Bowmaster Prelude

Bowmaster is clearly standing apart from all the archery inspired game available, providing the right mix of skill testing, strategy and customization to create a very addictive experience.

Design
The game design is pretty rich, packing a nice amount of features. You can start by creating a custom profile, choosing a name, a flag and a control scheme. Game progress will then be saved for each profile, with your current rank, experience points, acquired gold and unlocked skills.

At each level you will face attacking waves of the evil Trev'Gahr army. The enemy soldiers will try to reach your side of the battlefield and either capture your flag or destroy your castle. Your primary defense is a legendary magical bow you will use to target the invading troops or to destroy their own castle. You win the battle if you kill all the enemy army or if your own troops manage to capture the enemy flag.

As you win battles, you are also awarded with experience points and gold, that can be spent on upgrades and is required to generate troops. Different type of soldiers with various abilities can be summoned, and they are quite critical to face the enemy wave as your bow alone may not be enough to stop enemy soldiers from reaching your flag. It is much more efficient to manage troop creation manually and to switch off automatic mode.

The real edge is however given by correctly using the different types of arrow that can be purchased. Some of them have big impacts on the game, an others are required to target enemies with specific vulnerability.

Over the levels, you will face many different type of enemies with various attacks and resistances. It is important to carefully choose the most dangerous targets first, and to choose the right arrow for a given enemy. For instance, a trebuchet can cause great damage to the castle, and it should be silenced quickly if your fortress is threaten.

All the upgrades, troops and enemy types are essential to transform a potentially repetitive shooter in an addictive quest.


Gameplay
The shooting requires great accuracy and the engine does a very nice job to produce precise arrow trajectory and hit detection to reward good shooting. A small but significant detail is that your previous shot direction and strength is displayed as you aim, and it allows to adjust your shots one after the other. This is greatly increasing the gameplay appeal.

While aiming your bow, you also need to manage an army and generate troops at the right time. Gold and population will limit the number of soldiers you can produce within a battle forcing you to be careful with your death count. As soldiers cost gold, a balance is necessary between overproducing them and save cash for savvy upgrades.

You should also be careful to avoid shooting at your own soldiers, as they will often be mixed with enemies on the battlefield, and this feature actually implies more thinking to chose the right target. Landscape will change with each level and is an important element of the game. The different compositions can be more or less tricky, and create variations in the shooting possibilities.

Presentation
Graphic design is nice an consistent, soldiers are clearly drawn with pretty animation details. The battlefield background is pleasant with night and day settings. Arrows with special power generate good visual effects such as explosions or ice waves. Background music is a bit repetitive but appropriately chosen.

On the cons side, some gamers may find the game pace a bit slow, but it also creates a more strategic and less action oriented experience. And finally, it is obvious this game needs player versus player so badly...

Play Bowmaster Prelude on Kongregate