Heroes of Mavia

"Copy my homework but change it up a bit" were the words that created Heroes of Mavia, a real-time strategy game that unfortunately cannot compare to the rival that has already been on the market for a while, called Clash of Clans. Taking away the points of the game being an exact copy, the game lacks the same fluidity as others, and lacks a lot of the oomph that makes the other games in its category better than it.

Although multiple changes need to be made before the game can be enjoyed in the same manner as others, it is an alright base for what the game can truly become. Although no matter what changes the game ends up taking, it will forever be in the shadow of games that are exactly the same and have come out before, such as Clash of Clans.

Gameplay

You are first introduced to the troops that you will be using in the game, with a nice still to show off the designs of them all. The first standout feature from this is the graphics that you are shown, and as you load into the game, the quality doesn't diminish, but the life that you had once felt during that loading screen is instantly taken away. The game is early, yes, but the map is a completely empty green field with a few rocks scattered around. With these rocks also being able to get removed at no cost, or not giving you a gift for removing them, also adds to the blandness of what you see on the map.

Now, of course, with games like this, you are supposed to build your base out, and that, in turn, is the life on your land, but even then there needs to be some sorts of bushes, trees, and other random debris that you can get rid of. Getting rid of these could also, in turn, give you sapphires to have people be awarded for keeping their land orderly. When you eventually get your troops trained up, watching them ride around, fly around, and walk in the training camps is a fun sight, especially when you zoom in and are able to see the details on some of the troops, such as their weapons, outfits, and hairstyle.

With all these different troops, you don’t have to get to a really high HQ level to be able to dive into some of the more unique troops that are in the game. Early on in the game, you are introduced to the core troops that you will be using, such as the Striker, a blonde-haired barbarian with a massive hammer, Marine, who is as his name suggests a Marine with an AR, Boom Kart, which is a clever recreation of the skeleton bombers from Clash of Clans to be able to destroy walls, and lastly Skyfire, a troop that flies in the sky and rains bullets down.

These troops will make up most of the early part of the game before you are moving towards HQ 4 and 5. These troops allow you to use a couple of different strategies early on in the game when going up against other bases. Using either a combination of ground troops and air troops if the enemy is equipped with an air defense, and if no air defense, spamming a bunch of Skyfires on them!

Early on within the game, this can get repetitive as many early players are on similar trophy levels, so you either go up against really under-leveled bases, or you go up against a maxed-out HQ. With these repetitive battles early on, the game becomes more of a grind than fun very early on.

As mentioned earlier, while having no air defense makes you prone to an easy 3-star from an air attack, the other defenses in the game are a bit too good at keeping troops away, especially with the likes of the mortar around. Compared to other base builders, you are equipped with few buildings to be placed; in turn, the game gives massive health pools to a lot of these buildings, whether it be a resource collector, a turret, or even just a research lab.

This, plus the defenses such as the turret being able to mow down troops, or the mortar being a one-shot for the Striker, or even the more unique Ice Towers, which once added starts to create even more confusion for how to go about attacking, and all of these can be hard to take down when in the middle of someone's base. Once the player reaches HQ 4 and is able to get other troops as well as unlock the Hero, the game starts to progress pretty well with only a few hiccups.

These issues mainly only come from early trophy issues that are known to happen with any real-time strategy PVP game early on in its cycle. To combat this, the game does allow for a campaign to be playable within the beta, and this is a really fun and entertaining way to be able to get resources, alongside being able to get a better understanding of how your troops work without having to worry about losing trophies!

Review

With all of these features, the game still dwindles in comparison to other real-time strategy games that are out there. Not changing much overall from a game like Clash of Clans and unfortunately lacking within what they have brought to the table.

With extreme resource grinds to be able to upgrade, not having the ability to retaliate or have troops that can protect the base while you are away, and most importantly just the overall fluidity of how the game plays and allows you to zoom in and out, along with moving around the bases. This overall quality of life with how the game feels can be improved and with that making the game even more enjoyable for people to jump into the game and stay committed to wanting to continue within their journey in the game.

Overall, Heroes of Mavia is a fun base-building game that suffers from a lot of issues mainly coming from it being in beta, while some of these issues can be resolved with a quick update, the game does struggle from being in the shadows of games that are exactly like it but just overall better. Heroes of Mavia needs a lot more changes and quality of life updates before the game is ready to be taken mainstream. (Yes, I know it is out on the app store, but it definitely does not need to be there)