Orions - Legend of Wizards...Best Game of the Year?

More than a year ago, I made an unprecedented endorsement of a PalmOS game, something I have never done since. That game was a fantastic work of strategy known as Fantasy Realms. At the time, I bemoaned the lack of anything comparable for Windows Mobile devices. And when I first learned that Orions: Legend of Wizards was in development, I hoped that it would finally fill this void in the Pocket PC game world.

Now that I've had a chance to play it, I can say that it is all that I hoped it would be and much, MUCH more! I think this might just be THE game of 2007! Read on for a full review!

What Kind of Game Is This?

Orions will be immediately recognizable to anyone who has ever played Magic: The Gathering (which I have not). Additionally, fans of Redshift's Legacy, and it's sequel, will also recognize the format as it features prominently in the card game playable from taverns in those games. The core of this game is card-based combat. But, as I'll explain, Orions has added a whole lot more to this basic idea.

Gameplay

There's a lot to explain here, so I'm just going to dive right in: the heart of this
game is it's battle system, which is played with cards. Each combatant has a side that contains five slots on it. These slots can be filled by placing cards in them during your turn. Each player can place one card per turn. Usually you will want to use your turn to place some kind of creature in one of these slots because the creatures are the ones that do the actual fighting, but sometimes it will be better to use your turn to cast a spell. During the turn after being placed in a slot, a creature will attack the creature in the opposite slot if there is one and will attack the other player if there is not one. Each creature has its own health rating and its own attack strength. Additionally, some creatures can cast unique spells. Sometimes you may want to cast spell cards (e.g., heal, etc.) instead of placing a creature card. You begin the game with a relatively weak deck of cards from each of the six elements: fire, air, earth, water, life, and death). Each card belongs to one of these elements and each requires a certain level of that element in order to be cast. You gain a certain amount of each element each turn, and since the stronger creatures and spells require greater levels of their element, you've got to "save" that element (by not using cards of that element for a few turns) if you want to be able to use these more expensive cards.

But why are you fighting in the first place? To conquer or make safe,
depending on which side you're on, the world of Antavia, a world consisting of a number of orions (the game's term for islands). Each island belongs to one of the element types. You begin the game with only one orion of a type chosen by you when you start the game. The element type of a given orion ultimately determines what kind of cards can be generated on it. In order to get more advanced cards, you have to build certain structures. For example, the hydra is a water creature and to get hydra cards, you have to build a hydra lake, which can only be built on a water orion. But building these things, like building anything, requires resources. There are four basic resource types in the game and you start the game with a certain amount of each. However, acquiring more requires that you build resource generators (there are four, one for each type of resource). These resources will then accumulate each gameday (i.e., turn). Once you build the structure associated with a particular creature or spell, you then have to expend these resources to acquire cards of that creature/spell.

Once you've got a capable deck, you can attack adjacent orions (these will
either be neutral or belong to your enemy). If you are victorious, you will either gain 3 points that can be distributed among your stats (strength, intelligence, power, and specialty) as you see fit (except that you cannot control your specialty stat) or you will get the opportunity to exchange one of your default cards with one of your vanquished opponent's cards. Strength determines how much health you begin a fight with, intelligence affects the number of each element that you have during a fight, power affects the number of unique cards you may possess at any given time, while specialty is a measure of how far you have progressed in your particular elemental school. If you're last orion is lost you lose the game. If instead you have attacked another orion and lose the battle you simply lose whatever cards you used up during the fight.

Up to this point, I've been somewhat oversimplifying: there are two modes of
play: duel and campaign. I've been explaining the campaign mode thus far. Duel mode will allow you just to do battle with an opponent as thought you'd attacked an opponent in campaign mode.

Graphics

Unlike Fantasy Realms, the graphics in Orions are amazing, which will come as no surprise to those familiar with MoreGames's other smash hit, Enslave. Each card is, simply put, beautiful. And don't expect that just because this is a card-based game combat visuals consist of merely showing the cards that are in play. To the contrary, the combat experience is full of spellbinding animations (no pun intended).

