Fury of the Gods is an AR port of the original non-AR game that was initially released in 2013 and then released for PC in June 2015 and also for Google Tango. when I first came across this game on the App Store, I thought it’s an original high-quality AR game. After reading a bit more about it, I found out that it’s actually not.
I have to admit that this made me less excited as I am looking forward to playing dedicated AR games, those who were built from the ground up for AR.That being said, the game still deserves its fair chance regardless of its origins.
What is Fury of the Gods AR?
Fury of the Gods AR is an augmented reality (AR) Tower Defense game. The player gets to play one of the three Greek gods: Zeus, Poseidon, and Hades. Each god has its own campaign with different maps, different enemies and different unique god powers (aka abilities). The unlockable spells that you unlock during the game are shared across all campaigns, whether the basic ones which are god specific are not.
The goal of the game is to protect a central temple structure against waves of revolters who move towards the temple to in order to destroy it. Of course, as a god, you can allow this to happen and you use your god powers to punish them.
Furthermore, as you progress you’ll unlock a variety of mythological monsters that can be placed on the map and help you defend certain key point s needing extra attention and a stronger defense.
Gameplay
The gameplay is quite simple, you aim by positioning the centered cursor at the area you want to case a spell and tap to cast it.
At the left side of the screen, there is a rechargeable bar which recharges slowly over time. You can speed it up by aiming at enemies and tap-and-hold which will recharge this bar faster. Now, the fuller the bar, the more powerful the spell is. Each time you cast a spell part of the bar is consumed. If it’s depleted or very low, you cannot cast any speed. It doesn’t matter which spell you use, it consumed energy from that same bar.
Your temple has health, and it’s important to keep an eye on its health. The game offers some consumable packs. For example, an option to make your building resilient to damage for certain amount of time or an option to replenish his health completely.
You can also upgrade your temple and spells, to make them more powerful. For example, upgrading your temple will increase its health, attack damage, attack radius, minion souls on start and recovery value. Upgrading items or buying utility packs cost money. You obtain your money after each round based on your performance or if a daily bonus applied. You can also watch an advertisement which doubles the number of coins.
The enemy units vary, some move faster, others are slower. Some do damage from far (e.g. archers and catapults)or above (e.g. Falcons), also their damage defer.
The game renders as a 360-degree rounded arena. Enemies can attack from different locations around it. The player has two options, either physically move around the arena to position itself for better aiming, or swipe to rotate the arena on its Y-axis or use both.
Fun Factor
In general, I enjoyed playing Fury OF The Gods AR. In AR, in some ways, you get to feel powerful as you position yourself above the enemies so it felt like a god game in that way, similar to ARrived, but at a further up so it felt less personal. Of course, you can position yourself very close, but then you lose the wide view which is required to get a strategic view of the battlefield.
Each level can take quite some time to complete. I actually found myself just sitting on a chair with my iPad faced downwards in order to play it comfortably. I also liked playing it at an angle from the side rather than pointing my iPad down straight from above.
The game is challenging at higher levels. I am still stuck at a high level. I bought 3 health and shield packs for 500 coins and I was still wasn’t able to complete the campaign. The first view levels are easy, although I failed once because I didn’t upgrade my monsters and spells.
Spellcasting is fun. It’s followed by beautiful visual and sound effects, so it does make you feel like a powerful god. Still, because the map is big, the spellcasting effect look small and therefore less exciting than what it could have been if the enemies and the spellcasting appeared larger on screen.
The monsters, the different spells, and the utility packs make the game more dynamic, strategic and fun. The enemy can easily overwhelm you at higher levels if you are clueless.
I did enjoy playing it better when I made the game bigger. There is a maximum size which I was able to enlarge the game.
The thing that was missing in this game for me was a more strategic gameplay. It felt like a tapping fiesta than smart tower defense game that requires strategic thinking.
In that respect, it’s different than the other AR tower defense games that I’ve played like XR Defense, Terrorhedron, CastleMustBeMine AR, Tower AR and Toy Clash AR. There was less emphasis on strategic gameplay and more of map awareness and fast reaction to different threats. The unique abilities balance it in a way. This is one of those tower defense games that are more tailored toward action gameplay than just positioning certain defense units and let them fight for you. If this is the type of game that you want to play, you rather check out those tower defense AR games that I’ve listed above.
So Fury of the Gods brings something different. It’s not like all those other tower defense games that I’ve played. Although I personally prefer the playing those other games, it was refreshing trying something else for a change.
Leve Design, Graphics & AR Experience
The level design is fantastic but the sun lighting effects are pre-rendered. Like, if you rotate the map, it’s like you rotate the entire scene with the lighting and therefore you don’t get a nice effect of the lighting on the surface. It did negatively affect the immersion just a bit but the beautifully detailed visuals easily make up for it.
The levels are beautiful, especially the first two gods where a temple sits on top of a mountain. This verticality looks really nice in AR as it creates a better perception of depth as you move around the map.
One of the things that I didn’t like is that the enemies appear quite small as the map is quite big. I tried spawning it in about 5 feet (1.5m) but it was just too small for both the home screen’s UI and for the gameplay itself. I think this game is better experienced when played in relatively larger size. This is why it’s nice that the developer added the option to rotate the game, to make it more comfortable to target enemies without moving around it.
I didn’t like the Hades’ map design. It’s nice in terms of complexity and it’s more challenging than the others. However, it just looked bad in AR, too larger and too high. I definitely prefer the map of Poseidon and Zeus than Hades’ one. You can certainly feel that this is not a game that was designed from the ground up for AR.
Conclusion
Fury of the Gods might not be a brand new game, but its AR version felt like a refreshing experience. I am usually used playing small and short AR games. I’ve noticed that it was different because it’s the only AR game that I remembered that had an opening movie scene.
I did enjoy playing Fury of the Gods AR. The gameplay mechanics are fun and, the game is challenging. The AR experience was enhanced due to the very detailed and beautifully rendered level design and lighting effects.
I have to admit, it feels great watching such a rich and detailed level with such high-quality graphics appearing in your living room. The misty visual effect that surrounded the island gave helps blend the game well in any environment (I can’t wait to play it outdoors!).
Although I haven’t finished the game yet, I do believe that you can finish it in a few hours, It’s a fairly fun game, one with pretty graphics (Unreal Engine). The game plays different than all the other tower defense game that I’ve played, and in that aspect, it’s quite unique and delivers a fresh experience. Just keep in mind that if you are a fan of the classic tower defense game, you might not like that button-smashing experience.
In some way, the game felt more like a shooter and I think this is why I wasn’t hooked as I was with the other tower defense AR games that I’ve played.
The good news is that Fury of the Gods is free so there is no reason why not trying it out. I think that the game delivers an overall fun gameplay experience, although it’s not as good as an AR game as I hope it would be—Recommended.
Download Fury of the Gods AR free from the App Store here.