Jun 23, 2010
Risk: Factions hit XBLA today and it’s, well, Risk. Sort of. Published by EA and put together by Stainless Games (you might remember their most recent Xbox Live Arcade release: Duels of the Planeswalkers), it looks like this unique take on a classic just might have legs.
I’ve got to admit that the teasers that we’ve been given since the game was first announced sort of turned me off to the game. When I think about Risk, I think about mounting my savage domination of the Asian continent from my crafty base in Irktusk, not about cats shooting hairballs at zombies (or robots turning on their human masters, or warrior-monk yeti tossing icicles at everyone.) Thankfully, they’ve included a vanilla version of the game for us old-time die hards. This allows you to completely turn off all the fancy “Factions” stuff and simply play the classic board game.
However, you might find yourself not wanting to. A short dip into the campaign reveals that some of the additions they’ve made are actually pretty interesting. If you’ve been keeping up with the latest Risk rule revisions, you’re probably familiar with the concept of “objectives,” where in the “secret mission” rules variant each player was charged with trying to achieve four different (secret) objectives, short of world domination. This concept makes an appearance in Risk: Factions, however everyone can go after the same set of objectives, and each objective grants a special bonus if you achieve it. You might get to place an airfield in one of your territories (+1 to your highest scoring die when attacking or defending in adjacent territories), or get the ability to move your troops around BEFORE your battle phase. It might all sound overly complicated, but it does add an interesting twist to the old formula.
The campaign itself is split up by short flash cartoons that were apparently done up by the same guys who worked on the Penny Arcade game animations. If you’ve seen any of the videos floating around out there, that’s what you were looking at. They’re pretty well done from a technical standpoint, though I found myself wanting to skip through them. (especially after strained lolcats reference)
Custom games can be set up with either the classic, vanilla board and all the Factions stuff stripped out, or on any of the new boards (unlocked through the campaign) with all the Factions stuff turned on. A few other options allow you to set which version of the rules you play by, whether to play a prolonged, normal or shortened version of the game, and a few more. And, of course, the frustratingly terrible dice rolls we all know and love are still present. After losing nine out of ten of my attacking army to a territory held by a measly two AI armies I finally turned the game off and went back to playing This is Hard.
I might have to pick this up. I used to play Risk alot in college with a group of friends over a couple of cases. Man, those were the days. some of those games would go well into the morning. I wonder how this game deals with the length that a true Risk match can extend to.
Course it doesn't matter either way to me, I'm getting dis.
My biggest concern, I think, is that Risk allows one (or more) people to get eliminated, and then the game can just go on and on for hours more. This is probably my biggest beef with games like this (i.e. civ 4, where in a game with me, mav and D the AI was a complete dick to me, marched right past mav and destroyed me about three hours in, and mav and D went on to play for about twenty more hours without me.) If you want to play Risk with your buddies and you clear a nigh to do so, then get eliminated and they go on to play the rest of the night without you, well, screw that.
If you want to play classic risk (which is basically what I want to play) the only options you're given are how many slots to reserve for your friends, and how many slots to assign to AI players. Now, with Factions you're given the choice of World Conquest or Command Room. World Conquest plays the same as a regular game of risk (just with the factions stuff tossed in) while command room will make the games shorter.
Command room allows you to choose between "epic game," "quick game," or "normal game." Essentially, with Command Room you can win by achieving a set number of the "objectives" I mentioned in the article, and the game length is moderated by how many you need to achieve. I imagine that the "quick" game might be best, just to keep anyone who gets eliminated from being locked out of the fun for the rest of the night.
I should mention that you can also choose your map when you set up a custom game. This lets you choose from between 2, 3, 4 or 5 player maps. So if you've only got three people playing you can choose a three player map and have no AI. Or choose a five player map and have two AI. (or choose a five player map and hope two random people join you)
I got board laying down armies and turned it off after it took forever for me to download.
That would be weird though playing a full game with peeps and being eliminated early. I guess you could sit and bs for awhile or maybe flip the TV on while the other people finish up.
They also added some Family Game Night titles. Although I think the digital version of Jenga costs more than the physical version of it.
Of the games I've played so far I've only done random placement. That's how we always used to play when I was a kid (deal out the risk cards and then your territories are whatever you got dealt)
I'm not gonna go out and buy a game, bother to set up a game where everyone kinda has to be free and willing to play the game the whole night, etc. when there's a chance one of said people could end up being bounced almost right away. That's just a recipe for folks being not terribly happy.
On a side note, I've seen you guys play Catan all night. lol
The nice thing about catan is a game usually takes about 45 minutes and a lot of the time everyone is competitive right up until the end.
Anyone want to give this a shot in probably less than ten minutes from now?
D and I played two games, one against two AI and one against three and the game is a pretty good time. Moves along pretty quick etc (though I feel like with five actual people it would probably take FOREVER.)
D won both times and I learned that when I've got an army of 40+ I need to use it to straight up take him out instead of attacking the AI instead (and then assuming he probably won't attack me on the NEXT TURN based on the fact that I haven't attacked him all game and he only attacked me twice for territories that didn't really matter either way.)
D won both times and I learned that when I've got an army of 40+ I need to use it to straight up take him out instead of attacking the AI instead (and then assuming he probably won't attack me on the NEXT TURN based on the fact that I haven't attacked him all game and he only attacked me twice for territories that didn't really matter either way.)
