The basic premise of the game pitches two teams of five players against one another, with the objective of both teams being to destroy their rival's main base. Simple eh? That's what I thought when I was stupid enough to dive right into the fray, disregarding the tutorial. I failed to acquire a single kill and experienced a cascade of insults from my frustrated team-mates.
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| Shocking. Positively shocking |
Let's get one thing straight. Heroes of Newerth has an incredibly competitive community, not least because there are regular tournaments with substantial cash prizes. Sadly, the consequence of this is that tolerance for new players is thin on the ground, and if you're unfortunate enough to land in a game full of experienced players on your first foray into the game, either steel yourself for some harsh criticism or bail out.
This might seem like a good reason not to invest in the game, and having experienced it first hand I could understand if that was your decision. However, embarrassment can be avoided to some extent by spending some time running through the tutorial and checking a few online walkthroughs, because once you've reached the stage where you can handle the game's frantic pace and are no longer receiving a death-threat every thirty seconds, Heroes of Newerth is actually pretty enjoyable.
Although destroying the enemy base is your ultimate goal, getting to that stage is a long and complex journey. To begin with, the area between the enemy base and your own is littered with defence towers that will quickly turn most low-level heroes into pavement jam should you attempt to run between them. In addition, both sides spawn waves of Creeps – AI controlled units which automatically attack the opposing forces' units and buildings.
The early stages of the battle revolves around killing the Creeps, which provide a standard source of experience points. Furthermore, if you land the finishing blow on a Creep (or any other unit, for that matter), you are rewarded with gold. This can be spent on an impressive array of upgrades, which are created by purchasing a series of components in accordance with various recipes.
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| This is going to end messily |
As you can probably tell, there's a fair amount of meat to the game, and to be honest I'm only running through the very basics of what it has to offer. Once you've gained a few levels you can begin to mix things up tactically. Alongside the standard Creeps are neutral Creeps dotted around the map, these can either be killed for further experience points or, if there's a nearby skirmish going on between Heroes, brought into the mix by attacking the Creeps and then charging toward the battle.
Choosing your hero also requires tactical thinking, and not simply picking the one that can throw the biggest fireballs. The sixty-four heroes are divided into three primary groups – strength, agility and intelligence, and having a balanced team is crucial if you want to stand a chance of winning. But it's also important to note that each hero's abilities vary. Although some intelligence heroes like Glacius and the Demented Shaman both have abilities which root an enemy to the spot, Nymphora gains a higher-level ability to teleport allies around the map, which has obvious potential benefits. Buying items for your Hero adds further variation to their standard abilities. This also means you cannot judge the strengths and weaknesses of a character by prior knowledge of the unit's basic attributes, and so there are surprises in every battle.
There's certainly plenty to keep you going, and what's more it's all presented in crisp and colourful visuals, but the game isn't perfect. Movement of your character is done by simply clicking the mouse on the location you wish to move to. However, much of the game's combat involves advancing, making a single hit and then quickly retreating to avoid taking damage, which involves a lot of frantic clicking. As such I felt the game would have benefited from a click-and-drag movement style seen in games like Titan Quest and Torchlight.
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| Standing in the pool at your base regenerates health and mana |
The most significant problem Heroes of Newerth has is that is simply isn't very friendly to newcomers, and I'm not just talking about the competitive nature of the community. The tutorial moves at lightning pace, with a tendency to quickly tell you about an aspect of the game and suddenly move on, rather than giving you opportunities to try things out yourself. What the game really needs is an offline practice mode to allow new players to experiment with the different Heroes. This would alleviate abuse of inexperienced players and avoid seasoned teams losing a match because some poor sod doesn't know his Behemoth from his Plague Rider.
HEROES OF NEWERTH VERDICT
Heroes of Newerth is an intriguing mix of frenetic action and tactical gameplay, showcasing some of the very best aspects of it’s still-evolving genre. Be warned though, it’s not the best choice of entertainment for a relaxed Sunday afternoon, and is probably best played after chugging a few cans of relentless and shouting at your own reflection for half an hour.
TOP GAME MOMENT
Landing your first killing blow. It’s a lot harder than it looks.
