MORDHAU
by developer
and
publisher Triternion—
Xbox
series X
review written
by Jim
with
a copy provided by the publisher.
Estimated Reading Time: 9 minutes.
I
will start by saying I am not a huge fan of online multiplayer games
but I am a fan of the medieval period. MORDHAU is just that, but
because I like the setting and that I hear you can play with bots I
decided to give the game a go. When first starting the game I thought
it would at least tell me a little about what the menus in the game
were but there was no info at all. Luckily I figured out how to jump
into a combat tutorial. This is where I encountered some things I
didn't like.
First
off when the game loaded, the level the graphics were not fully
loaded making everything look muddy and hard to see. But once it
loads fully things look decent enough. I also think they fixed this
in a patch that has just been released as of this writing. One other
glitch I ran into was when I spawned into a level I just fell through
the level and kept falling until the end of the level. Next, I was
told how to use the sword that I had in my hands, and here again, I
have a slight problem. I can swing the sword in different ways but to
do this I had to use the right stick and the right trigger on my
controller. Okay, the trigger button is normal for first-person games
of this type, but using the right stick, the same stick that you use
to look around to swing my sword right, left, or up to down is just
not fun to do. I would do it and turn the view just to miss my
target! Lastly, I also learned that I could turn the sword around and
use the hilt to knock heavily armored enemies out more easily. This
is called MORDHAU a real sword technique that was used. I hardly used MORDHAU in any matches because I tried a few times the sword would
never turn around.
Next,
I learn about blocking and parrying attacks. This is all-time-based
blocking is less forgiving, but to parry I had to time it just right.
Then I could attack back this just doesn't work well when I am in a
live game with 30-60 something people playing. There were also a few
things I didn't really understand that much like clashes when the
other player or bot and I both hit swords at the same time or being
flinched where my weapon goes flying out of my hand leaving me
defenseless. One of the easier moves in the game is a stab which I
can pull this off easily by pressing the right bumper. I could also
kick easily with the left bumper.
Now
I was brought over and taught how to use a bow. Thank goodness a
ranged weapon! I am way better at range than at close range I
thought. I happened to be right this time as using the longbow I had
picked up was a lot easier to handle. Later when I played an actual
game though I would learn that the bow does not do a ton of damage,
but I do get to stay away from the action. It's also really hard to
hit moving targets and there is friendly fire so more often than not
I hit a friendly. Friendly fire also makes it hard when I get close
to an enemy and swing my sword to hit them and accidentally hit an
ally. So using a bow to me was a little fun. I just wish it was
stronger.
Still
in the tutorial, the next thing I learned was that I can ride a horse
and use a lance at the same time. Let me tell you it takes practice
to ride, aim, and hit a dummy all at the same time. At first, I just
couldn't figure it out. I messed around with it for a good half hour
before I finally got the hang of it. Next, I was instructed to get
off the horse and was brought to a door that I could break down with
an axe and then rebuild with a hammer. I think you can use any weapon
to break things but the axe may damage them more. Lastly, I was
taught how to use a catapult and I had a hard time aiming this. MORDHAU does not hold your hand at all with no crosshairs for the
catapult or show where my aim is going. I just have to shoot and
guess and then try again.
That
ended the tutorial
and so I was ready to jump into a single-player bot game. There were
a handful of modes to pick from. I knew what some of these are:
deathmatch, team deathmatch, and horde. Then there are ones I had no
idea what they were and MORDHAU doesn't even tell me how to play
them. They were frontline, sword game, and skirmish. I picked horde
mode to start because I usually like horde modes in other games. In
this game, however, things were different. You are tasked with
protecting a bot while earning gold you can use to buy new weapons
and armor. The weapons and armor were scattered all over the level
and there wasn't enough time between waves to find what I was looking
for. Needless to say, I died a lot just because I couldn't find what
I wanted or I didn't have enough gold to buy better armor.
So
horde mode didn't go so well for me and I switched modes. I can pick
how many bot players I want to play and I jumped into a single-player
team deathmatch. I thought playing with bots would be easy but I died
a lot either because I am really bad at this game or the “skill-based
combat” didn't translate well to controllers as it did with
keyboard and mouse. One thing I truly hated in the game was was
playing a local bot game. I get no in-game currency or experience
points.
That
brings me to the next thing I tried. Online battles! The first thing
I noticed was the game kept pairing me with players who were level
12-20 and there is no way I could compete when I am at level one.
That's where having the single player give you points would come in
handy. I tried both small-scale brawls and bigger fights with 32-64
players. In the brawl, it was me and one other person vs one other
person. I thought it would be easy but my ally just kept taunting
while looking at me and since I was a ranger with very little armor
and a bow the enemy player kept going after me while my ally just
watched until I died and then he would attack. This reminded me why I
hate multiplayer games. Real people could be jerks in games.
I
had to try out the large-scale battles next. Frontline is what it was
for this round. In this mode, my team and I must try to complete
objectives or defend objectives to win the game. This mode was a
little fun when I got good allies, but there were a few times where
someone would just spawn in swinging their sword and hitting allies
dealing damage. Whether it was on purpose or not I can't tell but it
got annoying quickly. One other annoying thing where it was
accidental or on purpose was people kept hitting the taunt button so
all you hear is the player's character yelling. This could be because
it is triggered by pressing down on the right stick. Why the devs
made everything the right stick is beyond me. After either winning or
losing I got experience points and money. Now the game does not give
me a lot of experience, but it does give you a small amount of money
that is enough to buy a new weapon or item for a character I can
create if I wanted.
When
playing as the ranger, my favorite class, I die very easily as they
are not armored well and all it takes is about one hit and I am
losing my head. With no story or anything I had very little to
motivate me to keep playing. Even changing classes didn't help as it
seemed everyone could swing their weapons faster than me. I just kept
spawning lasting less than a minute, dying, re-spawning again, and
rinse and repeat.
Because
the default bow user in the game was weak to me I decided to try
making my own character. But again the game does nothing to tell me
what I am doing. I just had to guess. So I found the armor and put on
some better armor, for in-game money of course, and then I bought the
long bow because I wasn't at a high enough level for the crossbow.
Next, I went to pick a melee weapon to take with me in case I drop
the bow, which happens a lot when you're hit. But I found out there
is a limit to how much you can bring shown as points, and the bow
took up most of the points! You can carry more than one weapon but you only get so many points to use when picking equipment. The armor covers three places: the head, body and legs. Each armor slot lets you pick from no armor, light, medium, or heavy armor where each costs more points. Weapons and other things like healing items also take points.
Score:
5 / 10
