Heavy Hitter: Orcs Must Die! Unchained Welcomes Queen Bionka as Playable Hero
Update introduces two new maps as well as guilds and rating system
Karlsruhe, 7/13/2016 – Developers Robot Entertainment are integrating numerous new features in patch 1.3 of team action tower defence game Orcs Must Die! Unchained. Mighty yet also a little cumbersome, orc queen Bionka joins the fracas in order to hold a protective hand over the minions. Fans of earlier entries in the series will also be excited to see the return of the classic survival battleground ‘The Baths’ as well as the new ‘Throne Room’ map. At the end of successful survival battles, a 5 star rating system now promotes ambitions for highscore hunters, whilst like-minded players can now organize themselves in guilds at will and head out together on the orc hunt.
A visual impression of patch 1.3 and Bionka’s abilities can be found here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PWc98pKhIlk. The full list of all improvements is available in the patch notes: http://en.omd.gameforge.com/revolution.html.
A heart for minions
Unlike her son, Bloodspike, Bionka does not profit from the suffering of her minions, in fact, the opposite is true: She sacrifices her health to protect her minions. Her ability ‘Sing An March’ is one such example of this, where damage done to minions in a set radius around her is reduced. Should a minion die however, the damage is also transferred to Bionka. The orc monarch also regenerates her health faster the more of her own minions surround her.
The new guild feature improves bonds too: From now on players will be able to organize in guilds, to work together towards shared goals within the game and to play for points within the guild ranking leaderboard, which offers exclusive rewards for the top spots at the end of each season.
An overview of the key features coming in patch 1.3:
+ New hero: Orc Queen Bionka
+ Guild feature
+ Two new maps: ‘The Baths’ and ‘Throne Room’
+ 5 stars rating system added to survival mode
About Orcs Must Die! Unchained
Orcs Must Die! Unchained takes the award-winning Orcs Must Die! action tower defence gameplay to a whole new level with team-based gameplay! But don’t get cocky, because the stakes are higher, the traps are bloodier, and the invaders are even more ravenous. You’ll need to bring your A-game and a few of the biggest orc-haters you can find! Orcs Must Die! Unchained is set in the familiar world of its hilarious fantasy predecessors, years after the finale of Orcs Must Die! 2. With the discovery of dozens of new rifts and worlds beyond them, heroes have come from far and wide to wage all-out war for control of these magical gateways. In the years since Orcs Must Die! 2, the War Mage and Sorceress have done their best to rebuild the once-mighty Order. Their new enemy, the Unchained, is no longer the mindless horde defeated twice before, but instead an organized army led by its own powerful heroes. Orcs Must Die! Unchained is available as a free download for PC. More details available at http://omd.gameforge.com/.
About Gameforge
With more than 20 titles and over 450 million registered players, Gameforge is the leading provider of free-to-play massively multiplayer online games (MMOs) in the western hemisphere. Headquartered in Karlsruhe, Germany, the group offers its online games in more than 75 countries and employs 450 members of staff. The portfolio encompasses numerous well-known game industry brands, including client-based titles such as Orcs Must Die! Unchained, HEX: Shards of Fate, prized role-playing game AION Free-to-Play and TERA as well as Europe’s most successful MMO, Metin2. In future, competitive RTS Dropzone and action-laden Anime MMORPG SoulWorker will add to the collection. Popular browser-based games such as OGame and Ikariam as well as a growing portfolio of mobile games complete their offering. For more information please visit http://corporate.gameforge.com/.
That being said, there is a lot on offer here as far as the story is concerned. You see while the main storyline for the guild does follow this path that challenges those trying to revive the once great empire, players will eventually be able to unlock the ability to explore individual storylines for each of the four warring nations and pledge their loyalty to them. This means that there is a lot of content here for players to dive into, though don’t expect anything complex.
When not at the hub where they can recruit forces, purchase equipment, and take care of various other basic functions players will be spending the majority of their time out in the field fighting enemies. The field map in Grand Kingdom is designed to be something of a board-game where the player’s unit and enemy units are similar to chess pieces that must be moved along paths. Players must move their piece one spot at a time and occasionally they can find items, treasure chests, fall into traps, or uncover hidden paths that allow them to skip past an area or sacrifice turns in an effort to take a shortcut. For almost every basic mission that isn’t simply exploration, players will be given a limited number of turns to complete an objective so whether to avoid fights and take a shortcut or simply powering through is a choice that appears fairly often.
Thanks to the seventeen classes available to the player over the course of the game, players can craft a squad that fits their play style perfectly or can change things up if a certain mission isn’t working out well for their initial set up as every class plays differently and has unique skills that may help in combat. Each of these classes can be broken down into four types, melee (where the most variety can be found), ranged, magic, and specialty units. These specialty units fit special niches such as being able to heal allies, place obstacles or platforms, and even bring a dominant force into combat at the cost of taking up the place of two units.
This is especially true with some classes that have skills that can target separate aisles that may accidentally strike one of your units or accidentally healing an enemy while also trying to heal your frontline solider with a health potion since some strike zones are poorly displayed. In fact some occasions might even call for striking your own team mate once to cause separation and then deal more damage to the enemy afterwards. The enemy is also affected by this and can attack their own units so this is something of a double edged sword that will keep players constantly keeping an eye on who will be acting next in an effort to take advantage of the battlefield layout and take out the enemy without damaging their own team.
NIS America has released this game with their own well-handled English dub and have also included the Japanese voice track for those who prefer that route. As far as the soundtrack is concerned, Grand Kingdom sports a satisfying array of tracks that fit well during battle sequences as well as a wide array of background music that plays while simply exploring the menus at the Guild base.
