Valorant Review
2020-07-02
Today we will look at a game that mixes
two genres that seem to have many attempts but even more promising but failed
attempts at the gaming market. Valorant is a competitive first-person shooter
that follows the tropes of having “heroic” abilities with a high skill ceiling.
Most notably in this department of games is Counter-Strike: Global Offensive
and Overwatch, both of which are first person shooters with high skill
ceilings. This is the first attempt at a first-person shooter by Riot Games and
it certainly has some shoes to try and fill.
First thing is first, let us dive into the story or point of the game.
The game focuses on a style that was made popular by CS: Go, 2 bomb sites, a
bomb (or spike), and an overwhelming urge to plant the bomb or kill the other
team. In this game, 2 teams of 5 battle it out on a map over bomb sites. Each
round earns you money based on performance allowing you to buy items from a
shop. This means teams can snowball or become too strong to stop and each buy
must be tactical.
As
you know all opinions are my own and do not reflect those of others, just
because I enjoyed a game or did not enjoy it, does not mean you should avoid
it. I will be basing the score of this game off a few factors that are listed
below. With that being said let us dive right in.
Graphics
Starting off with the run of the mill
discussions are the graphics. This game has cartoonish style graphics that
place it with the likes of Fortnite and Overwatch. The game looks pretty good
and has the normal sliders you would expect a game to have meaning it can run
on lower end PCs better than some games. Unfortunately, there is not a lot to
talk about here as the primary focus is the gameplay rather than the graphics
itself and the art style has been done many times by companies trying to cash
in on familiarity whether intentional or not. In order to run this game you
will need the minimum specs which will be an Intel i3-370m (CPU), Intel HD 3000
(GPU), 1 GB of VRAM, 4GB of RAM, and Windows 7 through 10 on a 64 bit system.
Overall, this means this game can virtually run on most computers at the bare
minimum of 30 fps. Performance gets a solid 10 from me.
Gameplay
Valorant attempts the style of CS: Go with
the previously mentioned bomb system and item buying but a mix of overwatch
with character abilities. You will be buying your abilities and guns as you can
move around to the hidden part of the chokepoint for either side. This honestly makes the game feel a lot more
tactical as to when to use your abilities and where because each ability will
cost you precious money that you could be using to buy weapons and armor.
Speaking of the weapons, I dislike how this game handles movement and shooting but
once you get the hang of it, the quick nature that you will need to get the
right peeks at the right time the game will start to feel better. It still
feels very stiff though when trying to shoot the wide variety of guns while
moving. I found the best way to compensate is to hold the sneak button while
rounding corners to still get movement while shooting. I was unable to tell if
there was bloom while moving or a fixed pattern. What this game does get right
is allowing for most guns to have the option to zoom in, if only it was better
to zoom than to hip fire as both have the same accuracy just a little more
zoomed in. It honestly feels like a missed opportunity that could set it above
the competition on the field. Gameplay gets a 7.5 out 10 for me because it is
good, but it does lack in some key departments.
Map Design
Moving on to one of the most important aspects that a game can have, it
is the map design. This game really was lacking in map design for most of the
maps that I had played on. The hallways were very narrow and typically
cluttered by walls or boxes that felt either out of place or were really
annoying to deal with. All open spaces felt like a guessing game for angles
because of this as most angles had 3 or more peeking opportunities for defense
and offense. This probably would not be an issue if it were not for the fact
that this game heavily wants you to not move while shooting. For a first game
made by new developers to this genre however I can understand. I hope in the
future there will be more maps with different kinds of sightlines similar to
how Overwatch and CS: Go do it. One map though that I do feel needs given
credit where credit is due is Bind as it gives much needed opportunities with
one-way teleporters and only 2 sites to focus on. This map still suffers from
the other issues mentioned before but it was much more forgiving and felt like
a more focused map from a developer who has a ton of potential. I look forward
to coming back to this in the future but for now, the map/level design gets a 5
out of 10 for me.
Monetization Style
Most games and game companies have to make
money, and with that comes an even more controversial topic. Where should they
be pulling money from? Valorant is free to play which means you do not have to
pay a dime in order to play this game. What this does mean however is that
certain things are now behind a paywall that can only be accessed with money.
This game falls into a bit of the middle ground when it comes to the
monetization. When we look at their other game League of Legends, we notice
they have a free rotation with hundreds of locked champions to buy with
earnable in game currency or a premium currency. This game does follow that
same style except it gives you 5 out of 11 and expects you to either earn them
or buy them with that premium currency. That same premium currency can also buy
skins and cosmetics that use a Fortnite style of a rotating market that
circulates every so often. This game also uses a battle pass system that can
also help earn experience to give rewards such as 2 free operators, and
progress towards other operators. I have seen worse monetization types, but I
also have seen better, this earns a 7 out of 10 score.
Accessibility
Accessibility is always going to be a
rating on how many people can actually play the game without much problem. The
game comes with a color-blind mode, a pinging system and a ton of visual
warnings for things. The big downside that I have found is that there is no
sign of controller support for a long time. This means anyone who has struggles
with a mouse and keyboard are unable to get anything going with a controller
until this game releases for console and mobile. It is a good sign in the right
direction for this game and I think for now it warrants a 5 out of 10. In the
future this rating may go up as new features are added.
In
conclusion, this game earns a 34.5 out of 50 on my final balancing sheets. Most
games may vary depending on certain aspects of the game, but this is my basic 5
I will be grading games on in the future. Valorant is a mediocre game at best
that really shows its flaws. The game can be fun, and the problems can be
overlooked but it is important to focus on these problems to help better the
future of gaming as a whole. This game is so much more fun with friends and
communication as well. This is the first game from this developer in this genre
and I expected issues, I cannot wait to see this game hopefully make the best
of its resources.
34.5 out of 50
Pros:
Unique characters and guns
Aiming down sights
Map potential
Monetization not too greedy
Runs on most lower end PCs
High skill ceiling gap
Cons:
Weak/Poor Map Design
Lack of mobility while shooting
No controller support
Region locked
