Creed Arena is an indie game that tries to be a retail game, and actually does a good job of it. The game may not look polished in certain places, and suffer from a number of small errors, but it does manage to capture what multiplayer gaming is all about.
It has that old-school feel that reminds me of my early days on Goldeneye and Red Faction. Sure, the genre has come on leaps and bounds since then but the core mechanics are the same. Capturing the fundamentals of good multiplayer gaming is something that even the high financed games have often failed to do. You want something that is easy to pick-up and fun enough to make you play more.
The story is a bit basic but it does try to be bigger than it is. Ultimately, it’s a gladiatorial arena game, where you have to fight your way up the leaderboards to become the best. But they do hint at something deeper by adding a voice-over at the start, explaining that you have to become the best to overthrow this oppressive, corrupt government.
While fighting your way to the top you will experience a variety of different game modes and an impressive range of well designed maps; standard deathmatch to a hoard like mode, and even a capture the flag variant. What is most impressive about this is the range of game types; the games are often fought with an AI team-mate, competing against one or two teams of up to 3 players; there are even different weapon specific deathmatch modes.
The maps may not look amazing but the majority of them are well constructed with different layouts giving the player plenty of options. The levels include teleporters, grav-jumps, raised walkways and a lift, very impressive for an indie game. The weapons spawn at different locations, often in hard to reach spots, but the payoff is worth it, especially when you get your hands on the rocket launcher.
Controls are simple and easy to use, with RT to shoot and LT to jump. Press RB to switch between a top down view and first person view, the latter being the best option. But again, having the choice is something that most indie games won’t give you. The jumping mechanic feels somewhat similar to Halo, infact, a lot of the game feels like Halo, which is far from a bad thing.
The actual mechanics of the combat has some interesting elements; with the penultimate goal being the gaining of fans. You obviously gain fans by winning games, but you get bonus fans for big hits, long shots, rapid kill succession, and melee attacks – and you lose fans for team killing and dying. When you get high points you enter crowd rage, becoming bigger, faster, stronger and more agile, leaping around the map shooting down everything that moves. The crowd noise adds a lot to the game, from the countdown chant as you await the doors opening, to the whoops and cheers as you smack a dinosaur in the face.
There are some issues that need some work, such as enemies spawning on top of you, a lack of weight in the weapons, AI team-mates running into walls or shooting you in the back with rockets. But what they have managed to do is create a really fun, simplistic shooter with lots of options to draw you back in. You can even do the entire campaign split screen or take it online, where sadly I could not find a game. If you like your shooters fun and frantic then go buy Creed Arena, it’s a great blast from the past.
VideogameUK verdict: 8/10
