For Honor Takes Pride in What It Does
Everyone is at war. Nobody’s happy with anyone else. Well, okay, you’re probably fine with with your immediate allies. Unless they let you down in the midst of a match, then you might need to have words. My point is, For Honor ’s modes is about proving your superiority on the field in a feud stirred by by Apollyon, the leader of the Blackstone Legion knights in either solo or multiplayer modes. And, when the network cooperates, it’s a pretty great mission.
Each chapter in For Honor ’s campaign gives you a chance to see what’s happening inside each group as they attempt to comprehend and reach to her troubles. We begin with the Iron Legion’s Warden, who comes upon the Blackstone Legion and Apollyon and sees what they’re up to. From there, we watch as the Raider, a viking, attempts to bring all of the clans together to face a common enemy. (Guess who?) Finally, the Orochi shows a samurai attempting to reclaim lost honor after being framed and rally fellow warriors. The story isn’t great and only lasts about six hours, but the gameplay within it helps. It gives you a more than adequate explanation for the continued push forward with its 18 missions, lets you try multiple classes and carry out some varied objectives, and gives you in-game currency and loot boxes for your time, all of which is more than enough in a situation such as this.
While the campaign is great for finding your footing in For Honor , the Domination, Elimination, and Skirmish are what I like to consider the learning curve modes, since you can rely on other players. These are the more forgiving opportunities for people to enjoy, as each one puts four people on a team facing the other four. Dominion allows respawning, for a time, and offers AI allies and opponents, with the only tasks being to reach 1,000 points before the other team by completing objectives and defeating all the human foes once you’ve reached that plateau. Elimination is a last-man-standing match with four people facing four other people and allows weaker players to still contribute and learn, while not getting totally and swiftly decimated. Skirmish is another four-on-four deathmatch, with points awarded for kills and the team with the most points winning. Unfortunately, Elimination and Skirmish are grouped together in multiplayer, meaning you don’t know what you’ll get when you pick Deathmatch.
Brawl and Duel are the more intricate affairs. Ideally, these put you against only human opponents, the deadliest enemies of all. Brawl is a two on two mode, where you have one ally to rely upon and two foes to defeat. It’s my favorite mode of all, thanks to the strategies you can employ and opportunities afforded by the number of players. You can really come up with some good plots when you have an able partner. Duel is almost as good, putting you one-on-one against a single opponent. There is no running or hiding. It’s you against him or her, and you need to be ready. And, thanks to tight controls and move inputs that make sense, it’s all on you if you can’t keep up.
An important thing to note about For Honor is that this is a fighting game. It isn’t a straightforward beat’em up like initial information would success. While you will quickly cut through mobs of soldiers from time to time, the major fights against specific opponents are the ones that matter. It plays with the sorts of weapon combos, strengths and weaknesses you’d expect from a game like Dark Souls , Street Fighter , or even Soul Calibur . You choose a stance, aiming up, left, or right, and then attack or guard from that position. It’s vital you learn to do things like guard break, parry, counter, throw, dodge, and make the opponent bleed. You need to know and watch your opponent for sudden shifts in his or her stance. Plus, you basically memorize the move set for the hero or heroine you happen to be using, so you know which combos to use. It’s as much mental as it is physical. Being agile enough to chain together the right moves and react to enemy assaults means nothing if you aren’t smart enough to know which attacks and defensive maneuvers are best for each situation.
This is why I suspect For Honor ’s Duel and Brawl modes are going to end up being the game’s lasting legacy. Especially with the benefit of Faction War, which will reward people for continuing to play and invest in the game over time. Going against people on these more personal brawls felt so much more fulfilling to me. When you have an honorable and smaller scale fight, the game really shines. You’re given the opportunity to really focus on your character and opponent. It’s possible to watch for any tells and make good use of the various skills you may have honed in a game like Bloodborne and find useful here.
These more intimate matches happen to give you an opportunity to really appreciate the detail in each characters. This is probably a silly thing to notice, but I think For Honor has the most intricate animations I have ever seen in a game. If you’re fortunate enough to find a moment of piece in the battle, watch the way your character walks, runs, swings their weapon, and raises their shield. Then, pick a different warriors and see how they move. Every single one is different. Every action is spot-on accurate. It’s one of the most authentic games I’ve ever seen. I mean sure, it’s also just a generally beautiful and detailed experience, but the care that went into these characters is astonishing.
