A colorful hybrid of Vampire Survivors and Hades. Review of the domestic Call of Sentinels
You are surprised to realize that Call of Sentintels is not a lazy clone – it is a dynamic game, with a lot of details and mechanics. They put their soul into the project and it is noticeable. However, you have to put up with the bad balance – and hope that it will be fixed with patches.
The game’s plot is quite simple, although it tries to surprise with sudden twists. The armies of darkness, in an attempt to summon an evil deity, invade the sacred lands of Havalos. Cunning commanders set hordes of monsters on peaceful settlements. Only a group of guardians can resist the forces of evil – godlike creatures that grant their power to chosen heroes.
The guardians’ gaze turned to four champions: a human, a warlock, and two women. The heroes will have to defend one of six available arenas. Before each battle, they show surprisingly high-quality videos. And during the break, the heroes exchange barbs with the villains.
Arenas vary in size, detail, and even atmosphere. The obstacles are placed in such a way that maneuvering becomes interesting. Often, factors such as moving pillars of fire and pools of poison affect the gameplay. It’s a pity that Harpy City lacks harpies – the cutest creatures with a disgusting character.
As is traditional with Vampire Survivors, the arenas are filled with hordes of enemies moving towards the hero. Among them are standard melee fighters; ranged units; fighters with special abilities; living artillery; area-of-effect minibosses. The only difficulty comes with the monsters in the second arena – I dealt with the rest without straining myself.
The bosses encountered in the final wave of the arena vary greatly in difficulty – some are hard to defeat, while others are practically unnoticeable. They have plenty of unpleasant surprises, but this does not change the fact that they are damage-absorbing sponges. The bosses in the endless mode are especially annoying, when you encounter them again and again during half an hour of grinding meat.
There is no usual increase in characteristics in the battle. Instead, you need to complete the tasks of the guardians: save the innocent; destroy the portal; light the fires; chase shadows; be in the circle. As a reward for completing, you can choose one of three enhancements, which determines further pumping.
Each hero has a connection with three of the five elements: fire, water, nature, light and darkness. Completing the Guardians’ quests allows you to collect an attacking and defensive set of skills – some elements form a unique synergy. You can strengthen the main attack, additional and dash. And if you focus on one element, you will have access to legendary gifts.
Not all elements are created equal. You can build yourself a spear that poisons, strikes with lightning and knocks back. Or you can summon the legendary Valkyrie, who hangs out nearby and lazily attacks with lightning.
Heroes can take a spear or a hammer into battle:
- Spear: Allows you to keep your distance from enemies. The spear has useful healing skills;
- Hammer: hits hard, but you have to let enemies get close. Without the earth element, it’s very hard to survive with a hammer. Only the darkness that gives vampirism provides stable healing, but this is not enough to survive.
On medium and high difficulty, you quickly have to abandon the main attack – especially when using a hammer. Not only does the main attack force you to get closer to enemies, but the skills associated with it are inferior to the additional one. But it is worth praising the developers for the fact that changing weapons also affects the gifts received from the guardians. In fact, such a choice completely changes the gameplay.
Completing arenas on various difficulties rewards gold and special resources. They are spent on purchasing passive buffs in the relic shop. The problem with this system is that gold accumulates more than necessary. A small part of it can be spent on opening additional gifts in battle, but the rest of the time it is of no use.
Stylistically, the game resembles Hades with a touch of fantasy. The eye is pleased with the bright locations and animations. However, the character design does not evoke emotions – it is not bad, but it lacks spice. This criticism does not apply to the elf necromancer – he is gorgeous in both appearance and character.
Diagnosis
For its price, Call of Sentinels is a good entertainment for an evening or two. It is interesting to fight in arenas and level up. The game has nice graphics and excellent animations. I am also pleased with the elaboration of the lines, when each hero has something to say in each arena – and they can boast of atmospheric voice acting. The game is well optimized – during the passage I did not encounter serious bugs, freezes and crashes.
However, the gameplay experience is marred by the balance of skills, weapons, enemies and bosses. It is also depressing that gold, one of the main resources, quickly becomes useless. Let’s hope that all this will be corrected in the future.
Pro:
- Good entertainment for a couple of evenings
- It’s interesting to level up
- Fight in the arenas of drives
- Beautiful graphics and animations
- Cheerful music
Contra:
- The balance leaves much to be desired
- Gold is quickly becoming worthless
***
All images are owned by A17 Games. Preview image is from SteamDB
