of truly random number generation. They are Psuedo random which is a far cry away from what is probably desired here. Also the map issue has been addressed with premade maps now selectable. The problem? You have to achieve ranks to unlock them and not a lot of people seem to want to play with early ones which puts you in random games for a while until you achieve the sufficient ranks (I think its around 12). Thankfully the unit issue was addressed with the release of unit distribution modes. These modes are; Random, the simple default state of the game; Borders, which prioritizes spaces adjacent to enemy spaces; and Manual, which lets you pick were you distribute troops. The problem with borders is that if you have unclaimed land that you want but a enemy moves next to you, you will have to wait until ALL spaces near the enemies are 8's. The Manual seems to work out well but as you claim more reinforcements the bloody timer stops you from placing them all. My advice? Don't use a track pad. Get a mouse.

The game also has a all distributed mode wereit randomly places your units across the map much like risk, and a draw system were you simply get 1 spot and expand into white (Unowned) territories until you start fighting. The First Player Advantage in the first system makes it pretty useless and the advantage in the second will have you in tears on a choke point map.

With all of this in mind I have to give playability a big fat 2/5

The Player community is actually one of the finer communities I have seen in MMO games to date. Runescape, a popular medieval MMORPG, is full of scammers, exploiters, and out & out jerks. Star Craft isn't much better, but Vortex Wars has a very nice community for a war game. I have had maybe 4 trouble makers in all the hundred or so games I've played. I hear they are coming out with a friend/foe list so you can follow your friends around and annoy them to death. No hard feelings seem achieved when breaking an alliance with someone so long as the original intent of the alliance is dealt with.

Not much else to say so I will give Player community a whopping 5/5.

Once again since this is a flash game I wasn't expecting much out of graphics and sound. I was impressed with the map scheme as all the spaces are made of hexagons allowing multiple attack points. The rendition of the world looks very good as well. Things are simple but organized and not to flashy with crappy colors. The game lobby is also very neat with a picture of each game type next to the name of the game.

The music, on the other hand, can be downright dreadful. At first the war theme sounds good until you realize that it repeats about every 8th measure and can soon turn your brain into slop if you play it long enough. I ended up turning on my Youtube.

Thanks to the simply graphics the game doesn't consume much in the way of computer resources. That's a big thing for me as I am a dsl user. Also it's browser based so you can play at McDonalds while stuffing your face with super sized big macs and watching you're gut get bigger from over playing games and underplaying healthy foods.

For all of this i give the Graphic/Audio Features a 4/5

When I go into a game I try to keep an open mind on what I am playing. I do try to enjoy myself were ever possible but this game just didn't hit it with me. Compared to Star Craft and Battle For Wesnoth I found it down right boring and the randomness in the games didn't improve my over all view. I personally wanna give it a 1.5/5 but I also have to take into consideration that it IS still in Beta. With newer versions coming out ever other day I may come to like the game a little more over time. Will it ever replace my beloved Battle for Wesnoth? Probably not as Wesnoth is a over all better game. Does it also make me feel nostalgic for a certain board game? Heck ya it does. Makes me wanna give my brother a swirly for losing all the damn pieces.

In short would I recomend the game to guys with good net and better computers? Probably not. To my fellow DSL and crappy computer users? I probably would. Beats the mindlessness of Angry Birds, B Gate's attempt at taking over the world.

As such, and without further ado, The final result. Can I get a drum roll? No? Aw screw you.

Vortex Wars (Beta) Grade:
Over all 3.5/5

Playability 2/5
Player Community 5/5
Graphic/Audio Features 4/5

The Final say: My dog ate the game board to.

[Zerieth]

Not to double post but I post this review here with the full knowledge that someone will bash it. The intention of any of my reviews is to inform the makers of the game were they can improve, and to let people know what they are getting into by joining a game. In time I may change my opinion and redo a review. It has happened.

[BadFurDay]

Runescape, a popular medieval MMORPG, is full of scammers, exploiters, and out & out jerks. Star Craft isn't much better

Just a quick tip, I think you went to the wrong place concerning Starcraft / Starcraft II. I find these games to have the most active and mature/adult communities of all video games. It's a bunch of guys who started playing in the early 2000s when they were teens, and are now most if not all well in their twenties.

Try teamliquid, or screddit, the ingame community / blizzard forums are probably where you tried looking, and both are filled with kids and avoided like the plague. Don't let some idiots ruin one of the best game communities around. I have never run into a single scammer, exploiter, or all out jerk that didn't get instabanned off teamliquid and screddit


That apart, I pretty much agree with your review. I find your appreciation of the community a bit too generous, there are plenty of idiots and trolls around ingame at times, you probably just got lucky. At least, Lopdo is doing a good job at getting rid of the worse ones of these, I usually don't see them ever again after they are reported.

[Lopdo]

I think comparing VW to wesnoth or SC (srsly?) is not really good idea. They are totally different games. If I wanted to make wesnoth-like game, I would. Perhaps I will, but it will not be VW2, it is just way too different. Also complaining about pseudo random generator isn't good idea either. Probability distribution is good enough imho. I have streaks of bad luck and good luck on real life dice as well and I don't think they are much more common in VW.

Anyway, thanks for you review and ideas.

[Ratburntro44]

Since when is VW an MMO?

"A massively multiplayer online game (also called MMO and MMOG) is a multiplayer video game which is capable of supporting hundreds or thousands of players simultaneously. By necessity, they are played on the Internet, and feature at least one persistent world."

I think you mean multiplayer online game.

[BadFurDay]

Since when is VW an MMO?

"A massively multiplayer online game (also called MMO and MMOG) is a multiplayer video game which is capable of supporting hundreds or thousands of players simultaneously. By necessity, they are played on the Internet, and feature at least one persistent world."

I think you mean multiplayer online game.

VortexWars is an MMO. IT is certainly not an MMORPG like WoW or the like, but it is, by definition, an MMO.

A more important question is: Does it matter?

[Ratburntro44]

I know the difference between an MMO and an MMORPG. Please do not insult my intelligence.

By definition, an MMO can support hundreds of thousands of players simultaneously and has at least one persistent world. I doubt VW can support hundreds of thousands of players simultaneously, even if it might be able to in the future. However, by definition, an MMO has to have at least one persistent world. I don't see this in Vortex Wars.

Vortex Wars is a multiplayer online game, not a Massively Multiplayer Online game.

[BadFurDay]

I guess it depends on the context and the wording.

As someone who has held a job as developer in a generic online game design team for a while, I was introduced to a definition of MMO that has to do with a persistent server on which subgames are hosted. The concept is to handle all the players on a single server clusters, and not through virtually hosted lans or direct connexion one versus one battles.

That made, for example, Starcraft's Battle.net an exemple of an MMO, and MUDs were considered MMOs even when playing on multiple closed servers.

I suppose the meaning of MMO has been tweaked and evolved over time to become that of a persistent world. I can give you that. As much as it differs from the original meaning, it actually makes way more sense that way.

But regardless:

A more important question is: Does it matter?

[Joshua]

I didn't even read the review (sorry Zerieth) because it was too long.
but ratburn and badfurday, i think the game is a MOG (if thats actually a game type, obviously not the cat), a multiplayer online game

[Ratburntro44]

@BadFurDay True, it isn't important. I'm guessing that it terms of programming, this is similar to an MMO, just in terms of gameplay, it is an MOG.

@Joshua Thanks for agreeing with me.