Hammerfight: Sleeper hit?

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kelbear

[H]ard|Gawd
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Jun 22, 2005
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This game is fantastic and I haven't heard about it anywhere. The 5-day steam sales gave me a taste for cheap games so browsed around to see what else I'd been missing out on.

Found this strange little medieval/steam-punk game:

Hammerfight ($9.99):
http://store.steampowered.com/app/41100/
I had no idea what the hell I was looking at in the screenshots, so don't feel bad if you don't understand yourself. Grab the demo and you'll understand.

You control a flying box with your mouse. Attached to this box, are medieval weaponry, like swords, axes, shields, and morningstars. Through the use of physics, when you move the box with your mouse, it swings the weapons attached to it. This tight interaction give a great sense of feedback when you whirl a morningstar around and slamming into the opponent's face, flinging them back and slamming them into the cliffside and stunning them. The power of your swing is dependent on your skill since the damage is calculated using physics. (It's not really the same, but I got the same feel as that old game Die by the Sword, don't know if any of you have even heard of it)

There's additional items you can pick up and use as you play, like throwing stars, spears, bombs, acid etc. Gems you can socket into the various weapons you purchase in the stores. Shields that defend against blows (until they shatter from repeated impact).

  • [*]Plot:     There's a pretty decent story wrapped around this culture. The exposition is that people known as "riders" are able to control these flying craft and have become the knights in these flying societies. A flying medieval culture is a pretty interesting concept, they even tamed flying worms for use as blimps to get around.
  • Graphics: It seems that they've hand-drawn all the graphics, it looks fantastic, especially with the additional effects layered over it, but this also means that they don't scale well. Doesn't matter once you're playing in full-screen. Try the demo and see them in motion. All those little bits and pieces of the flying machines and animals can be slashed and smashed to bits, turning them in flying debris. Destructible terrain too, I smashed a pillar down in the arena and it crushed a couple of spectators.
  • Sound: Interesting mediterranean/middle-eastern theme going on here. Sets a good atmosphere for the game.

  • [*]Modes:     Story, Arena, and a 4-player multiplayer by connecting additional mice to your computer. Haven't seen many PC games where multiple people can play from the same location.

Is it just me, or is Hammerfight a really /stupid/ name? Sounds casual and campy, which really doesn't fit this game at all. Original name was Hammerfall, which sounds much better in my opinion.
 
yeah those screens really do suck, I would have had no idea wtf I was looking at if I didn't read your explaination. looks interesting, kind of like new school phsysics/effects mixed with old school graphics.
 
Hammerfall is the name of a power metal band \m/. My guess is that they wanted to avoid confusion.
 
Got a bit deeper into the game. Now there's shotguns, automatics, and cannons, you can pick two weapons to dual wield at any time.

Powerful hits shake the screen and send you into a power-swing mode. Powerful hits on their weapon can shatter them or rip them away for you to take for yourself.

You can socket the weapons with gems that add additional effects, like igniting the enemies and environment upon contact. Also found another game-mode called hammerball, where you compete to slam a ball into the opponent's goal using your mallet.

Also found out that this is all made by /one/ guy. Art, music, story, programming, sheesh.
 
I went ahead and bought this after reading your post.

My initial thoughts were, "Pfft, this isn't anything special.", after playing for about 30mins or so. I turned the game off never expecting to play it again but something made me go back and give it a second chance. I am really glad I did because when you get into the meat of this game it f'n rocks! Best $9.99 I have spent in a loooong time.

I played for a good 3 hours last night after completing the campaign mode. There are several other game modes that unlock during your game time. Hammerball, Grim and Arena. So far I havent played much Hammerball but Grim and Arena are brilliant!

In Grim, you go on hunts, killing creatures to aquire "singing stones" to power up your socketed weapons. Typically I use a blade and a hammer in this mode and I have really gotten the hang of controlling my attacks. Essentially, you go through 3 waves of creatures then you go up against a boss creature that will drop coins and "singing stones". Grim could do with more mission variety. You just replay the same mission over and over, but it's still fun.

In Arena, you go up against other machines that have the same capabilities and weaponary available to you. I was getting my ass totally handed to me using the blade and hammer weapon set I use in Grim so I decided a change of tactics were in order. Now I am a chain mace wielding harbinger of death! Dual wielding a couple of similar weighted maces and smashing them into the face of your enemies is a hugely satisfying experience!

The game is fantastic, I couldn't have been more wrong with my initial impression. The only gripe I have with Hammerfight is that once your weapons have gems added, you cannot remove the gems and replace with another. Maybe you can just ditch the weapons and they will be replaced with unsocketed items at the "Hall" (your armory). Must try this when I get home :)
 
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When you drop an item outside the armory, it doesn't come back. You can just re-buy it, or just loot it from some guy in the arena.

I did my first playthrough with single-weapon and just killing everything in sight. For my second run I'm planning to win with honorable victories and avoid killing anyone. Adds a bit of difficulty since you have to control your swings more carefully. Uses a bit more precision too since the best way to get them is to slam the weapons out of their hands ("overkill" hits), then either knock or throw their weapon out of the arena.

I played using flails the first time around and it was a bit overpowered, and I couldn't really use the projectiles effectively because of the instability. Now I'm using the hammer of Dayrum (reward for completing Hammerball arena), it's heavy and rigid, making a nice stable platform to combo with the cannon. Makes a 1-2 attack with the smash followed by the blast.
 
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