If you do not yet know the beauties of Blood Bowl, let us enlighten you. It is an American football match with slightly different rules, which emphasize the impact talent of the players as we say in rugby. Concretely, the objective of Blood Bowl is to succeed in scoring a touchdown like in the NFL by sending a player with the ball into the opposing in-goal. To do this, you will have to rely on your team, which is also made up roughly on the same model as the NFL teams. Basically, behind a line of linebackers who must repel the onslaught of the opponent, the objective is to succeed either in passing in force to go to the touchdown, or to pass a running back in a hole then to make a pass to him long above the fray. Once the theory is established, we move on to practice. In fact, the ball game is not very popular, and the main objective is to beat the face of as many players of the opposing team as possible so as not to bother with too much strategy. As you have already understood, Blood Bowl 2 is a very violent game in which the life expectancy of your players is counted in minutes. A board game originally created by Games Workshop using characters from the Warhammer Fantasy Battle universe, Blood Bowl has also been adapted into a video game three times. In 1995 (developed by Destiny Software and published by MicroLeague Interactive), then in 2009 when the license landed in the hands of the French Cyanide. Today, they are trying a second try with Blood Bowl 2, which is intended to be an improvement on the game released in 2009.
MURDER GAME
As in the real boardgame, we find a turn-by-turn strategy game with all the usual elements. The board is thus squared with 26 squares in its length and 15 in its width, and each match takes place in two halves which represent 8 rounds of play each. During a game turn, each of your players can carry out an action, whether it is a movement, a tackle, the collection of the ball or a pass. Each action has a percentage chance of success corresponding to the roll of the dice in real life, knowing that for tackles, the dice system is taken directly from the physical version of the game. Blood Bowl 2 offers a real strategic challenge since heaps rules apply, forcing the player to think several moves ahead like a game of chess. For example, if a player is pushed off the field, he will inevitably be killed by the supporters. Another example, if during your passage, you miss a crucial action, your turn will stop instantly to let the opponent play. Basically, this means that you have no room for error, knowing that any match can be the victim of random events such as an invasion of the pitch by fans (which leaves a number of unresponsive players on the field in both teams), or like a referee who has a grudge against you (he doesn't like you, or he was paid not to like you) and who breaks your players' legs between rounds. In short, Blood Bowl 2 remains faithful to its elder by offering hilarious and ultra-violent matches, where you have to choose the right balance between game strategy and gratuitous violence.
Blood Bowl 2 remains faithful to its elder by offering hilarious and ultra-violent matches, where you have to choose the right balance between game strategy and gratuitous violence.
With Blood Bowl 2, the developers of Cyanide have gone all out to make their game survive over time and it shows! The first thing that jumps out at you are the graphics that have now become drinkable, or even quite good; in complete contrast to the heaps of pixels from the previous episode. This graphic improvement, we find it everywhere, whether it's the board when giving orders to the players, or the cutscenes that illustrate each violent action. We thus revel in percussion with disarticulated limbs, or more simply ridiculous falls when we have made a player run a little too far. This graphic overhaul, we find it with the pair of official commentators from Cabal Vision (the official broadcaster) since the ogre Bob Bifford and the vampire Jim Johnson are now fully modeled in the menu, while we can enjoy their comments in VO or VF according to your preferences. The importance of these two characters has also been revised upwards since their presence also serves as a common thread for the narrative of the campaign mode, which has also been completely redesigned.
Blood Bowl 2 now features a brand new fully scripted single-player campaign, which will have you take over the struggling Reikland Reavers team, knowing that the objective is obviously to make them reach the heights thanks to your coaching skills. Very well done, this campaign is narrated by the duo of commentators who will take you from match to match to the heights of the discipline, knowing that many pitfalls will end up on your way such as more than doubtful sponsorship contracts, cabalcopter crashes (rendering part of the field unusable) or even mutations, betrayals and deaths in your squad of players. Long story short, Blood Bowl 2's campaign is simply one of the craziest we've seen in this genre of games and it's not just for veteran players since the first ten games you go to play are specially designed for novices. We start by teaching you the basics, and with each new match, new rules are added, until you play a real match like a grown-up, without realizing it.
DEMOLITION DERBY
The other great strength of Blood Bowl 2, which makes it possible to salt the campaign, lies in the much improved AI compared to the previous opus. From now on, the opponents will have damn effective reactions. We saw a team seize the ball and play for time with the ball carrier well hidden behind his linebackers while waiting for the end of the match. In terms of gameplay, we also notice that almost all players of all races can cover a much greater distance in one turn than was done previously, which contributes to making the game more violent, and more focused on contacts. Thus, players who are fans of Elves and their completely smoked passes from the first opus, may be disappointed when they realize that their favorite race is now much less effective since any Orc will be able to pick up your quarterback in order to taunt him. very violently. Moreover, since we are talking about races, know that there will only be one new basic race with the Bretonnian knights who join the initial roster. This team features Humans with valiant knights in the front line, while their serfs and other peasants take care of the rear. Why only one new breed? It's simple, to allow developers to fill the roster with DLC races and thus make ends meet. Let's hope all the same that the example of Evolve will make developers want to abuse this economic model.
Obviously, who says Blood Bowl also says parties with friends, and this aspect has obviously not been left out by the developers. Blood Bowl 2 therefore offers a very successful multiplayer mode which will allow you to create your team from A to Z by buying players at the market price during the Mercato, choosing a logo and a jersey, knowing that the customization even goes up to the ability to build and customize your home stadium. Some referees like to feel pampered with cozy nooks set up near the cheerleaders, and they may well reciprocate. At the level of the game, if you can always organize games of 2 players on the same computer, an online multiplayer is also present to face other Blood Bowl coaches. A very well-made and fully dynamic transfer window system is thus implemented to allow you to manage your team's workforce. Each player has a career and ages. When you recruit a young wolf with long teeth, the latter will be between 17 and 19 years old, knowing that he will take a year every 8 games. Around the age of 32, the chances that the player will retire are 60%, knowing that at 33, 100% of players retire. Management therefore becomes crucial. What to do ? Keep an old, very good player who requires a big salary to shine in a match? Or resell them in order to be able to finance the new generation. Since the transfer window connects all Blood Bowl players, the market is potentially huge, and you are going to need a lot of gold to be able to maintain your team. However, online multiplayer is not a panacea since a major problem remains: ragequitters. Indeed, many players you are playing against will leave the game as soon as they are about to take a Touchdown, or as soon as one of their players is injured. This allows them to invalidate the events of the match, and keep their beautiful game statistics intact, as well as their bank account. So much abused that Cyanide would have to establish a system so as not to harm the desire to play online... We are counting on them by the way.
