Dawn of Titans (by NaturalMotion)

Better have a look then!

only two years after soft launch.. don't even know what to say

Well this is a disappointing day. Two games I was waiting for in soft launch finally released, the other being Galaxy on Fire 3, and both games - quite frankly - suck. Let me elaborate on Dawn of Titans.

After nearly 2 years in soft launch, you would have thought they would have perfected this game. It seems that the 2 year period was simply spent trying to work out how to monetise it, as the gameplay itself is virtually non-existent.

The much heralded graphics are nothing to boast about (maybe they were 2 years ago when the soft launch period began, but not anymore - that ship has sailed). The best thing about the game is the opening cut-scene, once you've seen that you've pretty much seen it all.

Your "base", a floating island in the clouds, looks very nice, but it's really just a feast of post-processing effects. There's nothing actually going on, it's pretty dead to look at.

The combat ... ugh. It's completely uninspired. Three blocks of infantry and a "titan", versus the same on the other side. Tap on each block and tap on the opposing side to tell it which block to attack, same for the titan. Tap the fight button. Then just watch; very little interaction is needed after that.

As the battle started, since I found myself having some free time with very little to actually do, I decided to zoom in and watch these little guys fight to the death.

I laughed. Out loud.

They're not even 3D guys, they're actually badly rendered 2D sprites which flicker in a very unnatural way. Any sense of immersion was gone immediately. Only the titan is a 3D model, clearly that's where all of the development work went.

They probably wanted to support older devices, but once again I can see development decisions based on a game that should have launched 2 years ago, this just looks awful now.

If you want to see this kind of combat done (marginally) better, look at Total War Battles: Kingdom, released earlier this year. At least all of the little guys are well animated 3D models which actually look like they're fighting a battle. Better still, play Total War: Rome, with none of the freemium annoyance which no doubt plagues Dawn of Titans.

I heard that Dawn of Titans was intended to be the goose that lays the golden egg for Zynga:

http://venturebeat.com/2016/02/10/zy...f-titans-game/

Based on what I've seen, it looks set to be the biggest disappointment of the year.

Thanks for the review Palanthian. I agree, that Zynga's attempt to be relevant falls pretty short

I also have been playing in soft launch and am saddened at what it has become. The graphics of the troops on the field are atrocious. They used to be beautiful looking but now they are horrid looking.

The gameplay is predictable because all troops react the same to combat once you get used to each troops behavior. An alliance I was in posted videos of how to counter each troop. We had it down to a science so it became dull to attack. No battle was a surprise. BORING!

Now, with this update, I want to delete the game to be honest. I am having way more fun playing War Commander:Rogue Assault in soft launch

Boring game. I really hoped it was not i was pushing myself to like it but no. Shame. Deleted

I don't find it that horrible... for a free to play... it's interesting. So far base level 5 I'm enjoying it.

Yep I kind of agree with you, but the troops zoomes in do look bad.