➤ AFK Arena, the review 🎮

Mobile RPG with gacha mechanics is usually built to absorb the player, lure them in with a relatively simple start, and then capture them in their own coils requiring constant effort and dedication in order to achieve meaningful results. All this has little to do with skill but rather simply with consistency in returning to the game frequently and perhaps - possibly, for developers - regularly spend some money, so that you can get those rewards that otherwise they are practically forbidden to those who can only use them normally. From this point of view AFK Arena it presents itself as a positive and correct proposal towards the players, as we see in this one review. In his trying to put together the porridge con l 'idle game, manages to mitigate those obsessive drifts of the former while avoiding the alienation of the latter, in the end staging a hybrid that manages to hold itself together and also propose something new. We have seen how this genre of games tends to be channeled into a narrow path made up of now codified rules, a canon from which it is difficult to get out with some innovative solution.

AFK Arena has the merit of being able to stand out from the crowd, not so much for its basic structure but rather for its rhythm and for the modification of some basic mechanics that are here more generous towards the players than in many other cases. The sense is always the same: it's about putting together a large cast of characters, evolve them and deploy them in battle, with the story essentially presenting itself as a series of fights, with bosses at the end of each map. Being an idle, the combat system is not particularly demanding, requiring only to deploy the characters on the field between the first and second lines with a minimum of criteria based on their class, possibly activating the special moves at the right time but even this task can be entrusted to autoplay. The difference with the others Mobile RPG standard is that in this case, as the name suggests (AFK is used for "away from keyboard", which is the acronym used when moving away from a device), even when away from the game our characters continue to fight , without proceeding within the story but gaining experience and various rewards that are particularly useful for their evolution and the possibility of summoning new heroes.

Gacha etico

The idle mechanics necessarily makes the whole RPG apparatus lighter, because the progression is structured in such a way as to require less effort, being able to be carried out even when away from the game. It is, in short, a title undoubtedly more casual compared to other exponents of the genre to which it refers, but this can easily be a strength, given the good balance on which it characterizes and perhaps makes it suitable for those who do not intend to invest time and money in reaching the highest levels in a gacha mobile RPG. The same management of the characters reflects this greater simplicity and general intuitiveness: to make the fighters evolve, just the press of a button, as well as to equip the best weapons and armor, provided that of course they have been conquered first. The combat system, which given its repetitiveness, it is advisable to proceed autonomously, is based on the evaluation of the overall fighting value of the teams that face each other, therefore all there is to do, basically, is to conquer increasingly rare and powerful characters and make them evolve as much as possible so as not to have particular problems to advance in history.

All this brings us to the management of in-game currencies, because it is on the gems that everything revolves, from the summoning system to the possibility of enhancing the characters. Being a free-to-play there are obvious tricks that make life easier for those who want to spend money, in particular a VIP system that ensures high-level items and characters, but the ability to collect rewards in the background makes growth much more relaxed and within reach even at no cost. There are also various game modes in which you can try your hand, such as the mazes that pose different paths to take in a path consisting of consecutive fights with the final boss, or various timed missions with particularly rich rewards. AFK Arena does not have the advantage of relying on the universe of some RPG known in other areas but finds a strong identity in the particular characterization graphics adopted, similar to that of classic cartoons. The stroke and the general atmosphere bring back to the more traditional fairytale, but inside there are different veins such as steampunk and some bizarre derivations of fantasy.

Comment

Tested version Android, iPad 1.15.08 Digital Delivery App Store, Google Play Price Free Resources4Gaming.com

7.2

Readers (4)

8.1

Your vote

AFK Arena can be the ideal solution for those who intend to try a mobile RPG with gacha mechanics but do not intend to invest a lot of time (or money), or it can be a first step to delve into this genre. In any case, the fact of allowing constant evolution even without dedicating oneself directly to the game, as happens in idle games, represents an incredibly generous solution in a mechanic that usually tries to crush users in a costly mechanism, in terms of time or money. Of course, all the underlying mechanics are affected by this casual trend, making it simpler and more immediate than usual, which makes the game less deep and challenging but on the other hand also appreciable for a wider audience.

PRO

Generous and intuitive but with the classic elements of mobile RPG
The idle mechanic pushes us to detach ourselves and return to the game several times
Beautiful characterization in cartoon style

AGAINST