Rovio is almost certainly best known for the Angry Birds series, but it’s trying its hand at something slightly different with Darkfire Heroes. This is a character-collecting midcore ARPG with some gorgeous graphics and more than a few twists up …
Rovio is almost certainly best known for the Angry Birds series, but it’s trying its hand at something slightly different with Darkfire Heroes. This is a character-collecting midcore ARPG with some gorgeous graphics and more than a few twists up its sleeve. And it’s pretty darn good.
The story here revolves around meteors crashing into a fantasy world and unleashing hordes of awful monsters. You’re in control of a team of legendary heroes who need to take them all down.
The game takes control of most things here – your heroes move and attack on their own. You choose when and where to unleash their most powerful attacks, dragging and dropping them into play. You’ve also got a deck of spell cards that cost mana to use – hurl one into play and it’ll do some damage or heal some allies.
There’s a decent level of tactical consideration to the battles here – you can’t just spam out your specials and hope for the best. Team composition plays a big part in things too, and there are loads and loads and loads of different heroes to collect and use.
Darkfire Heroes gets its balance between simplicity and challenge pretty much spot on. You’ll learn the mechanics in a few minutes, but you’ll be exploring and exploiting them in new and exciting ways as you push forwards. There’s a tight compulsion loop that drags you on to the next fight and then the one after that.
On top of everything there’s a pretty decent art style. It’s a mix of bright and grimy that manages to capture the decay of the world pretty darn well. It’s sometimes a bit tough to see what’s happening in fights, especially when things get bunched up, but you can usually work out what’s happening.
Throw in a decent progression system, a bunch of different modes and challenges that unlock as you play and you’ve got yourself a midcore ARPG that’s easy to dip in and out of on the regular.
Darkfire Heroes is a brash and engaging experience that’s going to hook you in from the first battle to the umpteenth, and you’re going to play it with a wrapt grin on your face. Check it out, we don’t think you’ll be disappointed.
Click here to read more reviews of the biggest and best mobile games in the world
