Chivalry: Medieval Warfare (2012)

I played a lot of different multiplayer games. Every game was almost identical in terms of mechanics and goal. Shoot the enemies dead. Some games I liked, some games I hated, but then came: Chivalry: Medieval Warfare. A multiplayer game in which you walk up to enemies, and chop them in half with swords, axes and spears. Holy shi…..I was baffled by the whole concept of this game and liked it immediately.

In this game, you can play classic modes like deathmatch, team deathmatch or Capture the Flag. In addition, you can also play Objective mode, in which you must perform tasks like killing the enemy king (while the other team defends him with their life), or pillage a village, which the other team defends. Like the name suggests, this game really feels like medieval warfare.

The mechanics in Chivalry: Medieval Warfare work great. You can hack and slash with your axe or sword and pray to God that you hit someone, or you can tactfully choose your moment to strike, while blocking the enemy attacks and avoid being pierced like cheese by the rain of arrows from other players in the background. When dying in FPS mode, your whole camera shakes and trembles like you are actually falling. This kind of realism really enhanced the experience. The best part is when your head gets separated from your shoulders and your camera rolls around twenty times, so brutal.

Matches can be intense and watching the chaos and bloodshed around you from other players is just epic. They are using ballistae, catapults, get burned by hot oil while ramming a gate, get shot by four arrows for trying to take a different, heavily defended path towards the main keep, it is straight from a movie.

This game looks amazing. The environments, the details of the weapons, character models and structures, it is glorious. The animations, walk cycles and combat animations are also spot on. Nothing to complain about here.

The sound of clanging swords, grunts from fallen players and flying arrows are also excellent. It is sound design like this, that really makes you feel you are playing a multiplayer war game.

The gore is brutal in this game and the developers did not hold in. Arms, legs, heads, it can all be removed from ones torso. This is one of the best aspects of the game. You don’t bash an enemy and let him drop dead, no, you stab, slice and mangle him until you are sure that he, and his reincarnation, never stand up again. Nice.

The only problem I had with the game is the hit detection. I still don’t know if this is/was because of my immense lack of skill, but many times, I stabbed and sliced, and nothing happened, even when the enemy was not blocking. It is just hard to predict what/when will hit your opponent.

The main, and only reason, that I quit playing this game eventually, is that I just suck too hard for intense, multiplayer games like this. I surely had my fun, but when my head (and my monitor screen) rolled around like a football for the millionth time in a match, it was time to try another game.

Nevertheless, Chivalry: Medieval Warfare is a great game and, in my own opinion, one of the better Multiplayer games.