Ace of Spades

Ace of Spades

The Basics: A blend of voxel based block crafting and classic team first person shooter.

Previous Time Spent: 36

Expectation of learning Curve: Low

Why I bought this: Minecraft Phase

My 3 Hours with the Game: I began getting back into the game with an astoundingly small download on steam, which earned the game a bunch of points from the get-go. From there, I dove in to the game itself. 

Knowing little about what to expect, and with a very fuzzy memory of the game-play from a few years ago, I decided to go ahead and join a random server. This turned out to be a very fast paced and fun zombie mode, where players begin as human, and attempt to survive against a growing horde of undead. This has been done plenty of times before, but I enjoyed the added lunacy of mutable environments. I spent a good deal of time trying to build a massive tower to protect myself from the dead, and was surprised when it came collapsing on itself, leading to brief violence and a quick transformation into a zombie. 

Playing as a zombie was a delight, and had a completely different feel and basic strategy, which I appreciated. All in all, the zombie mode provided solid, engaging and bizarre mindless fun. I could choose to strategically defend myself, run around like an idiot, or just dig a hole and cover myself with dirt, hoping that the undead didn't find me. 

I spent a lot of time digging holes in this game. Even in the engaging classic capture the flag mode. When I started playing capture the flag, I was a bit worried, as the server was more quiet, and clearly less chaotic. However, after finding my bearings, learning to follow the map, and getting into it, it felt a lot like playing capture the flag as a kid, only with bolt action rifles. 

The levels are huge, and the ability to dig and build allows a lot of opportunity for creative strategy and silly low cunning. 

The bottom line: This is the first game in my steam backlog that I'm happy to have purchased. It's the first that I will keep installed, and occasionally go back to as a silly time-waster. The low learning curve helped quite a bit, and I enjoyed the cutesy, retro-inspired graphical touches.