The idea behind the TouchArcade Game of the Week is that every Friday afternoon we post the one game that came out this week that we think is worth giving a special nod to. Now, before anyone goes over-thinking this, it doesn’t necessarily mean our Game of the Week pick is the highest scoring game in a review, the game with the best graphics, or really any other quantifiable “best" thing. Instead, it’s more just us picking out the single game out of the week’s releases that we think is the most noteworthy, surprising, interesting, or really any other hard to describe quality that makes it worth having if you were just going to pick up one.
These picks might be controversial, and that’s OK. If you disagree with what we’ve chosen, let’s try to use the comments of these articles to have conversations about what game is your game of the week and why.
Without further ado…
Modern Combat Versus
Modern Combat Versus (Free) has been hotly anticipated by our community basically ever since news of it leaked last year. A more official announcement didn’t hit until over a year after the leak, with a supremely locked down soft launch in the Philippines which actually required players to use a VPN to connect and play the game. When there’s a will there’s a way, and judging by the amount of YouTube videos that spawned around the time, there were loads of people playing outside of the specific locked regions of the soft launch.
This week the game finally hit the App Store, and the response so far has been fairly mixed with the overall gist being that as far as an online team-based shooter is concerned, Modern Combat Versus is great. It’s basically a Gameloft-y spin on a formula that lands somewhere in between Overwatch and Team Fortress 2 with a gritty, futuristic Call of Duty-ish military setting. Like Overwatch, the game has multiple classes as well as an ultimate ability which charges over time as you participate in battles. Gameplay is fast and fun, and feels a lot like what you might expect of a 2017 version of Modern Combat 5 (Free).
Unfortunately, it wouldn’t be a modern Gameloft game without a controversial free to play system. Like practically every other game released these days, Modern Combat Versus features unlockable chests, similar to Clash Royale (Free). They’re doled out pretty regularly, but, just like every game that uses this method of unlocking stuff, there’s a lot of waiting for them to open. Folks on our forums have argued that there isn’t much point in playing after you have four chests unlocking, as your progress is entirely limited by those timers. That’s true, I suppose, if the only reason you’re playing MC:V is to get loot, but it disregards the fact that playing the game itself is super fun.
The most curious design decision Gameloft made with Modern Combat: Versus is that this chest system is how you also unlock additional characters, each with their own classes and abilities like Overwatch. My concern with this is overall game balance as when Blizzard released Overwatch they made it very clear that the reason all the characters would always be available to everyone is because varied teams are important to gameplay. With most people in our community only having a few characters unlocked, even after playing a considerable amount of time, I’m wondering if this is the best way to go about doing this or not.
Freemium shenanigans aside, I’m having a lot of fun playing Modern Combat: Versus. The game has only been out for a couple days now, so it’s super difficult to say how much these things will impact gameplay in the long term. Of course you’re not going to unlock everything instantly, that’s not how these games work. I’m anxious to see how the unlocks unfold after sticking with the game for the next couple weeks. Chances are that Gameloft is running analytics out the wazoo in this game, so if they see any kind of player drop-off, expect all this stuff to be tweaked.
If you’re looking for people to play with, a great place to find them is over on our Discord. We’ve got a Modern Combat: Versus channel over there, as well as just a whole server filled with really cool iOS gamers.
