Turn and step and SLASH and spin and STAB and.. etc, etc.
Now to the gameplay itself, which is pretty much on a par with the graphics, ie, damn good, but with a couple of annoying traits that really shouldn’t have made it to the final release. Ok, I know that I’m a PC gamer at heart, but even a hardcore concosle fan will have to wonder what the hell is up with all the button bashing in Viking: Battle for Asgard.Want to open the lock on the gate? Hammer the ‘B’ button. Want to set light to the fuse? Hammer the ‘B’ button. Want to do anything in the world at all? Hammer the ‘B’ button. What is it with having to hammer the ‘B’ button all the damn time? It makes no difference how quickly you pound the button, nothing happens any faster so why not a simple press and hold?
Click for larger imageThis is most annoying when you want to use a leystone to teleport from one location to another. You pound away on the ‘B’ button and your character holds up the amulet to access the leystone map… but stop pounding too soon and the map doesn’t appear… pound too long and the map will appear but guess which button it is to quit from the map? Yep, it’s the ‘B’ button… the one you’re still pounding… so you then accidentally quit from the map and have to start all over again. So SEGA, listen up… press and hold, you hear me? PRESS AND HOLD dammit!
Next up is the camera control which, although you have manual control at all times, still likes to drag the camera back behind the player as he runs along. This makes it very tricky to run one direction and look to the side as the camera is forever trying to realign itself with a view from behind the player. Given that some of the best parts of Viking: Battle for Asgard are when you’re sneaking around and what to see whether you’ve been spotted by nearby troops, having a camera that won’t bloody well stay where you put it is damn annoying.
Click for larger imageAnd finally there’s the various context sensitive ‘auto’ bits which aren’t so much context sensitive as sodding annoyingly picky as to when they will or won’t cut in. Probably the first time you’ll experience this is in just generally running around. The landscape is a bit craggy in places and Skarin should automatically step up small ledges… except it’s something of a lottery whether he does or not. Often, you’ll have to about face and take a run up to get him to climb up the ledge. You can of course just jump up yourself but why put the damn auto-steping system in if the player has to bypass it?
Worse and, in my experience, more fatal, is Skarin’s ability to automatically hop over fences or onto boxes. It’s bad enough when you’re just running around to have him either refuse to hop over a fence or, as happened to me twice, hop over a fence with a fatal massive drop the other side, but now put this into the context of creeping into an enemy camp.
Click for larger imageThere’s several stealth sessions in Viking: Battle for Asgard that are hugely enjoyable and full of tension but that can easily be ruined by Skarin either not hopping over the fence to get out of sight or worse, when you are out of sight and creeping along a fence, Skarin takes it upon himself to leap over the fence into full view of a dozen bad guys… and then the sod won’t go back leaving you utterly buggered and very quickly dead… ending perhaps 20 minutes of carefully stealthy work in a short, brutal fight that sees you respawning back at base and having to do the whole thing all over again.