Reign Of Fire
HIGH It’s an easy-to-learn dogfighting game… with dragons!
LOW Occasionally strange matchmaking choices.
WTF Baby Dragon Evolution.
TRANSCRIPT:
Hi everyone! Eugene Sax here with another review from Gamecritics.com.
Suit up in medieval armor and mount a terrifying dragon to do battle in Century: Age of Ashes — a multiplayer dragon combat game throwing players into arenas to and turning them from fledgling dragon riders into legendary Dragoneers. But one rider alone can’t win the day, every win depends on teamwork and strategy!
In this PvP combat title, players will pick one of three warrior classes to take into battle.
Marauders are about power and hunting down other players, Windguards support and shield teammates, and Phantoms set traps and use stealth around the battlefield. There are no limits to how many of each class is on a team, and all classes are useful in their own way.
Century currently has three game types, and each one pits two teams of six against each other.
Carnage is the ‘deathmatch’ mode where the team with the most kills wins. Gates of Fire is a ‘capture the flag’ mode, where the flag carrier has to fly through gates to claim them for their team. The final mode, Spoils of War, has players attacking gold-carrying dragons and stashing the looted money in their coffers while also attacking the enemy team to stop them from stealing gold.
Each match will give players experience to unlock new items for their dragons and warriors, the most unique being dragon eggs. Players will be able to put an egg into incubation, which gives the players additional challenges. Completing these tasks takes the egg from hatchling to a full grown dragon. Thankfully, all of the unlockable items are cosmetic only, which makes it an easy game for anyone to jump in and play without worrying about missing any game content. However, it can be a bit of a bear to start playing.
The tutorial does spend a fair amount of time on the controls, but they still took some getting used to. Controls specifically for the PC have players using the mouse pointer to direct where the player wants to fly, but there is some delay in pointing to one direction and then having the dragon fly there. This might be a personal issue as I’m used to controllers instead of using a mouse for flight games, but this small delay can be the difference between life and death with combat being as quick as it is.
I’ve also found some occasional matchmaking issues that commonly plague these kinds of games. Century does its best to balance teams on both sides as far as player level is concerned, but there will inevitably be those occasions where one team will have at least one player of a significantly higher level who tends to crush everyone else during a match.
As much as I enjoyed my time in Century : Age of Ashes, I do have wonder how much staying power it will have. Since all classes are viable in each mode, I suspect many players may stick with one character class, get invested, and not explore the rest of what the game has to offer. As an example, I found myself only switching to other classes if the daily mission or hatching a dragon egg specifically required it.
Also, due to the limited amount of content that is currently present, a busy player will see nearly everything within a couple of hours.
Despite those concerns, the game looks great, each class is enjoyable to play, and each match is maybe 20 minutes at most — perfect for quick sessions. The game is getting updates and it looks like the developers plan on adding additional classes and modes in the future. I think I’ll probably go back in from time to time to check out new content, but for me, Century: Age of Ashes gets a 8 out of 10.
Disclosures: This game is developed and published by Playwing LTD. It is currently available on PC. This copy of the game was obtained via publisher and reviewed on the PC. Approximately 6 hours of play was spent playing the game.
Parents: According to the ESRB, this game is rated E10+ and contains Fantasy Violence and In Game Purchases. Players will be attacking enemies with fire, poison gas, and mines. There is no gore in the game. Players can purchase cosmetic items in the game, though items can be purchased with in game currency.
Colorblind Modes: There are no colorblind modes.
Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: There is text in game, but text is not resizable. There are no voices in the game, and the audio mostly serves aesthetic purposes. Music will change and signify that a match is about to end, but there is also a timer on screen so it’s not necessary for the game. The game is completely accessible.
Remappable controls: This game features fully remappable controls.
While Sonic and Street Fighter were great places to start, his first love was Final Fantasy X when his dad bought a PS2. Ever since, that love for gaming has evolved -- there are a number of game worlds out there, and he intends to explore them all. RPG to horror, platformers to casual and everything in between -- if it’s available, he’ll play it.
While his time is short between writing reviews, tabletop gaming, and attempting to start a cheesecake business, he has caught all 806 pokemon and can speedrun Star Fox 64 in less than 40 minutes. He’s always looking for new things to try and new challenges to conquer. You can find him on Twitter -- @eugene_sax.
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