Gloria Victis Review

[Michael {United Critics}]

Categories	Rating	Explanation
Gameplay 🎮	9	Amazing range of PvP and PvE activities to engage in daily.
Visuals 🎬	8	As a personal preference I play it on low settings for higher FPS, but on ultra it looks quite sharp.
Sound/Music/Voice 🎼	9	Takes me back to The Witcher and thats some nostalgia I can appreciate.
Replayability 🎡	9	Absolutely, this open world is massive and has a huge skill ceiling to obtain. There is never a dull moment in the universe
Price 💰	10	At $20 this is an absolute steal, for the amount of content you receive, not to mention the developers release updates every week.

💬Introduction

I almost didn’t pick this up on my radar until a friend suggested it to me, I was never one of the people who caught onto the hype train of For Honor, Kingdom Come Deliverance, or Mordhau. So directional combat and terms such as chambering were all quite new to me, but I’ve put in a considerable amount of hours into Gloria Victis and thought this might be a good time to put my experience on paper (metaphorically).

Have you ever had the desire to be dropped into the medieval time period to learn how to fend for yourself, expand your knowledge into multiple different crafting proficiencies and become a true “jack of all trades”, or be involved in the great struggle for domination alongside your nation and fellow brethren of your own guild or an already established one? Well, that’s exactly how Black Eye Games intends to scratch that itch for you.

Make way for Gloria Victis, a realistic medieval MMO that is absolutely packed to the brim with content that will keep you busy for HOURS, and it’s astonishing that a small indie developer can come up with this many ideas and game mechanics. This truly is an example of a Labor of Love.

🎮Gameplay

Gloria Victis is not shy of content, in the beginning, it feels as if they funnel you down a small corridor with quest after quest but this is all in preparation to send you out into the largely undiscovered, and somewhat treacherous territories. The first decision you will make is deciding which nation you want to be a part of, as this is the base building block along your journey of domination whilst you fight for stronghold points across the map. I won’t go into detail about these different nations as there really isn’t much to differentiate one from the other. Or just be like me and join Sangmar 😛.

Once you’ve completed the “rather long” tutorial into the game, and its mechanics, the world is yours to explore, but don’t be so hasty because most things out in the world is about ten times stronger than you (including other players, whose proficiency is much higher than yours), rather use your time to practice the directional combat aspect before you start charging headfirst into battle otherwise you’ll learn this lesson the hard way, as I did.

Once you’ve got a basic grasp on directional combat, it might be a good idea to join a guild as these guys are higher levels and will teach you numerous techniques as well as build ideas for your character. Another important choice would be what style of combat you’d prefer, whether it be a one-handed, two-handed, ranged, or maybe you just want to swing an ax around Viking style (entirely up to you) but make sure this coincides with your build, otherwise, you’ll end up spending skill points on the wrong things.

Now that you are a part of a guild (or not, entirely up to you), you might want to partake in some of the event types that will happen daily in the GV world. Events are a great way to earn XP, practice your combat and also snag some valuable crafting resources so that you can craft some high-tier gear (I’ll go into more detail on crafting further on). Events can basically be split into two categories. Real-world and Regular. Real-world events are basically just going to a fixed location and defeating the AI enemies as well as the big boss right at the end. Besides the AI enemies who are a challenge already, Real-world events can be joined by all nations so this can turn into PvP very quickly. Remember, Real-world events are lootable areas so the opposing nations can take some of your good gear, leaving you at a disadvantage the next time you find yourself in a conflict.

Regular events are Valley of Death / Open State of War / Deadly Harvest they are all basically just a massive PvP free for all, all the nations will join, and it's just a battlefield of slaughter. Don’t get despondent if you die continuously because it’s all part of the journey and remember that you are not on your own, there are other green-leafs among you who are also learning the ropes. This is why I believe the best course of action is to join a guild, as well as their discord so you can team voice chat during VOD, you will coordinate movements much better.

Apart from VOD / OSW / DH and Real-world events, from time to time you will receive notifications of events happening on the map, it might be that a guild in your nation has waged war on a specific stronghold of the opposing nations and they are looking for support, which you are then given the choice whether you'd like to participate or not. Or you might even find yourself on the opposite end of that spectrum, whereby you need to fend off invaders from capturing your nation’s stronghold points. (I spent a full 8 hour day doing this). Remember, GV is a team effort game and it’s best for you to always be involved in these events to allow your nation the chance of becoming the dominant one.

