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WARCANA

66%Game Brain Score
gameplay, graphics
story, optimization
66% User Score Based on 382 reviews

Platforms

PCPCWindowsWindows
Buy Nowfrom $11.55
Buy NowGet on Steam$11.55

About

"WARCANA is a real-time strategy game with a unique deck-building mechanic, where players must defend their base and summon armies against waves of enemies, in multiplayer battle-royale or single-player campaigns. Each card has a tech tree for buildings, units, and spells, with more cards unlocked from economy buildings. Choose wisely to have powerful monsters, spells, and defend against being overrun. The challenge: will you be the last one standing?"

Genres & Tags
Play Modes
WARCANA screenshot
WARCANA screenshot
WARCANA screenshot
WARCANA screenshot
WARCANA screenshot
WARCANA screenshot
WARCANA screenshot
WARCANA screenshot
WARCANA screenshot
WARCANA screenshot
WARCANA screenshot
+2

66%
Audience ScoreBased on 382 reviews
gameplay28 positive mentions
story10 negative mentions
  • The game features stunning pixel art and a unique blend of deck-building and tower defense mechanics, providing a visually appealing experience.
  • The gameplay is engaging and offers a lot of strategic depth, with various factions and deck combinations that encourage experimentation.
  • The multiplayer aspect is fun and competitive, with large-scale battles that can be thrilling to watch as hordes of units clash.
  • The tutorial is poorly designed and fails to adequately teach players the game's mechanics, leading to confusion and frustration.
  • There are significant balance issues, particularly in multiplayer, where certain strategies dominate and can lead to unfun stalemates.
  • The user interface is clunky and lacks polish, making it difficult to navigate and manage cards and buildings effectively.
  • story
    94 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The game's story and campaign structure are criticized for being confusing and poorly designed, with many players finding the missions overly difficult and lacking a clear tutorial to guide them through gameplay mechanics. While there is a variety of factions and scenarios, the campaign often feels like a series of frustrating puzzles rather than a cohesive narrative, leading to player frustration and a lack of engagement with the story. Overall, the single-player experience is seen as lacking depth and clarity, with many players struggling to progress due to imbalanced difficulty and unclear objectives.

    • “There's a huge amount of variety with multiple different factions to play, a huge amount of scenario missions, the option to build your own custom scenario missions, as well as online multiplayer.”
    • “The tutorial teaches you the very basics about the game and then blends into the single-player campaign, which explains some things further but is much more on the side of an actual campaign with specific missions with a limited loadout at certain times.”
    • “The intention was to teach the player specific ways to play, to show what each faction can do, but it wasn't quite clear enough in the 'sandstorm' mission how to do this.”
    • “The tutorial exists, but isn't great, and the missions give you no room to breathe to figure things out.”
    • “It is for that reason why I see many people struggle immensely with the solo missions because there really are some brutal ones and there doesn't seem to be a difficulty curve in the campaign itself.”
    • “The 'campaign' (just a bunch of fixed scenarios with fixed decks) highlights this beautifully, in that there is 1 solution that they want you to implement based on the stuff you have, and you either figure out what that precise way of playing the mission is, or you lose.”
  • gameplay
    68 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The gameplay of the game is characterized by its unique factions and mechanics, offering a blend of deck-building and RTS elements that many players find engaging and addictive. However, it suffers from significant issues such as a poorly designed tutorial, clunky UI, and unbalanced mechanics, which can detract from the overall experience. While the art is praised for its beauty, the gameplay lacks polish and clarity, leading to frustration in certain scenarios and multiplayer matches.

