Clever Beans has brought Vikings to the spotlight recently with their new release of Playstation Network exclusive, When Vikings Attack!
Clever Beans has taken a humorous approach to this game, and it works well. The game doesn’t take itself seriously, and that’s what it has going for it. The game is a quirky, humorous, and unique multiplayer centric romp wherein hordes of comical Vikings will group together and throw stuff at you. Your job is to put together a group of rag-tag civilians as fast as you can so you can successfully fend off the invading Vikings and protect your town. You will be mimicking the Vikings tactics, and it’s a lot of fun.
Gameplay consists of mainly just running around, picking stuff up, throwing it, then dodging the object the Vikings probably just threw at you. It’s a great system, but it becomes tiring rather quickly. This is possibly the game’s greatest downfall, as while the formula is a real hitter, the actual game play gets very repetitive far too quickly.
There is a bit of variety though to keep you entertained, even if you do start feeling bored with it. You can go online with friends or just do some matchmaking to quickly join a multi-player game that is playing one of the three modes available. While each offers its own play style, the concept of the game remains and it will only last you maybe an extra 30-50 minutes at most.
There is not a whole lot of strategy to try and learn, and it can almost be compared to a button masher type game. Pick something up, throw it with square, dash to the side with X, now go and find another object, repeat.
The game, if you’re not bored of it already though, has lots for you to try and do. There are almost 70 individual characters to unlock in the story mode that has me constantly re-playing old missions, and I really like how it tells you which characters you don’t have have joined you’re group and when they get hit and go down, it saves me A LOT of time, and I wish more games had similar ways to keep track of extra stuff like this. Trophies will also have you replying if you’re up for it, as they are rather challenging.
Overall, When Vikings Attack! is a fun game, and can be played for maybe an hour before getting tired of it. The upside, is that when you are playing it, it’s a blast to play, especially with friends. Cross-Buy is what me purchase this game as well, and it’s a definite plus for the game. In the end, I’d give this game a:
Graphics: Quirky art style, detailed levels, and OK looking character models that I think could have been worked on a bit longer: 8.0
Gameplay: Excellent formula, is a blast to play, too repetitive: 7.5
Sound: Good soundtrack, good voice acting, humorous sounds and good sound effects: 9.0
Presentation: Nice looking world, easy to use menu system, no touch capabilities for Vita version: 8.0
End Score: 8.1