top of page
Writer's picture@brunosbom

Review: War Mongrels



I can't describe the pleasure it is to see an RTT style game in my hands, but I can say that it is something unique, maybe even one of the game styles I have been passionate about since I was a child. Unpretentiously when I first saw War Mongrels, I believed it would be just another game from this modern era of strategy games that would deliver a similar experience to Commandos, well, I can say I was completely wrong, War Mongrels, was unique and certainly enters my top 100 games of my life and what better way to honor a game than writing about it?



Destructive Creations created and distributes War Mongrels, the same team that developed Space Raiders in Space, Ancestors Legacy and the controversial Hatred. So we can get an idea that the production company was already used to making similar games.


The game is available on the following platforms: PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Microsoft Windows, Xbox Series X and Series S, Mac OS, and PC via Steam.



STORY

The story revolves around World War II on the Eastern front. Like Finn Star Wars: The Force Awakens, our protagonists create a conscience, as they are Nazis who became aware of what they were doing and then decided to rebel, thus being deserters from the Nazi army. We begin with Manfred and Ewald, who reject the orders of their commanders and defect from the German army.


During their escape, they meet other people who have joined the resistance to fight the Nazi threat. The main story of War Mongrels is not surprising, but it is well told and captivating.


GRAPHICS

War Mongrels is not only beautiful, it is possibly one of the most beautiful isometric view games I have ever had the pleasure of playing. Its fluidity and color palette that brings the look of reality closer to our own reality makes us not only immersed within the story but fascinated by its beautiful landscapes and historical settings.


Violent landscapes and portrayal of reality, not afraid to use the Nazi swastika or show deaths by hanging, War Mongrels has excelled at extreme portrayal of the reality of the facts


Each stage in War Mongrels is unique, there is nothing that we can say, look, this graphical element is not that cool, everything is very well done and polished.

The character animations for example are incredible and realistic, when we enter combat mode the picture of our protagonists changes to something as if we had entered into a battle frenzy. I need to mention that I played this game through the Xbox Series X, without any kind of choking problem either.


GAMEPLAY

When I first played War Mongrels, I felt that I might not be able to do it properly, or that the game was not for me. This is due to the fact that War Mongrels on consoles has a much longer learning curve than is usual for games in general. This is something that can put off new players a bit, at least on consoles. You might not get used to the controls until about 5 or 6 hours into the game.


There is still a lot of confusion regarding genre in relation to RTS and RTT. When we refer to real-time strategy games, we think of resource management, base building and logistics, such as Warcraft, Age of Empires and Star Craft. While the model we are analyzing (War Mongrels) refers to a Real-Time Tatics (RTT) game, we can cite as an example games such as Commandos, Desperados and others. These are related to tactical and operational aspects of warfare, exploring areas and terrain, and completing tasks with the game's methods.


In light of this, War Mongrels is a GREAT RTT. Here, we have everything we expect from a complex and thorough gameplay. We have the tactical planning mode, where we can slow down time to plan actions together, but I missed the possibility of multiple actions, such as giving commands in sequence so that our actions could be even better planned and even facilitate escapes.


Each character has its own abilities, advantages and disadvantages. Some are more efficient, like Manfred, who can whistle to attract enemies. While Ewald can use the "Fight" ability to kill more than one enemy at a time. Others leave something to be desired, such as Greta, used in a rather silly way, because she is the only woman in the group. She cannot crawl and is easily identified in stealth situations, which makes us a bit angry with the character.


We also manage to get into a dynamic action mode, which is the game's combat mode, where the protagonists set out to use firearms. This mode works evenly, as perhaps the camera was lacking better refinement to make it completely stochastic. At times, it feels like there is a bit of screen missing so that we can hit our targets.


Unfortunately, I only got one copy of the game, so I couldn't test the multiplayer mode, but it looks pretty cool too, maybe it will make the game easier(or not)


ACHIEVEMENTS

War Mongrels on easy is hard, and our portal reviews the achievements, but how far is it worth it for a game? It may be one of the coolest games we have ever had the pleasure to play, but is it worth it to face an extremely complex mission with details, timing and strategies that need to be very well thought out and executed and do everything in Time Trial on the hardest difficulty of the game? Well, if you want to complete all the achievements, I'll tell you in advance. It may be one of the most difficult games to accomplish in your life. I am saying this with my purest essence, which is playing hard games. With 63 hours of gameplay, I am one of four people in the world who have the most achievements on Xbox and I am far from finished.


I will not do this now, but not at the present time, it will be a task for the future in a few years. I suggest that you play just for the fun of it, because finishing this game will give you at least 100 hours of play time if you try to complete everything.


Destructive Creations could put everything it wanted into the challenges of War Mongrels, without the torturous race against time. Then it would be more appropriate to finish, and it might even change my opinion about the overall picture of this game, since we focused exactly on this part, the achievements.


TRAILLER

CONCLUSION

After playing Desperados III, I thought RTT could rest for a while, as that to me was perhaps the highest point of where one could go based on narrative, graphics and gameplay. To me, they both resemble each other in every respect, they are games that are walking together. It was a delight to play War Mongrels, with charismatic and deep characters, betrayals, well told stories and fantastic settings. For sure, all these positive points put it in one of the best RTT games of this century and one of the main ones of the genre. Even though there are some minor flaws and problems that are perhaps lacking in the game, such as better step-by-step action planning, the game manages to hold its own from start to finish with fantastic moments and no drop in quality. There is also a room for a new story in one of the endings of the game, or maybe that was just my impression? I hope so, I hope that with Shadow Gambit: The Cursed Crew coming from Mimimi Games(Desperados), that we will see some amazing games in the not too distant future. I personally would like to see a War Mongrels 2, 3, 4, war mongrels underground 2.

Review realizada através da Gamertag: Scoulz


SCORE: 86/100


10 views0 comments

Recent Posts

See All

Commentaires


bottom of page