Welcome to our preview of the Closed Beta of the MOBA game Arena of Valor for Nintendo Switch!
Arena of Valor was originally developed for iOS and Android, and was released in 2015 for both mobile systems. Developed by Proxima Beta and published by Chinese internet giant Tencent, known for League of Legends and Player Unknown Battlegrounds Mobile. It made its way to the Switch with a closed beta, so keep in mind that this preview was written based on my experience with the closed beta – not the final product. The game is due to release in the winter of 2018.
History of the MOBA
Anyone who has ever played a MOBA game will feel right at home with Arena of Valor. For those who have no idea what I’m talking about.. here is a short explanation.
Multiplayer online battle arena (MOBA), also known as action real-time strategy (ARTS), is a subgenre of strategy video games that originated as a subgenre of real-time strategy, in which a player controls a single character in a team who compete versus another team of players. The objective is to destroy the opposing team’s main structure with the assistance of periodically spawned computer-controlled units that march forward along set paths. Player characters typically have various abilities and advantages that improve over the course of a game and that contribute to a team’s overall strategy. MOBA games are a fusion of action games, role-playing games and real-time strategy games, in which players usually do not construct either buildings or units.
The genre was born when a custom map of the original Starcraft game was made. It was a map where four players each controlling a single powerful unit and aided by weak computer-controlled units were put against a stronger computer. Later, and much more known, was the mod of the Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos – The Frozen Throne, known as Defense of the Ancients, or DotA, which became one of the most popular MOBA games, being only succeeded by League of Legends and of course its own successor DotA II. Other games in the genre are Heroes of the Storm by Blizzard and Smite by Hi-Rez studios.
Arena of Valor Gameplay
So how should we describe Arena of Valor (AoV) – basically as a mobile port of League of Legends (LoL). Riot Games was bought by Tencent in 2015 and has been pumping out heroes for League of Legends like crazy. On the side, they started developing the mobile game AoV to bring a ‘LoL-experience’ towards the portable scene. You can clearly see the ‘inspiration’ they have drawn from the original game, since most of the heroes in AoV are mash ups from LoL heroes. One of the starting heroes in the tutorial, Valhein, is a clear mashup between Twisted Fate, Sivir and a little bit of Ms.Fortune. Not that this is a bad thing of course, hence the saying – better a good copy than a bad original idea.
Once you look past the obvious overlap – the game is fun and quick – but can be problematic as well. The in-game chat system works slowly on the Switch, and would really need improvement to make good calls on how to set up the teams, which lanes, when to jungle/gank (visit someone else’s lane from jungle). This can tend to be a little frustrating when you have all picked warrior-like characters, but also need a support. No way to make this clear to the team. The touchscreen is also not used, which is a bummer. How nice would it be if you could ‘ping’ (place a marker on the map), with just a flick of the finger?
Once you have gained a few levels you unlock the arcanes (basically the runes from League), so you can tweak your heroes to benefit from some extra health or magic damage. This is where the game gets deep. You’ll need to focus on some sole heroes with the right arcanes to make your item builds synergies with your hero. Otherwise, you could be running a hero with magic damage on attack damage (so physical attacks) arcanes. In layman terms – trying to create magic with an axe. It won’t work. Since the game is still in Beta, there isn’t much room to tweak with the arcanes and you’ll get most of them at random, which makes the matches after unlocking them unfair. I had the same feeling again when playing League of Legends, way back, frustration and anger of the faults my teammates made – and my own builds that didn’t match up with the other players, since I didn’t want to put any money in the game.
Visuals of Arena of Valor
The game looks stunning on the Nintendo Switch. Heroes are detailed in both handheld and docked mode, but the game does suffer from the occasional frame drop in handheld mode. You will need a stable wi-fi connection to run the game, otherwise you’ll be kicked from the game and be penalized, so keep this in mind! I could use most of the heroes which Arena of Valor had to offer, due to lowered prices for the Beta. I have no idea how they will uphold once the game will fully launch, but we can expect the same price points as with League and Dota, which being the ‘ harder’ heroes to be more expensive.
Conclusion
If you are looking for a League of Legends game on the Nintendo Switch or any portable device besides your mobile phone, you should totally consider this game. The game is a good mixture of mobile MOBA’ing and the PC experience of League and Dota. Tencent has made some in-game shortcuts for buying items, calling to rally or defend the base, so you can spend more time looking for heroes to kill or towers to destroy. If you are easily angered by a loss or don’t want to spend a lot of money on a pay-to-win concept, most of these games are, stay away from Arena of Valor. Otherwise, you may have to buy a new Nintendo Switch .. you know, once you have thrown it across the room.
Tested on Nintendo Switch
