Mushroom Wars 2 – Review

Normally the best type of mushrooms are those covered in cheese on a pizza. A good second place is there for the mushrooms that are able to fight each other, such as those in Mushroom Wars 2. You might even be able to combine it with a pizza thanks to easily controllable gameplay. Grab some drinks when you want to play this sequel on Mushroom Wars and buy it on your phone, laptop or tv to play it the way you want to, depending on the platform you own. 

Story

As far as the cinematics explain the story, the world has come to an end. Engulfed in fire after a nuclear explosion, everything was wiped from the planet. Many years after, the Earth got vegetation growing on the surface again. With this vegetation came sentient life in the form of mushrooms. All was peaceful in Mushroomland, until the first protagonist’s father or grandfather got murdered in an attack, and the time came to retaliate. Every time after you completed a couple of levels, a new cinematic will be shown. They can be slightly confusing, but mostly they are about introducing you to a new race of mushroom..things.

Graphics

The cinematics, as well as the in-game graphics, look like they have been hand-drawn or digitally painted to life. Maybe a bit more appealing to a younger audience, but overall quite enchanting. The animations have been done nicely without breaking the style, sometimes giving the illusion of a soft painting coming to life. Cinematics and loading screens are not or barely moving, enhancing this ”painting feeling” even more.

Sound

Cheerful, happy music and sound effects are a big part of completing the enchanting looks that would appeal to a younger audience the most. The background music sounds like the mushroom kids themselves are singing, which is a smart immersive move developing wise. Combined with chimes and some orchestral sounds, it’s a combination of other cheerful atmospheric games such as the Sims or Pikmin, but thanks to the usage of voices that represent the mushroom characters in the game, it becomes something more unique.

Gameplay

Mushroom Wars 2, as well as its predecessor, is a strategy game with simple gameplay but multiple options. It seems to be improved in some aspects, mainly being the graphics and story, but gameplay overall stayed the same. You click on a building and either upgrade it so it produces more mushroom people, or you point it towards a neutral or enemy building you would like to conquer. Dragging the mouse allows for selecting multiple buildings to send in the cavalry all at once. There are some different buildings. General houses create population to attack and conquer, towers defend a small area by bombarding enemy waves, and there are some workshop buildings that arm your minions so you need less force to take buildings. That’s basically the entire concept of the gameplay. You produce, you conquer. Sometimes there are different game modes such as King of the Hill, but the concept stays the same.

Even though the easy-to-use controls and gameplay can be relaxing, it can also be frustrating, especially when playing on a higher difficulty. The only real choices you can make are to select a percentage of 25, 50, 75 or 100 from the current building’s inhabitants to send them out to fight. That, and using skills later in the game that are bound to your Q, W, E ,R keys, like usually done in Moba games. Once sent, you cannot change the route of your army. The same goes for when the enemy attacks you, you cannot fight them on the field, only by sending reinforcements to the house being attacked, which on any difficulty higher than easy, the game won’t let you know. The skills you use share a common energy bar, meaning that Q requires the lowest, and R, which could be seen as your ultimate, the highest amount of energy. This means that when you press E for example, you can’t use Q and W anymore until the bar has been filled again up to the point of the skill you would like to use.

There’s a pretty decent amount of singleplayer game to be explored, but for those who are more competitive in nature, there is also multiplayer involved. This doesn’t change the gameplay a lot though.The repetitive actions of the gameplay are mostly changed by the map layout. Walls and defensive points with towers prevent either side to easily overrun the other player. Sometimes it feels like the game is missing something, such a being able to build walls that connect two houses, or more combat on the field itself so you can quickly intercept enemies. Now, the main goal and gameplay is basically a ”divide and conquer” tactic, where only the choice how many mushrooms you send to attack which building really affects the outcome.

Conclusion

While Mushroom Wars 2 has advanced in graphics and added a story, and the atmospheric style with great sounds surely brings some good stuff to the player’s screen, the gameplay just doesn’t cut it for a longer period of time. There seem to be some missed chances when it comes to gameplay variations since the main variable is the map layout. Skills were a nice touch, but with the energy bar and little amount of usage, the strategy element of the game sometimes feels more like sheer luck than true strategy. Cheerful, yes. Fun, yes. Sadly also quite repetitive, which holds Mushroom Wars 2 back from becoming something greater.

Icecreamvamp

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I'm a game designer, developer, and reviewer. I've been reviewing for 3rd-strike.com since 2017.

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