that will give a definite edge, so things aren’t totally
balanced.
And, I’m going to be honest; while the Free to Play
release improved things a bit, you’re still going to
keep running into the hardcore fanbase that bought
the game early access, loves it, and will run a train on
your sorry ass. These are the people that fully accept
the game and see no flaws, in a “if you’re not going
to be as good as I am, why are you playing” sense.
That said, the release increased their peak
playerbase by roughly 5 times what it was in
previous months. Though I’d argue having the
servers die on the first night the game was available
wasn’t great.
They fundamentally changed an aspect of the game
in the last update. Before, each round you chose a
rite (a boon to an ability on a character) and you
could tailor it a bit to who you were fighting. Now, it
is a somewhat Paladins-like build that you set up
and choose at the beginning of a match.
What you’ve got is what you’ve got the entire game,
so don’t choose the wrong thing. They also updated
the UI, making it far more (unnecessarily) complex
than it was before. I’d argue these changes weren’t
exactly for the better but it is what it is.
It’s also important to note that this isn’t a standard
MOBA. It’s pretty much all 3v3 (or 2v2) teamfights, no
laning. Even in the new mode that sort of simulates
the standard MOBA setup of map goals and the like.
Splitting up is a death warrant; getting singled out by
the enemy team is a death sentence. It has a very
high skill ceiling, but it also has a very high learning
curve, if you didn’t intuit that by the rest of my
review. The former’s a good thing for any game, but
the latter can keep people from picking it up in the
first place.
All in all, Battlerite is either your cup of tea or it isn’t. I
can’t say I was terribly fond of it during the time it
was in our streaming rotation. It’s very hard to get
into, even if you’re familiar with MOBa’s. You might
feel differently. And the best part is, you don’t have to
ta ke my word for it, since the game has gone Free to
Play. So, at the very least, you should give it a decent
shot. You never know, you might love it.
Final Score:
3.5/5