Review | Valefor - Match Three + RNG

Review | Valefor - Match Three + RNG

It’s hard to make sense of Valefor, even if you understand the sum of its parts. Yes, it’s technically an auto battler. Yes, there’s a dark fantasy story. Yes, there’s crafting, building, and PVP. But in the same way junk food technically has enough calories to get you through the day yet doesn’t provide enough sustenance, you’ll be left lacking, and possibly hungry, after playing Valefor.

Valefor is an auto battler, or at least it’s trying to be. You can choose units from three humanoid races, with one more available if you’re interested in vicious critters. As per usual in this genre, you combine trios of items and heroes to get stronger and more capable. Unfortunately, you’re at the mercy of the infamous Random Number Generator (RNG). While through most of the campaign you’re able to beat enemies fairly by trying to get as many overlapping buffs and items suited towards your band of fighters as possible, you’ll eventually hit a brick wall in the form of RNG. No matter how clever or well planned your runs are, your enemies, who don’t have to suffer from potentially bad RNG, will be happy to end your game, repeatedly. Your enemies’ kits are fairly optimised while you may struggle to string together the most basic of buffs for your equipment, units, and perks. I found myself having to repeat the same tired run through the current campaign level to earn a pittance in gold, which let me slowly cycle through shop menus in order to hopefully improve my band of orcs. In truth, I don’t even think my orcs got all that better, just that the RNG finally gave me a break with better buffs like a perk that ignores 60% of enemies’ armour. Even though there’s a PVP mode where players can potentially build up some gold, playing it ended in much of the same way for me, without much currency to show for it. While Edge of Tomorrow may have proved to be a good movie, the gameplay loop wasn’t enjoyable enough for me to want to play out Tom Cruise’s role. 

Strategy is minimal, as you can only choose rudimentary positioning for your crew. While I did not expect control to the degree of a Fire Emblem in seeing exact percentages or a preview of how the skirmish would go, it would be nice to see terrain that would be advantageous for your heroes or traps to avoid and trick your opponent into. Most likely, what you’ll do is put your tank out front, unless you’d like to stick one of your units behind debris for some reason, though you shouldn’t expect to get much protection from enemy fire that way. Enemies eventually become so fearsome and heavily-equipped that, while I played, I would end up sighing and accepting that I’d be repeating the same level ad nauseam. The game simply does not allow you to equip your characters adequately, despite going a number of rounds before having to fight competent forces. The odd thing is, if the RNG were a bit less harsh, I do think I could form a team with the appropriate items to conquer what lies ahead, but I was never given that chance. As you can probably tell by now, this game is not well balanced.

One of Valefor’s finer points is that as you advance through the campaign, you’re presented with story vignettes in the form of songs of a surprising quality and variety. While you probably expect the old-timey singing of a bard, or even “butt rock” that’s completely incongruous to a “dark fantasy” game, there’s more to the music than those genre standards. The seductive tones of an elf trying to placate human fascists, nightcore folks songs detailing the struggle against the forces of darkness, or the prayers of the faithful seeking divine guidance, and other unexpected music genres appear in this game. Sonic Adventure 2 is a game I remember fondly that implemented multiple genres of music to great effect, but Valefor does not reach those heights. The music is varied, but it doesn’t turn this game from “bearable” to “great”. 

Valefor’s repetitive nature and lack of reward made me think why am I not just playing another auto-battler?” There are quite a few of these out there, from Teamfight Tactics to DOTA Auto Chess, and most are both readily accessible and free. I think that the game could have differentiated itself from the rest by exploring some of its concepts more deeply — such as expanding on more unique possibilities for unit composition like a team of hedgehogs and frogs, or building further on the strong musical backing.

 As is, Valefor is a tale that may be better left untold.

SCORE: 4/10





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