Valiant Hearts: The Great War is a puzzle adventure game. Looking at the smaller scale with pretty graphics and a unique aesthetic, you’ll think that this was an indie game. However, it is developed and published by Ubisoft. Anyway, the game is set in World War I and tells the story of a several characters that in some way or another, is involved with a young German soldier.
The game’s story is told via some exposition dialogue with a high-level overview of the events of World War I. Surprisingly, despite how it sounds, it works really well, and it captures the gravity and seriousness of several of the developments of the war. It’s helped by the charming graphics, which are 2D and has a cartoon hand drawn aesthetic to it. The characters don’t speak intelligibly (although you can tell what words they’re speaking if you listen hard enough), and there are massive lore dumps, which are admittedly optional.
The gameplay also shines. It’s a sidescroller where the characters can only move and interact with objects. It’s a simple control scheme and this highlights the imagination of the puzzle designs. The puzzles are mostly intuitive, where usually you just interact with everything you need to and then you can piece together what you need to do. These can involve trying to get the handle down from the roof of a building so that you can use the lever. Or you have a dog companion which you can command to bring you things from afar.
There are opportunities for new mechanics that is completely different from the puzzle aspect. There’s a chapter where there is forced stealth, but it doesn’t frustrate or annoy you. Another chapter will have you controlling a vehicle trying to dodge bullets and bombs. The game manages to add action to something that doesn’t require that much frantic action, despite how it might feel otherwise. Dying resets you to the previous checkpoint which is usually right before you die.
Despite the positives, there are still some minor annoyances. If you ever get stuck, there are hints available, but they will only reveal themselves after a set time limit, so it may get on your nerves if you’re impatient. Some puzzles require a tiny bit of timing, although when the game isn’t designed for faster paced reflexes to determine the angle and distance of the object you want to throw, this isn’t too great. Controls for certain vehicles can also be clunkier than they should.
The story often has time skips and moves at a brisk pace. It has most of the characters chasing down an enemy general, who constantly gets away. It can be thematically clashing when it is trying to tell a serious story showcasing the horrors of war, and then have exaggerated cartoony character reactions when they have a bomb thrown towards them. Later levels are bigger, but then that just means you’ll constantly have to turn forwards and backwards for those fetch quests and it’s at these points that you feel the characters aren’t running fast enough.
Towards the end, the game does start to overstay its welcome due to the instant death sections, if only slightly. The ending also feels a bit rushed, considering the build up, the characters all quickly unite, and the game then ends. It has a bittersweet ending. The game is not designed to be long, taking only around five hours to complete. You can then replay any chapter to find the rest of the collectables that you may have missed.
Overall, Valiant Hearts: The Great War is a fantastic and surprising hit. The game instantly captures your attention with its fantastic art style, and then wins you over with its gameplay, attention to detail and the way it tells its story that’s set in World War I. The characters are fleshed out and you care about their fates, leading to an emotional rollercoaster of a game.
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