Sounds & Music

The sound effects are superb in this game. The music, on the other hand, is not bad but not my favorite either. It doesn't intrude on the gameplay experience but when I made myself really focus on it, it got old after a while.

Other Features

• TCP/IP Multiplayer allows playing over Bluetooth, Wi-fi, or Internet (I didn't try the multiplayer features out)
• Multiple difficulty settings
• Randomly generated maps (you can also select the size of the map)
• Very good tutorial (a must for games like this)
• 66 unique buildings to build
• Powerful particle engine
• Support for WM2002 through WM 5 (but not square screen devices...this might be changed in the future)
• 74 unique cards. MoreGames is also planning on releasing expansion packs to add to the deck. I think this is a really good idea...74 cards is a fair amount but will probably get old eventually. I will be very disappointed if expansion packs don't follow.
• A final note worth mentioning is that the UI on this game is particularly well done. Double tapping on any of your cards brings up a handy little description of what each card does, etc.

What Makes This Game So Much Fun?

If I had to sum up what makes this game so fun in a few words, I would have to say this: it requires strategy on so many different levels. Let me explain.

Let's start with the card-based combat itself. First of all, as mentioned above each of your cards belongs to one of the elemental schools and requires a certain amount of that element to be played. Since you naturally want to play your stronger cards, this means that you're going to have to save up that element by not playing cards from it. But this in turn means that you're going to have to be playing cards from the other elements while you save up the desired element. Balancing the cards you use among the six elemental schools is the first strategy element of combat.

Another strategic consideration when engaging in combat is the placement of the cards in the slots. If there is no creature in a slot opposing your creature, you're going to attack the enemy player himself or herself each turn. Conversely, if you have an empty slot whose opposite is occupied by an enemy creature, that creature will be able to damage your player each turn. Another aspect of the card placement consideration is that some creatures have strengths and weaknesses against creatures of particular types. For example, a particular water creature might get 200% damage against fire creatures, which suggests that you should place it across from a fire creature. However, that same creature might be more vulnerable to other types of creatures meaning that they should not be opposed to creatures of that other school. A final aspect of card placement is that certain cards can affect adjacent cards. For example, a particular card might give adjacent cards a strength bonus, which would mean that placing them in a slot far from your other creatures wouldn't make sense.

The strategic component of the game is just as important outside of combat as it is while engaging in combat. As noted above, the way you get cards is by building structures that support the spells and creatures on those cards on orions that support the cards elemental school. This has several consequences: First, it means that you have to make sure that you build enough resource-generating buildings to support your creature-supporting buildings; secondly, it means that you have to make choices about which cards you really need (which determines which buildings you will build). This is also important because each orion has limited space for buildings [Edit: after playing the game a little more, I still haven't ever had a problem with space so this might not be as big a concern as I had originally thought]; finally, it means that you have to be deliberate about which type of orions you attack. If your elemental school is water, but you want to acquire more advanced cards from the fire school, you're going to have to conquer a fire orion and develop it. All of these considerations in turn mean that it's very likely that you're going to have to wait around for a few turns while the resources accrue that you need to build a desired building or acquire particular cards. While this is happening, of course, your enemy might be out conquering the world, which means that you have to carefully balance waiting for resources to accrue with attacking other orions.

Conclusion

I know that 2007 just began, but I think Orions: Legend of Wizards will probably be the best game of the year! With more layers of strategy than a large onion, the gameplay experience alone would justify the honor. Add to that dazzling graphics and capable sound effects and it's almost a sure thing! I can't wait for the expansion packs!

At a time when, still, inexplicably, a lot of developers continue to churn out rehashed versions of games that have already been made dozens of times, MoreGames has now produced not one, but two revolutionary Windows Mobile games (the other of course being Enslave). For those of you who weren't already convinced, with this game, MoreGames has shown itself to be a true leader in Windows Mobile game development!

[Note: These screenshots were taking from the developer's website because I can't take my own screenshots from within the game. For a much more extensive set of screenshots, I recommend checking out this page at pocketgamer.org. Also, this review was based on a release candidate of the game. If there are any changes between now and the game's release this Tuesday I will update this review. Finally, some of the links to the MoreGames website might change once the game is released. If they do, I will update this review accordingly].