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Mirage: Arcane Warfare review

By T.J. Hafer 6 days ago

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Need to know

What is it? Team-based first person melee with MOBA-like magic powers
Reviewed on: Windows 10 64-bit, Core i7-4770K, 16GB RAM, GeForce GTX 1070.
Price: $30/23
Release date: Out now
Publisher: Torn Banner Studios
Developer: Torn Banner Studios
Multiplayer: Up to 20 Online
Link: Official site
Buy it: Humble Store

Read our affiliates policy.

Mirage: Arcane Warfare reminds me of the games I used to make up on the fly with other kids on
the playground. I fire a magic spear at you! Oh yeah? Well, I summon my magic carpet and
fly out of the way! Adding those kinds of flashy, improvisational magical abilities to the high
skill cap, hack-and-slash combat that worked so well in Torn Banners previous flagship,
Chivalry, widens the tactical toolbox in the same way Total War: Warhammer did by introducing
fantasy elements to a previously historical series. Unfortunately, the dismally small player base
at present makes these mystic melees harder to enjoy.

According to SteamCharts, as of this writing, Mirage has an all-time peak of 190 concurrent
playerswhich is less than I could expect to find in Alien vs Predator 2 on an average afternoon
when I was still playing that years after its release. During the day, Im lucky to find a server
with under 200 ping and any players at all. I live in a relatively populated region, so I can only
imagine what it would be like if I were located somewhere more out of the way. During the
evenings in the US, there are usually a handful of full servers with decent ping, and a couple
others, with only a few players in each.

This is unfortunate, because Mirage can be fun and exciting. The emphasis on special abilities
makes it feel a bit MOBA-ish, along the lines of Overwatch but with more of a melee focus. The
team synergies and interesting tactics opened up by the wild abilities available to each class can
create some genuinely madcap, enjoyable deathmatches, and the multiple classes which can fly
generate tense aerial duels high above the larger battle.

Casting with class

It doesnt have exactly the same depth as Chivlary, but still requires a high degree of skill and
predictive ability to get good at it.

My personal favorite class is the Entropist. He can glide around on a flying carpet for a limited
time, and his main cooldown ability is a healing grenade, making him one of the only classes that
can restore his and his teammates health. This in itself is a big break from the Chivalry formula,
and allowed me to play as something resembling a highly mobile MMO healing class. Abilities
like these encourage teamwork in a way that feels natural and synergistic, whereas a lot of melee
team deathmatch games can get to feeling like everyone-for-themselves skirmishes.

Not all classes are as well designed, though. The nimble, low-health Tinker, for instance, I found
far less impressive. She can lay various traps for opponents, but they have such a small radius,
and so many of the maps lack meaningful choke points, that I never felt like I got my moneys
worth with her. I was usually relegated to making the most of her nimble rapier strikes and
hoping to out-damage melee classes with a lot more health than me. Some abilities that seemed
less useful in deathmatch could potentially shine in a mode like Capture the Flag where static
defense matters more. But certain modes are nearly impossible to find a group for at all unless
you bring a lot of friends.
While youre looking for a group, at least youll have time to enjoy the well-designed characters
and environments. Each class has a very distinct silhouette and visual style, with unlockable
costume pieces and color schemes allowing you to add your own visual flair. Its all very Arabian
Nights, with polished tile floors and intricate archwaysa significant departure from the muddy,
realistic world of Chivalry. The maps themselves are also cleverly designed, diverse, and have a
good flow to them when the server population is sufficient to really get some carnage going
with the exception, as I mentioned before, that not all of them have meaningful choke points able
to take advantage of certain class abilities.

The up-close bashing and slashing is very enjoyable, especially in a one-on-one context. It
doesnt have exactly the same depth as Chivlary, but still requires a high degree of skill and
predictive ability to get good at it. Attack and parry timings, using feints, and precision aiming of
spears and heavy sticks are all significant factors. Each weapon also has three attack typesa
long-ranged but weaker jab, a powerful overhead chop (which deals friendly fire by default to
cut down on spamming in crowded team fights), and a standard slash thats somewhere between
the two. The main issue I ran into was, again, due to the low player population. I was often
forced to play on high ping servers just to get into a match, and Mirages emphasis on distance
and timing doesn't lend itself to a 240 ms delay.

The ranged combat, by contrast, is very underwhelming. Even limited-use specials like the
Entropists Disintegrate beam pack all of the visual and auditory punch of a party popper, with
damage scaling to match. Unloading from afar never feels like anything more than dealing bee
stings to an embattled enemy who will have to be finished off up-close anyway. Add to this the
fact that missileseven specialscan be blocked just like melee swings, and I usually found
myself wondering why ranged attacked are in the game at all.

Welcome to the Thunderdome

Some entire modes are almost dead in the water, because you cant find a populated server to
play them on.

Arena is the best of the modes, forcing small teams to face off in enclosed, intimate, fighting
game-esque battlefields with nowhere to run. Matches put the emphasis on tightly-packed,
technical duels and using the various class-specific movement abilities to escape from sticky
situations and be exactly where your opponents dont expect. Theres also a stock standard Team
Deathmatch, an objective-based mode thats a hybrid between capture point and payload escort,
and Capture the Flag. These traditional shooter modes can be fun, especially with a team that
knows how to use all the various class roles in tandem. But I had the most fun playing Arena and
thinking of it as more of a fighting game with 3D movement.
Mirage is made up of entertaining and well-designed systems, some asymmetry in usefulness
between various classes aside. But as a multiplayer-only game, its impossible not to bring up the
astoundingly tiny player base (again). It affects every layer of the experience, from ping, to how
entire modes are almost dead in the water, because you cant find a populated server to play them
on. This makes Mirage tricky to recommend at the moment, as much as Id be glad to see its
active users swell and have more people to blast and bash around.

But Mirage is fundamentally fun. When the right factors align, its a lot of fun. The melee
combat keeps me on my toes, trying to think as many steps ahead of my opponent as I can, all
while staying poised to adapt to the changing battlefield conditions that fireballs and magitech
land mines can bring. Each class offers unique and interesting tactical opportunities, even if
theyre not all equally interesting. Its a shame that I can only really recommend it so long as
everyone takes my recommendation.