The most important events but probably the toughest would have to be the Deadly Harvest and Open State of War, which is basically just an onslaught. Every nation is attacking each other for a specific amount of time, and points are awarded for every point you capture. This goes on for a long period of time, so like I've said before GV is not for the faint-hearted, it is a commitment.
Events available look like this -> https://gyazo.com/de920ce971e6296164bb6b38ed6ece92



⌛Crafting

There is a large amount of importance to becoming proficient in not only sword-wielding combat but also different areas of crafting. Your guild may assign you the task of becoming the designated Weapon Forger, Armorsmith or if you’re a Medic you may even need to be assigned to Cooking and Herbalism to be able to craft healing items, buffs, and even meals to satiate their hunger after a long and tiresome battle.

Crafting categories can be broken down into the following: Forestry and Farming, Cooking and Herbalism, Tailoring and Leatherworking, Engineering, Armoursmithing, Weapon Forging, and Artificing.

Different crafting categories can be seen here ->https://gyazo.com/f7237f7e9828c82985ba8598d184ed9a

Most crafting can be done on the fly, the disadvantage to this is the amount you receive from crafting it directly from your inventory in comparison to the amount you get for crafting it at specific crafting workstations, You will receive significantly more when crafting from a specific crafting station.

Each of these categories has a plethora of crafting choices, some a bit more advanced than others and will require a bit of an investment into GV before you can start crafting them. The best thing for you to do is to try and become most proficient in the ones that are focused on survival, such as Forestry and Farming, Armorsmithing, and Weapon Forging. If you plan to max out a proficiency, understand that it is an arduous journey.

If you want to find out more about the various recipes you can come across in GV, you can find them here -> https://gloriavictis.fandom.com/wiki/Recipes


👦💪Character Development Trees

The one detail I can appreciate about GV is that nothing comes easy, and more specifically I'm referring to the character development trees. So now, you are probably thinking to yourself "Well, how does the weapon system or armor system work?". In the character development tree tab, you will see Weapons, Armor, Smelting and Roasting, Fishing, Archeology, and Disassembling. It all works on an upgrade node system, so if you use common weapons, armor, or items(white) in battle and quests or just in the open world, you will start upgrading your proficiency which will then allow you to use uncommon weapons and armor (green), and this will carry on all the way up until you reach the legendary tier (orange). Every time you improve to a higher tier, you will also receive modifiers for each of these different skills.

For Fishing, you will start with a basic Fishing Rod with just a bread ball as bait, but the more time you spend fishing, the higher your proficiency becomes and will then allow you to use fishing rods with higher durability as well as different kinds of bait such as shrimps and worms which allows you to catch rarer and more useful fish.

Smelting and Roasting will help you in two ways, firstly you will begin with the ability to only use campfires and this will allow you to craft charcoal as well as quicklime. As you increase your skill in R&S, you will then be able to use a Bloomery, a Furnace, and lastly a Mettalurgic Furnace. Each of these new additions will allow you to craft crucial elements for superior weapons and armor. Steel Bars, Dwizer Bars, and Bulat bars to be specific. These are all building blocks of certain tier weaponry/armor and items.

Archeology is also useful as it allows you to excavate in certain areas, every time you complete an excavation cycle you will be rewarded with items of rarity based on your skill level in the Archeology character development tree. As you increase this level it will also allow you to use shovels of higher durability as well as the ability to interact with certain treasure maps you will find in the world or even the ones you dig up. You can only dig up the treasure for the same tier level as your archeology skill.

And lastly, Disassembling allows you to break down items for their basic crafting resources, this can be useful if you have duplicate items as well as if you have no storage left, or even if you just want to sell some valuable items in the marketplace. Every time you increase your disassembling skill, you will receive a modifier to increase the percentage of the amount of scrap you will receive from said disassembled item. Just like the above, every time you increase this skill, you'll also be able to break down items of different rarities.

An example of the character development trees -> https://gyazo.com/2742599b09cbf762506db72bf2d91f94

As I'm sure you can tell, it will take a long time to max out each character development tree.

💪💫Attrributes/Abilities

Of course, only the strongest of the strong survive in the world of Gloria Victis, that's why it is important to put your attribute points into the right areas corresponding to your build. You have 3 attribute areas, Strength, Dexterity, and Constitution. Strength increases base damage, stamina, and stamina regeneration as well as slashing damage reduction. Dexterity increases damage dealt with Bows, Knives and Swords, increases headshot and backstab damage, increases piercing damage reduction, and also stamina regeneration. Constitution increases health and health regeneration, stamina, and stamina regeneration and also increases bludgeoning damage reduction. So, from what you can already see from some of these attributes, some would be more important to certain builds than others. A medic would benefit from higher Constitution, an archer would benefit from higher Dexterity and a tank build would benefit from higher strength than it would from Dexterity for example. It’s all about finding the sweet spot, if you join a guild they will actually give you values to set into each of these attributes so your chosen build will be at peak performance.