But yeah the game pretty much immediately won me over. The all-new FACTIONS mode takes a lot of liberties with the formula but ultimately turns the focus away from elimination type play and more on carefully crafting specific goals. There appears to be a great deal of balance here, where an early game risk may secure you a huge advantage for the entire game, while a more defensive position of holding on to certain point-scoring resources while amassing an army and racking up star cards could be just as successful. It also ensures games are shorter and that usually no one gets wiped out, as trying to completely destroy opponents is remarkably inefficient.
Of course this is only after 2 games. Maybe later it will be evident that there is some overpowered game thing at work. But it makes for a good first impression.
ALSO: The AI showed some signs of actual craftiness, though it quite clearly scrambles for short term goals.
i have played a faebook variant called Attack! or somesuch, and i can tell you that with normal risk rules, where card turn-ins become larger and larger armies, that games just don't take that long. a game on facebook takes 20-30 minutes.
will be waiting on this one, though. just bought catan and bf1943, so i'm good for a good while.
I kinda wanted this one - but with Tomb Raider and Castlevania coming in a couple weeks - I'm saving my XBLA money for those.
Got into game with dustin and bio. Feel like I'm getting the hang of the game better, and I can see it being a good time going forward, but I still feel like I'd rather be playing something like catan. Risk is more intense than I like for my kick back and relax xbla multiplayer stuff, and it requires being more cutthroat than I prefer to be in my social gaming experiences.
For instance, I won tonight but to do it I had to attack bio pretty early on and then jump on D almost right afterwards. Normally I'd have then eased up just because I don't like being a dick, but if you ease up in risk you lose.
risk should be called "vicious kicking people in the nuts and then stomping them on their faces"
it really is a game of ruthless dominance. you either go for the throat or someone gets your first.
That's why I like Risk,
At some point you got to take one, but the dice don't always roll in your favor. I guess for classic Risk one strategy is to know which territories to bail on, and which to build off of on the early go. If you try to do too much or too little it can hurt you.
I think I might get this game. Maybe a few more trial runs will convince me.
the dice are what kill me. i like games to have some element of luck, but i like it when strategy wins out, and too often in risk it comes down the dice rolls and what cards you get. you're in position, you go, and bad rolls mean your game is suddenly over.
also, once someone gets on a roll near the end, it's all over. they wipe out some guy with four cards, and their armies just explode.
This game is a lot of fun. Would be a lot more fun if it didn't glitch out on us every single time we play.
Well I finally tried playing a ranked match, but unwisely went with a Quick Match which ironically put me in a game on the classic risk map with the rule set to "EPIC LENGTH GAME". With 5 players I came in second -- I thought I was doing just fine, but then I discovered that you can earn a point (with no objective bonus) for wiping out another player, and when it came down to me and one other player he went full force after two of the losing armies (whose owners had quit the game, making them easy pickings). 5 player epic length game is not a good idea and I will be avoiding that set of options in the future.
But the star of the show was one NickHex420, who about half way in to the game was sending me private messages beseeching me to ally with him until the other two players were out. I never intended to take him up on his alliance, and eventually took one of his territories in north america while going for the "Conquer 12 Territories in one turn" objective. I got it, but he quite clearly was not happy. On his next turn he tried to take north america back but wound up losing like 8 of his armies to one defender that wasn't even me. I remarked that that was tough luck, and here are the private messages that followed:
I mean if nothing else I'm impressed he got "you're" right. But my favorite is his LOL, indicating he is laughing out loud at his own awesome burn.
LMAO (second LMAO to meet length limit)
Plus, he probably smokes tons of weed... you know... with the whole 311 reference (Nick Hexum is 311's lead singer) and "420" in his gamertag. That instantly makes him cooler than you -- the fact that he said, "Eff the man! I'm going to put a drug reference in my gamertag!"
Man, this guy must be awesome.
And he plays in the Underground with all the 1337's,
I use to think those didn't mean anything until I found out they use it to pair you with people, no wonder I ran into so many douches.
Oh man.
I haven't gotten any fun messages like that since I played Rock Band online.
That's a pretty far cry from all the great people we played with on catan. I guess that's just an example of how a game like risk attracts a different kind of person.
I use to think those didn't mean anything until I found out they use it to pair you with people, no wonder I ran into so many douches.
(My apologies to anyone here in the VU who uses the brand but that is the connotation for me)
I always thought the knobs would be labeled as "Hardcore." I'm surprised you'd get that out of someone playing Risk though. I get that all the time when I beat dudes in Street Fighter, but from Risk, I'm honestly a little taken aback.
look risk is serious business
taking over all of the lands is a cutthroat operation
I don't think the labels really matter all that much. I'm in the 'family' zone and I still get plenty of obnoxious douchebag 15 year olds who love to call me faggot whenever I shoot them.
Me personally, pretty much everyone sends me poorly thought out rants over private message, it's (almost) always an "UNDERGROUND"er.
I use to have it set at Underground, but I didn't think that mattered at all. I just thought it was a novelty.
I only found out those were used to pair you with people in the same zone recently when someone over at the Xbox forums questioned if they even work anymore. Ends up they really don't. Plus some games are going to attract one type of person more than others.
It just seems weird Dustin got that from Risk of all games. Sometimes I miss setting my privacy to friends only. I get suckered into wanting to switch it back to public when people say communication helps your team.
But last time I had it switched back to public I hear more f-bombs than actual intel. Or my personal favorite, 4 guys on your team telling another guy to shut the hell up during the whole match with me laughing the whole time.
Ah the memories.