Where WWII and the related topics of fascism, genocide,
and atomic warfare get far more media these days, WWI may have been, in fact,
the grittier, dirtier war. With the Age
of Industry burgeoning, the relatively high-tech weapons deployed in WWII,
particularly air weapons, were still a dream in WWI as trench warfare, running
lines of soldiers into lines of soldiers, and brute force armaments were the
norm. Battles with thousands upon
thousands of casualties were not uncommon, most the victim of bullets or
bayonets from ground-level firefights.
The majority of WWI occurring on European soil (a continent whose
cultures are so close in comparison to the global scene yet possessing
centuries of history both peaceful and aggressive), the thin red line never
meant so much. Using these circumstances
as a platform, Ubisoft developed Valiant
Hearts: The Great War in 2014. Possessing
a unique, hand-drawn art style, it is a puzzle/action game highlighting the
human side of war.
A streamlined run through a couple of major WWI events,
in Valiant Hearts players will take
on the role of one of four (and a half) characters. Depending on the scene or setting, there is the
Frenchman Emile, his German son-in-law Karl, an American soldier named Freddie,
a Belgian nurse Anna (and an unnamed dog Emile finds that players can control
to some degree—the half). Karl called
into war by the German side which subsequently pulls him away from Emile and
his daughter, the two men spend a good portion of the game trying to reunite
the family. Freddie a gung-ho sapper-type
soldier, he befriends Emile in the early going, and together the two escape and
must find their way through many difficult situations. And lastly Anna, a young woman whose
scientist father has been kidnapped by the Germans and put to work building
advanced weapons, seeks to help the injured she encounters, as well as rescue
her father. The four’s stories,
sometimes individual and sometimes intertwined, form threads in the overall mini-tapestry
that is Valiant Hearts.
Winning a Games for Change award, Valiant Hearts is set in war but the violence and fighting, though natural
aspects of the game, are pushed to a side position in favor of the human side
of mass conflict. For players who are
interested, short descriptions on the various details of WWI are available in
the menus, not to mention numerous collectibles are littered around the game
which have their own historically accurate write-ups. Amid scattered action pieces, it’s puzzle
solving that takes the lion’s share of gameplay. Whether it be locating a missing car part to
drive to a certain city or figuring out which levers open which doors on a
machine that will aid escape, players’ lateral thinking skills are needed. Breaking up the puzzles are said action
scenes as well as rhythm movement and quicktime events, all of which test reactions
and finger dexterity. Anna, for example,
when using her nursing abilities to save people, must push certain button
combos in rhythm with the wounded person’s pulse. The overall mix of these elements—puzzle solving to action scenes to dexterity—make for more varied
gameplay than one might imagine of such a relatively small title.
If there are any complaints about the game, they would
be detail oriented. A handful of the
puzzles require a degree of accuracy that the overall loose feel of the game
and size of the objects and things used in the puzzle does not fit. For example, one puzzle requires the player
to throw a stick of dynamite through a moving bit of fire. I attempted this numerous, numerous times as
well as exhausted all the other possible tactics, but nothing seemed to
work. So I looked online, and sure
enough I needed to throw the stick of dynamite through the fire. I repeated the action many more times until I
found the miniscule sweet spot in the fire and could take the next step in
solving the puzzle. Were this an
isolated incident, I could chalk it up to the inevitable. But that a few of the other puzzles likewise
hinge on such a minor technical detail was occasionally frustrating.
One thing I cannot complain about is the art. A type of comic book art animated in almost
stop-motion fashion, its pastel colors are consistently delivered, enhancing
the overall game. Valiant Hearts could have been a lot of things, but the hand-drawn art
style makes it a better game, plain and simple.
In the end, Valiant
Hearts is a stylish puzzler heavy with the portent of WWI and the
atrocities of war. In some ways the
opposite of titles like Call of Duty
or World of Tanks, titles which to
some degree glorify war, Valiant Hearts
tells the human side of armed conflict via comic book styled brainteasers and
real-time action events. (Looking at the
art and design, one might be inclined to describe the game as ‘cute’, but
looking closer at the content and collectibles, such descriptions fade.) In terms of indie/small games, it’s a real
winner.
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