Over the course of CWaveSoft and Nexons development of Hyper Universe, I’ve watched their progress first hand of this 2D side-scrolling beat’em up MOBA. With the launch of Hyper Universe still fresh in mind and more appropriately, impressed in my muscle memory imbuing me with a bad case of “controller grip”, does Hyper Universe have what it takes to leave a lasting impression on MOBA loving gamers everywhere? This is our Hyper Universe Review.
As mentioned, Hyper Universe is a MOBA and the objectives of each match therein are fairly simple to grasp. While there is a tab in Hyper Universe that is labeled “Story” the story elements are fairly light, and are more likened to an achievements list with story elements rather than an actual traditional combat oriented “story mode”. In terms of each match, there are several towers standing between you and your opponent’s main defense tower. Technically, you aren’t required to beat each tower in succession before you reach the final tower, but it’s usually the preferred strategy. With a total team of four, you have several different strategies to accomplish your task. You can split your team in several ways to take on either the top path, or the bottom path, or you can face off against some big, nasty enemies which will grant you experience and gold to upgrade your gear, not to mention some possible consumables as well to aid you in a pinch. With several match types starting from an AI battle to a Ranked Match, there are quite a few ways to test your different methods for winning.
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Compound the gameplay strategies with the addition of team compositions from 41 different heroes divvied up into 6 different categories and you have a lot of potential to mix and match your team to ensure victory. The different characters are actually one of my favorite things about Hyper Universe. Each Hyper can range from silly to sexy, and one of the biggest and most notable differences between my early access preview and the new, released game, is that they’ve added a bevy of costumes across the board to earn or purchase, some of which even add new dialog or completely overhaul the look (or sex) of the hero. New heroes can be purchased through the Hyper Shop which, once barren, now has a lot of different items for sale including characters, skins, gear slots and more. You can purchase these items with real money, or you can earn funds in-game for most Hyper Shop purchases.
Once you’ve selected a hero, and understand the basic ebb and flow of the battles, you can begin customizing your heroes a little more by gearing them how you’d like to play them. Each hero has their own basic gear set, and you will obtain a special story unlock for utilizing it, but with a little planning you can break away from that set and create a new gear set that fundamentally changes how you play your character. For example, you can gear a character highly for health and defense if you want to be more of a tank, or you can gear your character for critical hits if you want to hit hard and fast and get out of there. You can even gear yourself to earn gold faster to upgrade your gear faster if you wanted to. There are a lot of options for the player that really wants to get in there and customize their characters.
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Some sticking points I had with the game were, for one, each match, even if you’re facing the AI, requires you to queue up and load into it, and this can take a little bit of time as you watch each players connection load in. Despite the “Story” achievements being far ranging, I didn’t particularly find any of the story points interesting. When I think of a story mode, I think of something akin to how the tutorial of Hyper Universe is, you run in with an objective, and things happen along the way. I can’t truly fault a MOBA for skimping on the Story aspects, but seeing a story tab felt somewhat misleading to me. Lastly, I did feel somewhat nitpicky about the gameplay in some areas. The main issue with so many characters is that true balance is far out of reach in many situations. I’d often find the same characters being played more than others, and in a few matches this was cause for concern because two players on the same team cannot use the same character.
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There is a lot to like about Hyper Universe barring that you’re a MOBA fan and aren’t averse to rehashing the same arena content as one does in competitive multiplayer games. With a little practice and a lot of experimentation, battles can become frenzied and rewarding as you best your opponents and pile them underfoot. With more to inevitably come with Hyper Universe and no entry fee to get started, you have nothing to lose in trying out Hyper Universe for yourself. Good luck out there hero, you’re going to need it.
Final Score: 7.7
Pros
- Fun, fast paced 2D Action Gameplay
- Plenty of characters and customization to be had
- Free to play but characters can be earned with in-game currency
Cons
- The “story” is not really a “story mode”
- AI gameplay still requires you to go through matchmaking
- MOBA gameplay can get repetitive, too few levels and objectives
