9.2 /10 1 Votes
10/10 Steam Director(s) Michał Drozdowski Initial release date 14 November 2014 Genre Survival game | 4.5/5 Google Play 8.4/10 IGN Programmer(s) Aleksander Kauch Developer 11 bit studios Publisher 11 bit studios | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Distributor(s) Deep Silver
11 bit studios Designer(s) Rafał Włosek
Grzegorz Mazur Artist(s) Przemysław Marszał
Bartek Rydel
Jakub Piotrowski Writer(s) Maciej Skóra
Kacper Kwiatkowski
Wojtek Setlak Platforms PlayStation 4, Android, Xbox One, iOS, Microsoft Windows, Macintosh operating systems, Linux Nominations The Game Award for Games For Change Similar Survival horror games, Other games | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Review this war of mine
This War of Mine is a war survival video game developed and published by 11 bit studios. The game, inspired by the 1992–96 Siege of Sarajevo during the Bosnian War, differs from most war-themed video games by focusing on the civilian experience of war rather than frontline combat. Characters have to make many difficult decisions in order to survive everyday dangers. There are various endings for each character, depending on the decisions made in the game. This War of Mine was released for Microsoft Windows, OS X, and Linux in November 2014. Android and iOS ports were released in July 14, 2015. PlayStation 4 and Xbox One versions were released on January 29, 2016, under the title This War of Mine: The Little Ones.
Contents
This war of mine gameplay trailer
Gameplay
This War of Mine is a survival-themed strategy game where the player controls a group of civilian survivors in a makeshift shelter in the besieged, war-torn fictional city of Pogoren, Graznavia. The main goal of the game is to survive the war with the tools and materials the player can gather with the characters they control. Most of the characters under the player's control have no military background or any kind of survival experience, and will require constant intervention by the player in order to stay alive. It is the player's responsibility to maintain their characters' health, hunger and mood levels until the declaration of a ceasefire, which occurs after a randomized duration.
During the daytime, hostile snipers will prevent the survivors from venturing outside, thereby offering the player time to craft tools from gathered materials, trade, upgrade the shelter, cook food and heal the survivors. At night, the player is given the opportunity to venture out and scavenge nearby areas for valuable resources for their everyday survival. During their excursions, the player-controlled survivors can encounter other NPC survivors of the war, who they can choose to help with gifts of food or medicine, or rob and kill. The player can also build a radio inside their shelter, which will provide useful information such as weather warnings, updates on the city's economy and news of the ongoing war effort to help the player plan appropriate shelter upgrades and scavenging missions.
The player starts off with one to four survivors whose actions the player can affect. The actions the player makes will change the type of endings each survivor has. Each character has one or two traits that helps/hinders the player, besides hidden, varying stats that affect combat, movement speed, and so on. Some traits are useful during certain days while others are useful all the time. For example, one character named Bruno has a trait called "Good Cook", which helps the player use less fuel and water when cooking meals. There are a total of 12 playable characters. The Little Ones DLC includes the possibility of adding an extra, child survivor, that can not defend him/herself or perform any of the tasks needed to maintain the shelter at first. In addition, the child survivor must be given constant attention to prevent it from being depressed, but can be taught by the other survivors to perform small chores like cooking, filtering water or growing crops, and once bonding with an adult, it can sleep with them in the same bed at night, dispensing the need of a separate bed for both.
A scenario editor was added into the game through update 1.3, which will allow players to create and select survivors. The editor also allows environmental conditions and the length of conflicts to be changed.
Player-created content was released freely via the Steam Workshop, as of update 2.0
Development
The game was inspired by the poor living conditions and wartime atrocities that Bosnian civilians endured during the 1992–96 Siege of Sarajevo, the longest city siege since World War II. In November 2014, unlicensed copies of the game were made available online. The developer's response was to post a number of working serial numbers in comments, encouraging downloaders to share them with friends, and buy the game if their financial situation allowed.
Reception
This War of Mine has a score of 83 out of 100 from Metacritic on the basis of 55 reviews. The game reportedly made back its development costs in its first two days for sale.