Heroic is basically a dark fantasy version of Clash Royale, that aims to mix things up with its 2.5D visuals and three attack lanes. While it’s a solid effort, and does feel a little fresh for a few hours, it …
Heroic is basically a dark fantasy version of Clash Royale, that aims to mix things up with its 2.5D visuals and three attack lanes. While it’s a solid effort, and does feel a little fresh for a few hours, it lacks the balance and immediacy of its direct competitor.
The basic premise: You’ll select a hero, build a deck of troops, and head into battle against a real opponent. You have to try and destroy your enemy’s portal by attacking down three lanes, while countering whatever your enemy throws at you.
Playing a card requires energy, which recharges over time. Cards cost varying different amounts of energy, with the cheapest cards generally being weaker than the strongest cards.
Your heroes also have special abilities they can use throughout the battle. The base hero includes a fireball spell, which decimates any units it comes into contact with, and a spell that increases the damage of any allied units attacking down a specific lane.
Battles still largely involve trying to gain a mana advantage over your opponent by countering their troop cards with cheaper variants than your own. There aren’t quite as many options here though, so it’s not a particularly challenging affair.
That’s ultimately our biggest problem with Heroic – the balance just feels a bit off. We liked that heroes have their own playstyle, but the troop cards themselves often underwhelm. They just seem to lack the punch of their Clash Royale counterparts.
It’s just little details. Archers have way too short an attack range, so they’re basically obsolete, and your basic Knight card can’t really take much damage before it falls. We like how literally every single card has its place in Clash Royale, while you get the feeling with Heroic that you’re going to replace most of your introductory cards after a short while.
Upgrading them is also far less intuitive. Whenever you open a chest, you’ll get a variety of different upgrade resources. Each card uses a different resource type and you have to level up the card a bunch of times before upgrading it to a higher tier, at which point you level it up again.
Why Nordeus thought that was a better system versus Clash Royale’s straightforward levelling up of cards is anyone’s guess. It’s just fiddly and messy, though it might encourage you to spend more cash trying to get what you need, which is likely what the developer is aiming for.
One positive of Heroic is its visual style though. The dark fantasy aesthetics do separate it from Clash Royale’s cartoony visuals, so if you’re not a fan of them then Heroic at least offers an alternative.
Ultimately, we can’t recommend it in a world in which Clash Royale exists though. It’s by no means a bad game, it just pales in comparison to Supercell’s efforts. Its attempts to change up the formula have simply resulted in a lesser experience, and it isn’t as tightly balanced as its inspiration.
