Ogre Combat Review

There are two game modes in Ogre Combat. Normal mode and survival mode. Normal mode is about the same as a campaign. There are five different levels, that contains of three stages each, with a boss in the last of the three stages. Once you’ve defeated the boss, and passed the three stages of a level, you will proceed to the next level. In survival mode, the goal is simply to survive as long as you can. Fight with all your might and defeat all the waves of the opponents until you fall.

To control the ogre, you can use either the arrow keys or WASD, depending on what you prefer. You attack with either T and Y, or 4 and 5. That’s all that you need to know, in order to play the game. There aren’t any more buttons involved in playing the game.

The biggest problem that I had with Ogre Combat is that there’s no health bar visible. You can see how many lives you got left, before you lose the game, however you can’t see how much health you have before actually losing one of your lives. It would definitely help a lot if I could see how much health I had before losing a life, since I would play a lot more careful when having low health. Another problem is once you’ve pressed “Normal mode”, you can see what stage you’re currently on, but I’m missing a “Back” button. If I change my mind and want to play survival instead, I’ll have to start the game and from there go back to the main menu.

The graphics is probably what I like the most about the game. I’m not sure why, but I find the graphics quite appealing for my taste. Many people would probably not see the graphics as something special, but in my opinion I like it. It might not be very detailed or well-made, but it’s colorful, bright and most important of all, it’s quite wild. A game which includes fighting and a lot of combat naturally shouldn’t have cute or fancy pictures, but rather something crazy, something wild just like Ogre Combat got.

Overall, I do think that Ogre Combat is a neat game. It could definitely be improved, but name a game without any flaws at all? It’s not the best game I’ve seen, but it’s more than enough to entertain for a little while.

In the game, the player controls an ogre character, armed with a spear and a sword. The player can moves the character left and right with A and D keys, or left and right arrow key. Jumping is done with the W key or with the up arrow key, while picking up extra spears and blocking enemy attacks is done with the S key or the down arrow key. Spear and sword are used by pressing the T key or the 4 key, while enemies get kicked by pressing the Y key or the 5 key. Although the game doesn’t say it, there are special combo moves too. Spear is thrown at the enemy (giving the player an instant kill) by moving towards the enemy and pressing the T or 4 key, while the special sword attacks are performed in the exact same manner once the spear is thrown. A special jump attack is performed by pressing W or up arrow and T or 4 at the same time.

There are 3 basic kinds of enemies, that get stronger throughout the stages, and special boss enemies which tend to be normal enemies with special powers. The most basic enemy type is the ogre with a sword, these enemies charge at player mercilessly and might be the most dangerous enemies of all. Another type of enemy is ogre with a bow and arrow, which fires at the player from a distance, and is rather harmless if the player blocks the incoming arrows. Third type of enemy is the ogre with a spear, which performs a melee attack with a spear which has a longer range than a sword. These enemies drop their spears when killed, which can then be picked up by the player.

Sounds in the game are average to good, and if the player dislikes them, they can be turned off at any point, though it should be noted that this is not that likely to happen as none of the sounds are really bad and the music supports the game well, despite its simplicity.

Visually, the game is nicely drawn, and the game area on screen is quite large. The background is well animated, though simple in nature. The player’s character and enemies all look good and well distinctive, and animated good as well. It should be noted that the game gets quite bloody, so much so that there actually is an option to turn off blood effects. Also, the game comes in low, mid and high level of detail, so weaker machines should be able to run it as well

Overall it’s quite a good and challenging game, with difficulty increasing rather well and bosses being hard to beat, but not impossible. The game looks and feels good as well, and do to constant difficulty increasing, it never gets repetitive as well. There are downsides as well, mostly bug related. For example, the player is supposed to have 5 lives both in normal mode on each stage, and in survival mode, but those lives do not work, the game is over after a single death. And deaths themselves come as a surprise as well, as there’s no health indicator, meaning that the player can never be sure how many more hits it can take. The game would also benefit from being able to keep high scores in survival mode, as it could provide quite a competition to the site visitors. If and when these issues get sorted out, the game will receive the highest ratings as well, but for now it just feels like a great game that needs some polishing.

Current rating – 8 out of 10