I am quite a simple person – when I hear that in a production you can become a dwarf, it is immediately at the center of my interest. This is also how HammerHelm hit my ugly hands – a mix of cRPG games and city builder created by SuperSixStudios. What impression did this work have on me, which is currently in Early Access? How would I say it …
The dwarf is not tossing!
In the game we play the role of a dwarf who is banished from his home, underground city, thrown to the prey of all dangers. Our perky protagonist, however, does not break down, creating a settlement on the surface, to which his likes will start to attract over time. Unfortunately, this introduction basically has no effect on the rest of the game, and the dwarves could be replaced by anyone. We will not experience the atmosphere of bearded men who like to drink here. BA! We can forget about any empathy into the presented world, because it is painfully simple, not original and simply boring.
Candle locations with terrifying voids
In the introduction, I mentioned that the game combines two different genres, giving a quite intriguing and having enormous potential combination. However, curiosity and hope flicker very quickly, after the first minutes of production. I don’t like criticism and always try to get the best out of someone’s work, but I must say unequivocally that nothing works in this title. The cRPG segment looks poor, offering us a trivially simple combat system, in practice limited to thoughtlessly clicking the left mouse button, a few little improvements to the fun that require leveling up, and painfully repetitive missions consisting of gathering, killing, gathering, killing, killing , killing, gathering and occasional killing. In this game, reminiscent of an extremely weak MMO simulator, there are even such absurdities as assigning a task to literally every house built, in which, after examining strange noises that keep the household members awake, we meet a ghost asking us to eliminate the zombie plague (in the number of two) raging after him. nearby ruins. Let’s add the extremely onerous and horribly frequent backtracking and the creation of new equipment, which does not affect the speed of defeating opponents, and we have a perfect picture of how you should not do cRPGs. in which, after examining the strange noises that keep the householders awake, we meet a ghost asking us to eliminate the zombie plague (in the number of two) that spreads in its nearby ruins. Let’s add the extremely onerous and terribly frequent backtracking and the creation of new equipment, which does not affect the speed of defeating enemies in any way, and we have a perfect picture of how you should not do cRPGs. in which, after examining the strange noises that keep the householders awake, we meet a ghost asking us to eliminate the zombie plague (in the number of two) that spreads in its nearby ruins. Let’s add the extremely onerous and horribly frequent backtracking and the creation of new equipment, which does not affect the speed of defeating opponents, and we have a perfect picture of how you should not do cRPGs.
Building a city is no better. Apart from the limited area of the island, where we can create the foundations of our metropolis and the details that affect the hydration, cleanliness and beauty of the houses, the location of the buildings does not matter in the slightest. Food from the cook appears in the bellies of the inhabitants automatically, clothes seem to be only a statistic, diligence to optimize the communication route does not matter at all, and the walls only take up space, without any usefulness. Even if we poorly manage the selection of structures and our subordinates lack basic livelihoods, apart from their sadness, we will not experience even small consequences that would affect the gameplay. Whether we are a good leader who cares about our people or a mindless loser, development will be essentially the same.
It is also worth mentioning that after reading the title described here, you can say that SuperSixStudios likes bizarre solutions. I was really surprised when, sitting in front of the computer as May was nearing its end, pumpkins suddenly appeared on their heads, heralding the Halloween event. A similar surprise appeared on my face when it turned out that after entering a special location, the options for saving and exiting to the menu (or even from the game) are disabled! Although the greatest absurdity is to create a key that allows you to constantly sprint, when it actually affects the speed of movement without any restrictions or requirements. So why run slower?
When starting, the hammer can spin for a long time
For my braided beard!
In the face of strange mechanics and embarrassingly poor gameplay, it would be nice to move on to what I can assess positively. Here, however, another disappointment comes in, because the graphics also do not knock you down. After starting the main menu, the game shows that it is an ordinary, ugly thing. Of course, I did not expect the fountains worthy of the upcoming generation of consoles and full use of ray tracing, but many productions (such as Stardew Valley , Hollow Knight or even Minecraft ) show that even without consuming all memory resources, you can look not only correct or original, but also on your way beautifully. HammerHelmHe seems to have all of this in respect, serving us a gargoyle that was technologically twenty years late. Admittedly, it is clearly visible that the creators target their production also at very young recipients, but while this may justify a certain sweetness and politeness of the setting, it still does not explain the extremely ugly simplicity. It is also worth mentioning that although the island tries to be at least a bit diverse, the dungeons and caves are either almost identical or simply repeat themselves in the world.
Maybe at least I can praise the audio? None of those things, because this production does not let us forget that it can screw everything up. Both in the menu and during the game itself, we are treated to infinitely looped melodies that are quite mediocre and completely inconspicuous, and their only advantage is that they are very easy to ignore, sparing yourself the nerves that could be caused by their monotony and complete lack of reaction for our doings.
Since some light praise has appeared, let’s return to the complaining, because in the case of all other sounds it is not so idyllic. While felling trees sounds so-so, and the splitting of stones and minerals is accompanied by a strange knocking, the roars and groans of all kinds of mascarons are the most ordinary mistake, especially in the case of bizarre hissing skeletons. The special abilities of the opponents also have an unpleasant tendency to launch at an almost random volume, which is why I have been treated with unexpectedly loud, unplanned jumpscare more than once, despite being quite muted.
To the horizon you can see that visually it is really bad
Incredibly ugly, not very pleasant-sounding and, above all, boring as a screen adaptation of S @ motivational online game – this is what HammerHelm looks like, the production is remarkably broken, which not only cannot be recommended, but honesty tells me to warn you against even approaching it. The potential of a very interesting mix of genres has been wasted in literally every aspect and the only justification for its existence would be that it is a final project in college. Although the first impression suggested that this creation could still be saved, such a longer session convinced me completely that if this production was to come out, it should be done with Steam. Literally, the only thing that I can describe as an advantage is the ability to stroke the dog, but taking into account that it is not known where the pet comes from and why it exists in the city, this plus is really small.
