Warface

Genre: First-Person Shooter

Players: 5 Co-Op (Online), 10-32 Competitive & Team Competitive (Online)

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Review:

WARNING: THIS GAME HEAVILY PUSHES MICROTRANSACTIONS

Warface is a Free-to-Play Online-Only First-Person Shooter on the Nintendo Switch, which in and of itself places it in a rare breed of games. But more than that, it is a game that clearly operates in the same space as somewhat more realistic first-person shooters like Call of Duty, which pretty much means it’s an endangered species. Suffice it to say, Switch owners right now are kinda’ desperate for good First-Person Shooters to play, and that combined with the fact that this game is free means that a lot of people won’t care what reviews say, they’ll damn well give this a try, because it’s not like there are many more options when it comes to this sort of game.

Right off the bat, I ran into a problem when trying to play Warface – literally every other game I played, the game froze up in menus, going on an endless loop and refusing to let you even so much as exit out without quitting the game outright. With new releases I tend to cut them a bit of slack, so I held off on reviewing this game for a few weeks, in hopes that this problem would be resolved. It hasn’t. I still have to reset this game after roughly 50% of my matches. This is on top of the long load times already present in the game. So already I’m not in the greatest of moods when it comes to this game.

Graphically, Warface has become notorious as the game that brought the acclaimed CryEngine to the Nintendo Switch, although don’t let that get you too excited – the game looks fine, but hardly impressive. A lot of the lighting and detail we tend to associate with games using that engine is not present here, and while the game is certainly playable in its 30fps framerates and 720p resolution (540p handheld), it’s hardly impressive. Honestly, in some ways I’d say Call of Duty 4 back on the PS3 and Xbox 360 is superior to this game in the visuals department, but that may be my bias showing. Still, the fact that I’m weighing it against a game that’s 13 years old should be telling.

Gameplay-wise, you can tell that this game is aiming for roughly the same area as Call of Duty, featuring a very similar control setup and feel. That’s not to say that this game doesn’t bring anything of its own to the table, it offers a class system (players can choose an assault trooper, a medic, a mechanic, a sniper, or a Terminator-esque robot), cooperative moves to work with other players, and on-the-go customization (if you have the equipment to do so).

The gameplay works well enough, though I wouldn’t put it in the same league as Call of Duty. It’s hard for me to pin down exactly, but something about movement and aiming doesn’t feel quite as fluid to me. To the game’s credit, it gives players optional gyro aiming, and there’s plenty of customization options… although that’s also one of the game’s problems.

See, unlike Call of Duty, players don’t earn customizable loadouts through skillful play, but instead unlock weapons (as well as other equipment, like body armor) through play that they can use for a limited amount of time, and of course you can extend that by paying a little cash. If that sounds a bit like pay-to-win to you, you’re not the only one.

Frustratingly, I found multiplayer matches to be frustrating as enemies often seemed to absorb endless supplies of bullets but I went down in just a few hits. I could put it down to me simply sucking at the game, but I’m actually a fair to decent Call of Duty player, so I suspect that’s not it.

The game does thankfully provide a decent PvE mode, but this also has its issues. Matches seemed to come in one of two varieties – either they were so easy that my randomly-assigned team would breeze through the area like it was nothing, or we’d play a map where we’d get easily picked off by snipers and a seemingly endless supply of spawning enemies without making much progress.

In the end, when it works, Warface is still a mostly competent shooter, which is better than nothing… but that’s only when it works. And even then, you have to look past the pay-to-win microtransaction-pushing weapon-renting mechanic, and the fact that it still can’t hold a candle to a game that was released over a decade ago, a game that it is in many ways trying to imitate. Despite my love for exactly this kind of game, I’d honestly rather be playing Splatoon 2 – it looks better, controls better, is better-designed, doesn’t assault me for microtransactions, and it doesn’t remind me of another, much better game that I’d rather be playing.

tl;dr – Warface is an Online-Only, Free-to-Play First-Person Shooter very much in the style of games like Call of Duty. However, it’s not nearly as good as those games, and frustrates players with microtransactions and maddeningly buggy menus. If you absolutely need a semi-realistic shooter on the Switch, this will suffice, but it’s hardly a substitute for a real Call of Duty game.

Grade: C-

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