RATINGS:

Gameplay: 6
Graphics: 6
Sound: 5

Overall: 6

Pros: Looks great, very casual and easy to play.
Cons: Almost identical to their other game Goodgame Empire.

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We’ve lately dedicated some of our time to checking out Goodgame Studios’ latest free-to-play browser title Shadow Kings: Dark Ages. Set in a classic medieval world, this city-building/ empire management MMO tasks players with constructing their personal fortified castle to fend off AI-controlled Shadow Orcs as well as other enemies, while the majority of later game actions revolve around PvP.

Registering was quick and painless: We only had to enter a mail address, username and password before activating the "submit" button to immediately log in to the game and start playing. As usual, the tutorial introduced us to the basic gameplay aspects and large arrows pointed out when to push what, guiding us with baby steps through the early stages.

There is a huge range of buildings and military units players are able to create, each requiring a different combination of the 4 available resources: stone, wood, food, and gold. To construct a building, players generally need wood and stone for their initial construction and upgrades while military units need food on an hourly basis and gold is used for practically every construction. The game also features a 5th premium resource in form of gems which can be earned by levelling up and purchased with real-world money. Gems enable players to accelerate the construction progress and to purchase unique items only available with gems.

Gameplay is tremendously fundamental and easy to pick up for those who don’t look for something that requires too much of their thought. It’s casual, with construction queues and waiting times by nature, and long journeys when attacking distant locations, making Shadow Kings: Dark Ages ideal for those who like to check in time and again while doing something else in the meantime. If you get stuck with something to do, there are continuously quests being thrown at you to build this, kill that, buy the other, and each time you gain XP and other rewards to help your fledgling city out.

Shadow Kings: Dark Ages pretty much remains the same as you level up, the only difference is that you get access to additional buildings and units as well as to a few features that grant additional options. It’s a resource management MMO at its core, so whether constructing a building or training a unit, you have to prioritise what to construct, particularly in the later game stages when multiple players might attack you at once while you’re trying to eke out your personal empire.

Combat is relatively simple, whether attacking an AI-controlled camps or a rival player’s city, you are able to select the forces you want to send to attack along with battering rams and catapults, and to decide whether to attack from the front or the city’s left or right flank. After each battle, you will be informed by a battle report about your progress. New players have a 24-hour grace period where they cannot be attacked unless they choose to let down the magical spell that protects their city, in order to be able to attack someone else. We took full advantage of this and attacked a player that removed their spell, only to get completely crushed by the time our warriors arrived (even though it was the nearest player city) as they had already produced twice the number of units that we had sent out; we still had a great time though.

Goodgame Studios already having the extremely similar Goodgame Empire title under their belt, Shadow Kings: Dark Ages doesn't really score any points for innovation. Although graphics are different and the GUI is tweaked a bit, it basically is pretty much exactly the same game. That said, while being pretty similar to the previous title, it’s still a pretty fun game and looks pretty good, though there is a slight mix in the graphical styles in areas, but that’s more of a personal preference. Interactivity and communication with other players seems easy, the menus are sleek and concise and even without the tutorial it won’t be too difficult for players to quickly understand what to do and where to go.

In case you’re interested in further details on this title, just activate the INFO button below.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, September 2nd, 2014 at 1:35 pm and is filed under MMO News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Puedes dejar una respuesta, o un trackback desde tu sitio web.