Developer: Tri-Heart Interactive
Publisher: Tri-Heart Interactive
Platform: PC, Switch
Tested On: PC
The Otterman Empire – Review
The Otterman Empire is a third-person multiplayer arena shooter that has many similarities to recent games such as Rocket Arena, Overwatch and Rogue Company. Besides certain unique mechanics, the game falls short with a lack of story, difficulty, and game modes, which is a staple for most games in this genre.
Story
The story in The Otterman Empire can be considered a simple one, or better yet, none at all. It revolves around an otter named Major Tiko, causing problems around the planet using his advanced robot technology and it’s up to the player to stop him. Ironically, all the cutscenes in the game are less than ten seconds long and muted, and this more or less proves that the story isn’t the most relevant part of the game. Also, the actual story intro isn’t even the actual story, it’s a tutorial that somehow leads the player to the final act of the game, which doesn’t really make much sense.
Graphics
The graphics in Otterman are actually well done. The game runs really smooth on PC at 1080p and 60 fps with no texture pop-ins or dips in framerate. When it comes to making custom changes, surprisingly there are no options to increase the framerate or to adjust anti-aliasing, which is confusing considering most games on PC have that basic option available.
The playable character models are very well done with each character looking completely unique from each other, especially the Sniper and Melee classes. Not much can be said for the enemies, however. Literally all the enemies are recycled from map to map in the campaign, ranging from small robots, bigger robots, laser turrets, and the few mini-bosses players will encounter. The same can be said for the maps also; there are eight stages available ranging from ancient ruins, an arctic base, and even a battle arena and besides the prior maps, all the other areas look generic and basic.
Sound
There’s not much to say for sound mostly. Since the game doesn’t have actual voice acting, the priority is mainly with sound effects and stage music. The sound effects are good, but more or less the same, with the basic sounds like lasers and shooting being similar to other games in the genre. The music, however, is surprisingly good with some being so enjoyable we purposely went back to certain stages just to have another listen, especially the Battle Arena and Ancient Ruin stages.
Gameplay
The Otterman Empire is an over-the-shoulder third-person shooter. The player has the option to double jump, strafe and to float in the air while using their primary weapons, adding plenty of mobility to the game. The unique aspect is that all of the playable characters’ weapons and abilities are water-powered, so the player will have to travel to random streams of water scattered throughout the maps in order to refuel. There are a total of eight playable characters primarily otters (with some being non-otters like a turtle, fish, and an alligator), with each character having a different primary weapon and ultimate ability that stays true to each playstyle. The latter involves deployable sentry drones, airstrikes and even becoming invincible while dealing double damage.
The story levels are linear, ranging from defeating a certain amount of enemies to collecting certain items around the map, etc; all in order to get a high enough score. Getting a high rating on stages rewards the player with new playable characters and cosmetic unlocks, like helmets, skins and jetpacks. There’s also a 4 player co-op mode available, basically making breezing through the campaign even easier.
The game only has 2 modes, the story and versus, with story being the worst of both. Other than the campaign missions being repetitive, the game compensates for its easy difficulty by throwing unhealthy amounts of enemies at the player when the round starts leading to plenty of annoying deaths. Also, there’s no real penalty to dying other than waiting on a cooldown to respawn, meaning the player can basically grind to an easy score and just wait for the level to end without doing anything else, which kills the enjoyment greatly.
The versus mode seems to be the go-to mode for the game. It’s a two versus two format that combines two different game modes that were seen in story mode. With friends, this game mode is really fun, with the modes being randomized every round adding a small amount of extra replayability.
Furthermore, there are plenty of quality of life mechanics that seem to be missing. This involves hit markers and the notification of what direction the player is taking damage. This is very confusing, considering the campaign has a tendency to throw all the enemies at the player at once, making it impossible to know where to direct your focus towards. Lastly, in spite of the game being a 3rd person arena shooter, it has no sort of online capability. Being able to duke it out online is considered a standard when it comes to this type of genre. Hopefully, there are patches soon to address these issues.
Conclusion
The Otterman Empire can sometimes be a fun game, the unique character types are great, the character models are amusing and the music is fantastic. But in spite of that, the base gameplay and the lack of game modes can and will make the game far less enjoyable and forgettable after a few hours of play. We reckon this game would already be improved a lot by simply adding a proper online mode to it.
The Otterman Empire - Review,
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