In fact, the opportunity to always be looking better is quite a motivating factor in For Honor . This is a game with oodles of customization options. Putting together a character, collecting good pieces of equipment, designing an intricate emblem, and making your warrior your own is often as satisfying as winning a match against a worthy opponent in Duel. Nobushi is my favorite character ever, and it isn’t just because she has a Blissful Rest Tier 3 ability that fully restores her health and wonderful bow attacks, but also because I believe she has some of coolest equipment options. If pressed, I’d say For Honor feels like a Dark Souls -style fighting game where everyone is competing to prove they’re both strongest and best-dressed.
Does all of this setup make it sound like something’s got to give? Well, it does. Unfortunately, actually getting those nifty bits and pieces is both a crapshoot and chore. While you can get random item rewards from matches, you’re mostly exchanging accrued Steel in exchange for additional characters and randomized boxes of equipment. With a character being 500 Steel and scavenging boxes costing at least 300 Steel, it eventually begins feeling like you’ll need to resort to microtransactions to build up your armory. Steel can be earned from making progress in the game by playing and going through the tutorials, but it’s difficult to get enough for everything you need when the online multiplayer isn’t always working properly.
There are issues with multiplayer cohesiveness and continuity. It could be due to For Honor ’s reliance on peer-to-peer networking. If the person acting as host has a bad connection, everyone’s going to have a bad time. It might be launch issues and growing pains. While I didn’t have many problems finding a fight when choosing a quick match or Duel, it was difficult finding one that really worked well. All I know is this. I absolutely am noticing latency and connection issues.
Now, this might not be the biggest problem in all games, but it is in one like For Honor . Precision is of the utmost importance here. Doing something in the right place at the right time is critical, and sudden lag screwing up timing is the last thing we want or need. That isn’t even taking into account disconnects due to connection issues. I don’t know if it was rage quitting, but I ran into more than a few instances where I couldn’t finish matches due to something going wrong.
Let me give you an example of my worst For Honor experience so far. Now, I’m not the best player out there. Given the game’s age, I’m sure I’m not the only one. So, when I have an opportunity to win Duels, I’m pretty happy. It was a 2-1 match in my favor. Except suddenly, there are connection errors. The screen dims, I see the warning, and when it clears, suddenly my opponent has completely walloped me. Even though I was pressing in the correct direction to supposedly guard against the attack, it did nothing. Twice in a row this happened during the fight, assuring the enemy’s victory.
Of course, I suppose I should be thankful that I was even able to play at all. I encountered network error 0004000014, matchmaking error 0002000115, and many other errors beginning with “000” when attempting to take part in the multiplayer modes.
If For Honor were a game that wasn’t didn’t rely so heavily on its internet connection, I could rave about it for hours. It is beautiful. The move sets for each character are well thought out and balanced, meaning people who put in enough effort will succeed with any of the available heroes. The campaign offers an interesting enough solo experience that lets people gradually face greater challenges. The multiplayer is extraordinary, when it’s working properly. It’s just that Ubisoft has once again not anticipated the needs of a game such as this. I feel like peer-to-peer wasn’t the right system for such a game, and that it would have been better for everyone if this had been a client-server game.
RATING OUT OF 5 RATING DESCRIPTION 5.0 Graphics
For Honor is a stunning game with exceptional animations and detailed character designs. 4.0 Control
It isn’t too control For Honor and find your way to victory, so long as you can remember the inputs for essential moves and execute them correctly. 3.0 Music / Sound FX / Voice Acting
The voice acting and background music are fine, but aren’t among the most memorable. 4.0 Play Value
While the the campaign can be completed in under 10 hours and the network is suffering from some launch woes, there’s quite a bit of potential in the multiplayer modes 4.0 Overall Rating – Great
Not an average. See Rating legend below for a final score breakdown.
Review Rating Legend | |||
---|---|---|---|
0.1 – 1.9 = Avoid | 2.5 – 2.9 = Average | 3.5 – 3.9 = Good | 4.5 – 4.9 = Must Buy |
2.0 – 2.4 = Poor | 3.0 – 3.4 = Fair | 4.0 – 4.4 = Great | 5.0 = The Best |
Game Features: