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[HGH]

So I noticed a new Orcs Must Die came out 3 days ago and I've seen nary a peep about it.

Via GameForge's press release:

Orcs Must Die! Unchained today enters open beta, now all can join in on the fun without any game entry restrictions.

Once they log in, players can head into Survival mode with friends or face other players in the Siege mode. To defend their rifts they can build traps and use a range of weapons in order to blow countless orcs to kingdom come, thus following the grand Orcs Must Die tradition.

Gameforge and Robot Entertainment have used the time in closed beta to steer the course of the game in a completely new direction: initially conceptualised as a PvP game borrowing some ideas from the MOBA genre, the developers acted on community suggestions and expanded Orcs Must Die! Unchained to include an extensive PvE mode and in doing so, recaptured the all-too-familiar tower defence gameplay of the previous games.

Fans of PvP duels can battle away on two maps; in cooperative mode the game starts the open beta with 8 available maps, all of which vary widely in appearance, difficulty and the range of minions that charge toward your rift. Recently added maps ‘Shark Island’ and ‘Frostbite’ are no exceptions to this rule: the former offering a Caribbean flair with blazing rays of sunshine, snappy sharks in the water and swashbuckling pirate minions whilst ‘Frostbite’ stays true to its name, taking place in an icy castle scenario.

Ready for open beta, Orcs Must Die! Unchained is available in English, French, German, Italian, Polish, Spanish and Turkish and can be downloaded directly from omd.gameforge.com or from Steam. There’s a special treat for those quick off the mark: all who participate in the open beta between 29th March and 13th April at 12 PM (CET) will receive the exclusive hero skin ‘Firestarter’ for hero Smolder – this skin will only be available in these two weeks of the open testing phase.

The biggest details on the open beta launch in review:

Free access to the game via omd.gameforge.com and Steam
7 language versions
12 playable heroes
8 maps in PvE mode Survival and 2 maps in Siege PvP
Traps and items for crafting and upgrading
Orcs, orcs and even more orcs!

Orcs Must Die! Unchained takes the award-winning Orcs Must Die! action tower defense gameplay to a whole new level with team-based gameplay! Bust skulls with your best pals in 5-player PvE co-op Survival, or put your teamwork to the test in 5v5 PvP Siege action!

Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qFYfsYzCfdg
Steam Store link: http://store.steampowered.com/app/427270/
Publisher's website: http://en.omd.gameforge.com/

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I decided to give it a try since it's F2P. Some personal observations below.

It seems rather than stick the previous singleplayer/co-op format, the developers opted for a MOBA type game. Oddly enough rather than jack the enemy number up to compensate for the amount of players, it's enemy health that's ridiculously high instead.

In addition, only a couple areas per map can be trapped, leaving you with long stretches of rooms where you have to handle things yourself. Classic 1 hit kill traps and physics traps don't seem to exist either.

The PvP mode doesn't seem very balanced at the moment. Mostly, you're not guaranteed to be matched against players with similar levels of progression, so you might trounce or get trounced by teams with more options and better traps than you.
The F2P format is here in full force. Basically you're looking at 30 hours worth of games to get enough currency for new traps, even more if you want different characters. Stuff isn't exactly cheap in real currency either. The game adopts the free character rotation system from various other MOBAs as well.

I wasn't sure whether to share impressions, especially since I don't mean to put a damper on an announcement thread, and being a beta all this is subject to change. But since the original OMD was one of my first Steam games, seeing it charge format so much is disappointing. There's still fun to be had in PvE, but I'd have happily forked over $60 for Orcs Must Die 3.

 

[hurzelein]

Hm, seeing this coming to console (alltough PS4 only?) is a plus, not sure about the new direcion though. Will definitly give this a try when released, OMD 1 was one of my favourite 360 games. Always hoped for a console release of 2, seems like this chapter is over.

 

[patchday]

wow had to search to find this thread. Just downloaded. Oh they are going f2p route then. Yeah would have liked to just pay $60 to unlock all the heroes, etc. Hopefully there's a hero pack so I dont have to grind. Watched a guy stream the game for a bit. Looks fun. Will try; just need to tear myself away from Rainbow six siege to try

 

[Koeta]

I liked the first two games this one they went to another place at first with moba like stuff but it seems like they added co-op modes back in so that's good.

I played some the other day and I'll be checking it out more soon. (^_^)b

 

[PaulloDEC]

I gave this a shot earlier on, but I couldn't get past the fact that what was previously all about traps and trap layout has now become a SMITE-style MOBA with some traps thrown in. As a huge fan of OMD and OMD2, pretty huge bummer.

Maybe I'll give it another look.

 

[PedroLumpy]

I played a bit, I didn't really like it. I hate being subjected to the shit defenses other people build. I have no idea how people can be so dumb about something so simple.

 

[patchday]

I've been playing Siege exclusively and have really taken a liking to this game. I like how it has taken some ideas from MOBAs and meshed it with a little Capture the Flag and Tower defense. I really dig- so much so I put down for the Ultimate Pack

Looks like GAF won't have any interest in the game

Game has nice controller support too. My ps4 controller was recognized immediately.

 

[JustinBB7]

Played it last few days, tutorials for both survival and siege, but only played survival matches so far, and I gotta say it's really fun. Better than 1 and 2 actually. The F2P aspect is a bit lame, but just by logging in once a day and playing 1 game I already crafted a hero, and almost have enough for the second one. So I don't mind that as much.

I do think it will be more fun to play with a bunch of friends, specially on the higher levels. I thought the beta only had 1 map for a bit because every time I went into matchmaking I kept getting the same map, which was really easy. Until I got higher level and got harder maps, which are a lot of fun.

As for the MOBA mode, I haven't tried a real match yet, because I like being well prepared for it and know all the heroes/maps/skill before I go into it. But the tutorial for it seemed really fun and I'll play a real game soon.


I understand the F2P complaints though, but if you look past that I personally feel it's a better game. Still beta so plenty of work to do for them, don't know why the menu starts in a small window and then the actual match launches in another window and when the match starts it weirdly takes a long time of all players stuck there just waiting. So hopefully they will work on those things.

 

[VandalD]

The initial reaction to the game here wasn't so great. It doesn't look like a bad game, but it's shifted genres into something I've never been into. The co-op in OMD2 was a load of fun, though. I'll probably give it a shot at some point, but I don't expect the game to grip me, especially not the PvP side. Having to deal with the trap placements of up to 4 other people sounds like the worst idea ever, even worse than solo queuing in LoL or DOTA2, from an outsider's perspective.

 

[Rodney McKay]

Played it last few days, tutorials for both survival and siege, but only played survival matches so far, and I gotta say it's really fun. Better than 1 and 2 actually. The F2P aspect is a bit lame, but just by logging in once a day and playing 1 game I already crafted a hero, and almost have enough for the second one. So I don't mind that as much.

I do think it will be more fun to play with a bunch of friends, specially on the higher levels. I thought the beta only had 1 map for a bit because every time I went into matchmaking I kept getting the same map, which was really easy. Until I got higher level and got harder maps, which are a lot of fun.

As for the MOBA mode, I haven't tried a real match yet, because I like being well prepared for it and know all the heroes/maps/skill before I go into it. But the tutorial for it seemed really fun and I'll play a real game soon.


I understand the F2P complaints though, but if you look past that I personally feel it's a better game. Still beta so plenty of work to do for them, don't know why the menu starts in a small window and then the actual match launches in another window and when the match starts it weirdly takes a long time of all players stuck there just waiting. So hopefully they will work on those things.

Wait, does this have a single player mode, like 1 and 2? Or are those Survival and Siege modes just different multiplayer modes?

The reason I haven't even touch this or looked at any coverage in the last 2 years (can't believe it was ANNOUNCED two years ago already, crazy) is because it seemed like all it was was a multiplayer MOBA version of Orcs Must Die. Since I have no interest in multiplayer, I pretty much wrote it off immediately.

But if it has as much content as 1 or 2 that can be accessed in single player, I'll probably give it a shot, if just to see how bad the F2P elements are (I can look past it in some games, but others definitely abuse it).

 

[patchday]

The initial reaction to the game here wasn't so great. It doesn't look like a bad game, but it's shifted genres into something I've never been into. The co-op in OMD2 was a load of fun, though. I'll probably give it a shot at some point, but I don't expect the game to grip me, especially not the PvP side. Having to deal with the trap placements of up to 4 other people sounds like the worst idea ever, even worse than solo queuing in LoL or DOTA2, from an outsider's perspective.

Not true at all; only like 2 ppl place traps tops. most of the time in their own lane too

Also Survival mode is from OMD 2

 

[patchday]

^^ Actually I finally played Survival Coop mode yesterday. You are correct in that mode 4 players are setting traps

Anyway I guess interest died out in this game (on GAF). Which is a shame its a lot of fun and they adjusted the microtransactions so you can get started heroes for less crafting materials

 

[Sora the Cat]

I just tried it, seems like a really fun game. Will play a few more matches.

 

[Tylercrat]

I really like it. I think it will be my main game for a while.