World of Warships

http://worldofwarships.com/

So, this crossed my radar last week, and I've been watching pretty much every video I can possibly find. I am such a sucker for capital ship battles. I'd be playing the hell out of it, but it's still in closed beta.

It looks beautiful. Each ship is highly detailed, and they've gone into a fair bit of historical accuracy with their capabilities, armament, defenses, etc... The thing I like most is the integration of all four ship classes into a single game. The rock-paper-scissors mechanic is in play, which accurately represents how these engagements typically went.

Destroyers: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=En6TlMiSsBY

Very fast, light armor, light gunnery, and torpedoes. HEAVY torpedoes. They're stealthy (as much as these ships ever were), and they can pop smoke screens which are a decided defensive advantage. A destroyer can wreck a battleship, if played well. In the island-heavy maps, they're like ninjas. Heck, with their low detection radius, sometimes you'll see their torps before you see the boat. But, they're squishy. WAY squishy.

Cruisers: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UfxkFmMQ7i0

Jack-of-all-trades, depending on your nation, ship tier, and loadout. They can be destroyer-hunters, anti-aircraft, battleship hunters (big game, that), or anything in between. It's definitely the most diverse class.

Battleships: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YTC7vcoJWFo

The biggest of big boats with heavy armor, ridiculous firepower, and massive range. They'll blow just about anything out of the water with just a few shots. Only other battleships can withstand their firepower, and if you place your shots well, they won't hold up long.

Carriers: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zdIteppCI84

I'm impressed that these integrated so well. It's really easy to be OP with carrier designs. In fact, a lot of new players apparently complain (a LOT!) about carriers early on. Usually they're battleship players who have forgotten that all that firepower and armor is at a price. Slow ships are meat for a well-played carrier's torpedo bombers.

But, what impressed me most about the carriers was the gameplay. All the other ships play from 3rd person mode and zoom into gunnery mode for shooting. Carriers play like an RTS. You see the whole map, and direct your planes like RTS units. In the video it starts about 4 minutes in. About about 5:50 you can see the fighters engaging enemy fighters. And he sets up a torpedo run starting about 6:20. He's using automatic spreads, not manual. A good manual spread can put six into a battleship's side. In fact, here's a vid for that:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kMk_lLalrAg

Anyway, this game looks really cool. It's built along the World of Tanks/Warplanes monetization model (naturally, since it's all wargaming.net), and thus is free-to-play.

I'm really looking forward to it coming out of closed beta.

Zoombie said:

Maybe this is just me...but I'd be infinitely more interested if this was A) Set in space and B) set in the Warhammer 40,000 universe.

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Hey, Zoomers. Check it out:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XczNemDv7Cc

Dreadnought.

Very similar to WOWS. Still in alpha, but looks good, no?

cmhbob said:

Sigh. Another great-looking game that I won't be able to play due to being stuck with satellite internet.

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Possibly, but it's pretty forgiving on the lag. If you watch a few vids, you'll see what lag looks like. A ship moves, then stops, then moves, then stops. It would make leading more difficult, but not impossible.

Also, carriers aren't affected by lag nearly as much. Might make manual torp runs tricky, but wide spreads are your friend there.

Ahhh, data cap. Gotcha. Yeah, that's certainly a problem.

So, you can buy your way into the closed beta via pre-order. I'm generally against pre-ordering except when I know it's something I'm going to enjoy. After about 30 hours of YouTube watching, I was sure I was going to enjoy this. So, I bought in.

This is a hoot. It's a chess match with varying levels of strategy based on what you're playing, how you're fit, and how the battle evolves. It doesn't take long to figure out, either. There's depth and subtlety, but just about anyone can be useful off the bat. Of course, this isn't to say I haven't had fights where I'm playing a destroyer and happen to run right down a channel filled with enemy torps, but bad luck happens. I've also had games where my carrier swept the skies of enemy craft, bombed down three boats, and set two others on fire. I do love being an MVP sometimes.

In fact, with the recent release of the Japanese carriers and the American Battleships, everyone is up in the big boats right now. Things is, the IJN carriers focus mostly on bombers and torp bombers. They're light on fighters. US carriers tend to have more and better fighters. And, since the IJN carriers are brand new, the queues are clogged with them. So, being a bastard, and having a Tier V USS Bogue available, I tricked her out to have fighters with ridiculous survivability and lethality. Got 40 aircraft kills in one mission alone. It was to the point where I could intercept the enemy torp bomber squadrons before they could even deploy. In one particular mission, I shot down two incoming squadrons, and the opponent asked 'Do you have the upgraded fighters?' I said 'Yep. All upgrades.' He said: "We're Fucked." Bwahaha!

Anyway, suffice to say, this is a pretty good time. You'll encounter the usual frustrations with matchmaking pvp games, like with people having no idea what they're doing or other derpy moments like when a friendly destroyer torpedoes your battleship, but generally it's a solid game. Very entertaining.