We analyze Darwin Project, a battle royale that arrives with its final version for PC, PS4 and XbOX One.
Darwin Project is a free-to-play multiplayer title in battle royale style, developed and published by Scavengers Studio. In 2018 we could see its first version for Steam Early Access and Xbox Game Preview, and after more than two years, the title has received its final version for both PCs and the most current consoles. This final version retains the central aspects that made it unique and adds some other modest improvements to try to enter a genre that has its kings well defined. Do you get to stand up?
Dynamic, tactical and with survival elements
The premise of the game is simple. Like all battle royale, we must survive. Although unlike virtually any other game of the style, skirmishes with other players will not be strictly mandatory: the title takes place on a snowy continent, so in addition to surviving on the battlefield, we must survive the cold, obtaining every certain time, what developers call warmth.
During the game we will find two types of meters; the standard health bar and a heat meter. As we move forward, our heat meter will fall and we will receive a continuous alert that we need to warm up as soon as possible. The moment our meter reaches zero, our character will suffer damage over time and we will see how the screen will begin to freeze at a frantic pace. So to combat the cold, we must look for loot chests that have the probability of dropping a hot coffee, shelter in lava streams or, in the most common scenario, cut some other trees and gather some wood to make our own bonfire to get warmth. A key aspect to not end up frozen which Olaf in Frozen is that at all times we must make a good forecast and use of our resources throughout the game.
The director mode, its great differential
The game begins with ten prisoners on a snowy continent that has many different areas and the show's director, an eleventh participant, who takes the form of a large drone that can fly around the map to monitor, improve or worsen life to survivors. The advantage of playing as a director is that it allows you to draw additional strategies in the game, either by resting areas of the map, distributing resources and warmth among the players or throwing explosives. As for the map, it is divided into 7 zones based on hexagons, which the game closes every two minutes to reduce the sand until there is one for sudden death, the latter being a very popular resource in the genre.
Count on my bow and my ax
Something missing in the equation is weapons, since this is one of the major premises of Darwin Project. The title wants to differentiate itself from the heavyweight of the genre – friendly for children and not so children -, which includes many AK-47s and derivatives. In Darwin Project the weapons lead us to a different style of play, moving away from the easy fire, which will force us to be more strategists in the arena and where we will try to bring out our skills pointing with the truth from afar. And yes, our only weapons will be an ax and a bow with which to attack and defend ourselves. For Moria!
Unlike games like Fortnite, players don't have to constantly store a litany of different resources in the "magic pocket." The gamemaking system is reduced to only two collection materials: wood, harvested from trees and a single resource, Darwinium, collected from bright containers. As for resources, wood is used to make arrows, fires and various traps. The Darwinium is used to create passive character improvements per game, as well as new skills for the equipment class chosen by the player.
- Wood improvements: Creating arrows, lighting bonfires, building traps.
- Improvements with Darwinium: Increase of passive and class skills, such as the installation of turrets, among others.
Coincidentally we will meet other players, either hunting you, or you to them. At this point, if you have created some arrows, you will try to eliminate them from a distance before participating in the battle of ax against ax. And here is the grace, since our class skills will add a unique flavor in PvP, either by physical or passive attack, exploiting to the maximum their reduced options for improvement.
It is at these times that your options regarding the allocation of resources really come into play. Since a good use of the improvements will be essential in our strategy to guarantee victory or against defeat. And that really, is a success. Unfortunately, in the long run all your tools end up being somewhat scarce for what you promise and can be made repetitive in the long run.
Classes and skills
At the beginning of the game they will allow us to select the class we want for our character, where we can choose between 3 available. And is that each class will provide us with different skills that we can unlock and improve during the game.
- Jet Wings: we could say that this class is hunting oriented. In choosing this we will obtain a jetpack and the ability to fly over the map for a certain time to obtain a quick location of our enemies, evade attacks in the PvP and place ourselves at strategic points on the map to hunt down the enemy.
- Grapple Gauntlet: it is a class that stands out for its immediate speed and action. With the choice of this class we will use a gauntlet, as if it were the same Thanos, which will allow us to cross the hills and mountains of the map quite easily with the Help of a hook. It is effective in PvP, to easily flee from restricted areas of the map, grab enemies or to evade bombs orchestrated by the show director.
- Headhunter Drone: is a class that is oriented to stealth and farming, and as the name implies, we will have the help of a drone to track areas of the map maintaining a certain distance with our character. This class is useful to obtain a quick collection of items, as well as to reveal the enemy's location without jeopardizing the type.
Cosmetic customization improvements
Like all games of the style, we have a customizable section of our character. In this section, we can modify the face, hair, clothes and accessories of our avatar, yes, both for free and for payment, we will get very few customization alternatives. That's where the "friends" micropayments of the game come in, where we will exchange euros for ramen coins. The minimum purchase amount is € 1.99 that guarantees us 200 ramen coins, and the maximum is € 39.99 that offers us 5500 ramen coins.
Graphic section
The game is made with Unreal Engine 4, which suggests that the game would look good and that it would perform well, but the case is somewhat different here. The graphics are not really the best that the game engine has to offer, emphasizing even more, in its version for consoles.
CONCLUSION
In general, Darwin Project fulfills its premise: to entertain. It is a different title if you like battles where resource collection and creation, PvP and survival are included. With an artistic cartoon style and a more strategic hunting concept, we cannot deny that its strong point is its free-to-play modality. Unfortunately, at the technical level it does not stand out too much, its options make the experience end up being something repetitive in the long run and does not stand out at the playable level despite the mix of genres.
THE BEST
- Its free-to-play mode
- The PvP and resource management makes it interesting
- Chaos and the "surprise" effect of director mode
- Meets your premise, entertain
WORST
- More news is missing in terms of maps and classes
- The game eventually ends up being somewhat repetitive
- In console your graphics do not stand out
- Its basic costumization, and character aesthetics does not just convince
Right
It is not the latest or the most original, nor does it have the best execution, but it can be fun if you like the genre. Good, but improvable.
