Iron Fall: Invasion - Not sure who it's for?
(3ds Eshop demo reviewed)
Iron Fall: Invasion is a third person shooter for the Nintendo 3ds and 2ds created by a small team called V.D.dev. You may or may not have played a game made by them as they have made quite a few random entries for every Nintendo hand held since the game boy colour but it must be said that V.D.dev love to push the power of the system they are working on. Go and find gameplay of Driver 3 for the GBA on you tube and you will be amazed how they can fit a 3d open world onto a system that was designed for 2d sprite gaming. Iron Fall: Invasion is no different from their previous titles offering some pretty impressive spectacles for the small screen of gaming.
Full disclosure I have only played the demo version and will not be able to give a full review of the game but I was interested in this game enough to want to make a blog to review this game. In my play time I played through the tutorial (spoiler it is pretty boring even for a tutorial), the first mission of the game and a single map of the multiplayer. This is all that is offered in the demo with the option to buy either the campaign or multiplayer for $13 or both for $26 (Aussie dollars by the way). For a demo their is an acceptable level of content on offer and it gave me enough to give this early opinion on the game.
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| Traditional death match was on offer in the demo multiplayer |
The game play in general feels very much like Gears of War without the grit or violence. You will find yourself playing as an armored up soldier who seems like a pg bland version of Marcus Pheonix doing many of the things he would do. There is cover, a sprint button and an active reload feature. It all works well despite the fact I felt it was a bit hard to press the reload button at times due to its placement on the New Nintendo 3ds. The real issue in the campaign for me was the voice acting, I have never been good on judging voice acting but your information person Sam sounds like a robot the entire level and every time there was an attempt at fleshing out the characters it fell flat due to the lack of emotion coming from any of the voice actors.
The multiplayer was a smooth experience though I am still not sure if the C-stick is the best for shooting. It may be my lack of practice but I can usually hit my target easier with a regular right stick on a controller.
As said before the visuals in both the campaign and multiplayer are pretty great. I still remember walking through hotel rooms and being surprised by how nice beds and pillows looked. There were even tv remotes just sitting around, tiny things most hand held games would not bother with.
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| Look at all those containers to the right, next gen right there |
My real concern about this game is I am not sure who it is for. It acts child friendly using robots and aliens for the bad guys and the multiplayer even says you have been knocked out instead of killed but swearing does happen in the story mode and if you fail an active reload the player will swear pretty much every time. It is barely there but I can't help wondering why swearing was added but the multiplayer refuses to say you have died. I don't think this game is for kids which is a shame because a large market of the 3ds is kids and it would have helped the game in sales.
Overall from what I have played the gameplay is solid despite some problems from the hand held's buttons and c-stick and if you want to play a third person shooter on the 3ds then this and Resident Evil Revelations are basically all there is. I just hope Majouras Mask and Monster Hunter 4 don't overshadow this game too much because there was a lot of effort put into it and it is a decently fun shooter even if it is not really that unique.
7/10 (based on the demo)