    • “Mainly played through the campaign, and while the game definitely takes a bit of getting used to, I've greatly enjoyed the gameplay loop, siege battles with an insane amount of units, and the beautiful pixel graphics.”
    • “Having only made it halfway through the solo campaign, and not yet having tried multiplayer (matchmaking is rather slow), I can say that I am very enthusiastic about the strange blend of game mechanics Warcana brings to the table.”
    • “Very fun game with fresh gameplay elements!”
    • “The tutorial is very bad at explaining game mechanics.”
    • “The UI is horrendously clunky, core faction mechanics are flat-out bugged and non-functional for one faction, the campaign missions suddenly see a massive spike in difficulty at the fifth mission to the point where it feels like zero testing was even done on them, and the balance is completely non-existent with any online matches functionally boiling down to you either play the single viable meta deck or you can just quit the match instantly; you will not win.”
    • “To start with, the range overlay will straight up lie to you; it's like there's a disconnect between where units appear to be and where they actually are. This is especially jarring when you're trying to use your manual attack spell to kill units; you can't accurately select where the attack lands, and there's an inconvenient grid select mechanic where you won't know where the spell will land before you commit.”
  • graphics
    54 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The graphics of the game are widely praised for their beautiful pixel art style and impressive animations, contributing to a visually stunning experience, especially during large-scale battles. However, some users note that the pixel graphics can become difficult to distinguish when zoomed out, and the user interface could use improvement. Overall, the art style is considered a highlight of the game, enhancing its appeal despite some gameplay criticisms.

    • “Mainly played through the campaign, and while the game definitely takes a bit of getting used to, I've greatly enjoyed the gameplay loop, siege battles with an insane amount of units, and the beautiful pixel graphics.”
    • “There's really a lot to like about this game, the deck-building and tower defense mashup works well in many cases and the art style is fantastic, not to mention the scale of the battles.”
    • “The pixel graphics are great, the music is nice, and the design of the buildings and the units are absolutely beautiful.”
    • “Yes, the graphics are more retro than others, but judging the game by its cover isn't a cool thing, right?”
    • “Graphic quality runs on highest setting.”
    • “Honestly, the only flaw I can think of in the game's marketing is pushing it towards the RTS demographic; this game isn't at all APM heavy and your deckbuilding, building placement, and timings of spawning your units are all more important than how fast you can click or press hotkeys.”
  • optimization
    24 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The optimization of the game has received mixed reviews; while some players praise its ability to handle a large number of entities without significant performance issues, others report poor optimization and a lack of essential settings, leading to clunky gameplay. Overall, there is a consensus that while the game shows potential for optimization, it currently requires further refinement to enhance performance and user experience.

    • “When was the last time you saw a game that could hold 100,000 entities in game at once before it starts having performance problems?”
    • “The devs must have optimized this game with a microscope because holy hell is it great.”
    • “This seems like a very well optimized and polished game.”
    • “The game is poorly optimized; I hope this essential aspect gets fixed as soon as possible.”
    • “I will update my Steam review to include this fact, but I continue to believe that the game lacks essential optimization settings and polish in general.”
    • “I think trimming the fat is a necessary aspect of all deckbuilders, but to get a really optimized thing going in this game, I feel like you need to trim a lot of it, and if you don't, the whole deck just starts feeling clunky and slow.”
  • music
    16 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The music in the game is highly praised for its dynamic nature, adapting to the factions in play and the game's progression, creating an immersive experience. While primarily featuring one track, it is complemented by fitting sound effects and beautiful graphics, enhancing the overall aesthetic. Reviewers commend the soundtrack as engaging and well-composed, contributing significantly to the game's atmosphere.

    • “The music, while only really being one track, is dynamic, switching based on which factions are in play, who is winning, and so on.”
    • “Music and effects are greatly done and fitting either the faction, the specified card, or the landscape you are playing on.”
    • “Couple small extras, the soundtrack absolutely slaps, props to the composer for an awesome one.”
  • humor
    2 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The humor in the game is well-received, with players finding it both enjoyable and amusing, particularly in the context of its deck-building mechanics. Overall, the game's comedic elements contribute positively to the experience.

    • “Nice and funny deck builder!”
  • grinding
    2 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    Players find the grinding aspect of the game to be tedious and repetitive, leading to a lack of enjoyment over time.

    • “It gets tedious quickly.”
  • replayability
    2 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The game offers significant replayability due to its extensive content, featuring five fully developed factions, each with unique mechanics and units, enhancing the overall experience and encouraging multiple playthroughs.

    • “There is a lot of content for the price, with 5 fully fleshed-out factions that have unique mechanics and units, which greatly enhances the replay value.”
    • “The game offers a wealth of content, featuring 5 distinct factions, each with their own mechanics and units, making it highly replayable.”
    • “With 5 well-developed factions, each offering unique gameplay mechanics and units, the replayability factor is significantly increased.”

Buy WARCANA

7h Median play time
11h Average play time
2-24h Spent by most gamers
*Based on 6 analyzed playthroughs

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