Win in Real-Time with New Facebook CCG Game CLASH: Rise of Heroes

Rather than cloning another farming concept, Qunify Games is taking on a less-popular social genre with the card-based strategy game, CLASH: Rise of Heroes. Almost identical, in most respects, to analog collectible card games (CCG) such as Magic: The Gathering, it’s a game that takes only a few minutes to get the hang of, but has enough depth to create a rather respectable amount of strategy. Essentially, the game is a comic book rendition of Challenge Game’s fantasy Facebook CCG, Warstorm. However, while many elements are similar, many are different as well, including a more colorful means of storytelling and the one thing that CCG players are always looking for: Synchronous game play. Clash has an interesting means of starting things out, tasking players with the creation of their own, personal superhero. Of course, creating an avatar is nothing new, but this hero comes with two specific, chosen, sets of powers that translate into unique cards and becomes the central, and most important, card in one’s deck. On the battlefield, the player’s hero has three stats associated with it: Focus, Strength, and Health. The objective is to reduce the opponent’s hero’s health to zero. The most basic means of doing so is to simply “attack” (ending one’s turn), with a hero’s strength indicating how much health it will take off the enemy. Obviously, however, this is not the most strategic way to win, and will likely result in a loss. The idea is to play cards that are drawn into a hand of five. Each one costs a certain amount of focus (more powerful cards cost more focus), which is generated by the hero each turn. The longer the game runs, the more focus is generated, so it becomes a strategic choice as to when to play certain cards. These card types will consist of allies, items, defensive spells, or offensive spells. Allies are among the most powerful, as they can be placed into four slots adjacent to the hero, attacking any of the enemy’s allies that lay across from them on the battlefield and attacking the enemy hero if none are present. Additionally, allies often come with special abilities such as double attacks, forcing enemies to lose turns, and so on. These, too, have health, and once it reaches zero, the ally is removed from play. In order to keep them alive, one has to play items, defensive spells, and offensive spells. These are the real money makers, so-to-speak, as they can be used immediately. Sometimes they will do direct damage to a target (e.g. a card called "Energy Beam"), while other times they could heal a friendly card or even protect it from damage for a short while. Of course, these are all basic examples, and as the player plays more, new and better ones will be added to the deck. Moreover, should one save up focus, these can be played in rapid succession for devastating results. Earning new cards isn’t that tough either. The first, and most direct, way to earn new ones is to level up or win single player battles, where aside being given the typical option to post the achievement, a free card is granted to the player. Aside from this, players can participate in the single player campaign or short missions to earn what is called VP (Victory Points) that can be used to purchase new cards. As one might expect, they cost a good chunk of the in-game currency, but users can always purchase the virtual currency, Clash Cash, to buy cards for cheaper costs. As far as different forms of play goes, Clash is pretty interesting as well. The game doesn’t just plop the user down into random battles, but in an actual single player story-mode. What is cool about it though is it takes the approach that Exorcists vs. Demons did and gives the players a few pages of a comic to tell it. Once finished, can sit around and wait for more campaigns to release, but likely, they will jump into the battle-mode. This is the primary social mechanic to Clash, as unlike other Facebook CCG, the battles are actually real-time. In competing titles such as Warstorm, the cards are auto-played with most of the strategy occurring in assembling the deck. Here, assembly and on-the-spot decisions win the day. Of course, the big concern is that synchronous titles are not always popular with the average Facebook user, as many are not traditional gamers. However, as the platform continues to grow, so does the potential audience for synchronous titles. All in all, Clash is a surprisingly addictive game. Whether one prefers the single player or the multiplayer, it’s still pretty fun if you like strategy. That said, the latter doesn’t come too highly recommended until you have a strong deck, but it’s still pretty entertaining. Overall, there is really not much to complain about and any qualms is mostly nit-picky elements that are easily overlooked (such as slow loading tool-tips or small, rasterized, white borders where some effects were cut out in Photoshop). In short, if you’re a fan of CCG or of strategy, CLASH: Rise of Heroes is worth checking out.

Social Pro Daily

Win in Real-Time with New Facebook CCG Game CLASH: Rise of Heroes

Christopher Mack

About

Subscriptions

Events

Publications

WORK SMARTER - LEARN, GROW AND BE INSPIRED.

Subscribe today!

Christopher Mack