Attributes look like this -> https://gyazo.com/18be860e0e53842f22b7c6a4f3f933a2

Abilities are basically just more modifiers to spec into your build, and just like attributes if you have a specific build in mind, it is a good idea to place your ability points into the right abilities otherwise you'll be wasting ability points. There are too many to mention so I'll just use a screenshot to demonstrate a build idea, which is the current build I am using.

Abilities tree -> https://gyazo.com/d9c39ef78d4a386615ea2605745e6e03

The two areas that are completely untouched are basically the medic abilities as well as mount improvements. Since I am using a tank build which is 2 handed combat, these two ability trees do not improve my current build. Mounts can also be upgraded at stables to have higher HP as well as higher stamina. So there is no reason for me to spec in to mount.

⚔😤v😤Combat & PvE/PvP

As I've briefly touched on combat in an earlier section, This combat system will take some time to get used to. It is not like most games where it’s just balanced from the get-go, you will need to work hard to improve your combat efficiency. As daunting as it seems at times, the best way to do this is to join every single event that pops up whether it be PvE or PvP. You have to lose a lot in order to win in the long run, that’s just the nature of this game.

Another way you can do this is by going out into the more PvE aspects of the world, the map in GV is quite big (https://gyazo.com/c499cab8cb1fcde41549e2f07338e70d) and you will come across plenty of AI opponents that will make for good XP farming, but also be wary into which territories you are venturing into since once you leave your nations stronghold it is no longer a safe zone and you will be subject to looting by higher level players.

A rule of thumb is to always wear armor that you don't mind losing during Lootable events like real-world events and to wear your best gear during Valley of Death PvP since it’s not lootable. When capturing enemy points, there is a timer for a specific amount of time that is non-lootable, so you can wear your best gear for this, but just make sure you don't spend more time than needed in these areas, otherwise, you can incur a great loss.

Directional combat and its strategies can take some time to get used to, just move at your own pace and also maybe change your keybinds since moving the mouse around to block from different angles can be quite challenging as you won't really have a great FOV for your enemies next attack or if you are being pressed by multiple enemies at the same time.


🎬Visuals

This is where it gets a bit iffy for me because GV is a fast-paced game especially during combat sequences so ultimately you want to try and retain as much FPS as possible. Personally, I play it on the lowest settings for the reason I specified above. I have actually pushed it to about medium to high and the game does look great for an indie development studio, but for me, the focus in the game is not about how great it looks, it’s more about how diverse the open world is with its multitude of events. challenges, crafting proficiencies, and more.

it can be a bit choppy at some points, if you are moving into a new area that needs to be rendered or during combat sequences, you may experience some FPS drops and some lag.

I guess my one pet peeve would be the way your character summons his mount, for some reason it reminds me of the fire Jutsu from Naruto and it kind of breaks immersion. ->
https://gyazo.com/c69c36312ca8c94c3839d266476ec80b

Graphics options -> https://gyazo.com/623838a64685b57f856c4facec593351

For reference, graphics on the highest setting (without bloom and lens flare) -> https://gyazo.com/a0a0ccd508ae102ce0ca90899bd8b3fb


🎵Sound/Music/Voice

If you are a fan of the Witcher (let’s be honest, who isn't?), you’ll probably notice the login screens backing track sounds very Witcher-esque, and that’s because they used the same composer. The sound and music used in the game really just put you into the atmosphere better than I've seen it done from developers that aren't indie studios. Honestly, these guys do immersion through sound so well. Normally I put music on when I'm doing playthroughs for reviews, but not with GV. I wanted to experience the whole palette.

📃Pros and Cons

Pros

● Engaging combat mechanics
● Interesting crafting proficiencies
● Thorough character development trees
● A rewarding PvE and PvP system
● It’s a life away from your real life (WoW vibes)
● Great soundtrack and immersive atmosphere created with sound as well

Cons

❖ Can present you with FPS drops at times of high activity or new areas rendering


☁Final Thoughts

My honest opinion is that I absolutely loved my time playing GV, even though I feel like I only revealed the tip of the iceberg of the game in this review because honestly, Gloria Victis is an experience you need to unravel for yourself. I will probably play this for months and years to come. With its vibrant open world, its competitive directional combat, and its multitude of crafting proficiencies as well as character development trees. There is never a lack of anything to do in its universe. And I think that is an amazing selling point and a reason why I highly recommend it.

Rating: 9/10

Reviewed by: Hollow & Michael
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