“For Honor” is a new game that was released on February 14, 2017. After playing the game once, I can honestly say that this is one of my new favorite games. Going into the fight, I expected it to be a very one dimensional fighting game; always the same sort of fighting and same gameplay. However, I was pleasantly surprised to find all the characters intriguing as well as an amazing online gameplay experience that allows the player to go through many different ways to combat your enemies.

“For Honor” is a medieval fighting game. It has three factions you can choose from, the Knights, Vikings and Samurai. The game creators plan to add more as the game progresses. You can join any faction you want, but play any character in the game. There are four characters for each faction. For the Knights, there are the Wardens, the Conquerors, the Peacekeepers and the Lawbringers. The Vikings have the Raider, the Warlord, the Berserker and the Valkyrie. Last but not least, the Samurai have the Kensei, Shugoki, Orochi and the Nobushi. Each character is unique in fighting style and keeps it interesting by having strengths and weaknesses for each class. The fighters all use varying weapons from a common sword like the Warden to a giant club wielded by Shugoki, the massive samurai.

When you select the faction you want to be a part of at the beginning of the game, you decide what side you will be fighting for. After each match you complete, you are rewarded a certain amount of faction points that you can place on the map. Each faction fights for control over the whole map, and at the end of each round of faction wars, one faction is given rewards for winning. There are five rounds in a season and the seasons, as of now, have no limit.

When you are playing by yourself, you can play the story mode, which is packed with content and an interesting story, or a 1v1 fight online, which is one of the most exhilarating experiences in the game. It is pure talent and skill of the player wielding the character against another talented player, or against the AI to practice. The different maps allow for an interesting and new experience each time you play.

The 2v2 feature allows you to play with a friend against two online enemies, or you and the AI against two bots. The game likes to keep things interesting, and a great way to play is allowing your friend and his opponent to finish their duel first, and not double team the person. That way, you allow a fair fight, because a 2v1 is nearly impossible. The game is very good at making everything a tough fight, the AI is skilled and smart, making even a fight against the computer a challenging endeavor.

There are three ways to play a 4v4; Dominion, Elimination and Skirmish. Dominion is an exciting way to play, having capture points all throughout a map as well as small foot soldiers from each side that attack players and each other, adding to the chaos. Elimination is a gamemode where four teammates go up against the other four. Fighting all over the map with power ups, there is just the players against each other. You don’t get a respawn, there is just one life, and it goes to the best of five rounds. This is one of the hardest game modes to play, but it is easily one of the most fun, especially when talking to your friends during the fights. Skirmish is very similar to Elimination, however is a gamemode where the first team to 1000 points wins. You get to respawn, but by dying you are giving the other team points.

One of the only things I didn’t like about the game was that there was no way to do a split-screen battle, which was in production but unfortunately cancelled soon after beginning the production of that feature. Besides that, this game is very good. I would highly recommend getting it, 10/10, would play again.

The views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect the views of The Oracle, Columbus East High School, and Bartholomew Consolidated School Corporation.