Player UMC Reviews

This is a place where you can add your reviews for the current (1.10.x/1.11.x) UMC campaigns. It aims to provide all the information not only about the story, but also about completion, difficulty and playing style of the campaign. Please edit, it is a wiki.

Blueprint

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Battle for Wesnoth UMC campaign / reviews

Reviews for Campaigns available in the 1.10.x stable and 1.11.x development versions.

Invasion from the Unknown

Tags: elves, undead, skirmish, dungeon, puzzle

Description: Starting with usual elves in forests and deserts, quickly adding the undead faction in a battle against several custom factions, evil human army, mysterious Verlissh, sinister demons, robotic automatons and dreadful, biomechanic Shaxtrals, that progresses through caves and steppes into the mysterious Dark Hive, where the Shadow Master dwells. 30 scenarios. Complete.

Summary: This campaign has a good and interesting story, enough long to develop an army of recalls an use it well. You will encounter many new kinds of enemies, assuring that you will never get bored, even if you aren't a fan of the default era. Its gameplay is unique in many ways, frequently, the enemies are just coming, and you have to pass through the area instead of defeating some leader. Another speciality are boss fights, when you can defeat a boss only using some special technique. The campaign is also balanced pretty well, easy difficulty is to enjoy the story, hard difficulty is really challenging. However, almost all new units lack animations of any kind, that harms the visual part of this add-on. Also, some elements of the storyline are too exaggerated. But these little problems will not spoil anything.

Surroundings: 7

Design: 10

Story: 9

Fun: 10

Replay value: 7

Player Note: 10

Review by Dugi

Talentless Mage

Description: taken from the campaign file Humorous and silly campaign about mage apprentice who has managed to learn only one simple spell in thirty years. Expert level, 10 playable scenarios.

Summary: this here is Wesnoth parody at its best. The campaign mocks the common cliches in Wesnoth campaigns and overused events, like loyal units coming out of villages, random magical items scattered around the map and low quality frankensprites. Very absurd and pythonesque at times, you will keep smiling and laughing through the whole story.

Surroundings: 6

Design: 8

Story: 9

Fun: 10

Review by Dunno

The Library of Kratemaqht

Review: General: The campaign is about genesis, course and outcome of civil war in empire of Anaktoron. Surroundings: The way campaign looks. How it feels and uses game engine is simply amazing and unseen before. Maps are nicely done although many parts of a map serve for story (decorative) purpose only what is not always good. You will travel through wealthy and populous kingdom which is torn apart by war. To create this impression in most of maps there is a lot of villages and they are placed in large groups, but map look doesn't suffer from it. More over you can feel destruction in game world as never before. Campaign features custom burning houses which are not only mere visual effect but have impact on battle course. It is one of most cinematic campaigns if not the most. Cutscenes are packed with action and take place in several locations. Also game transition fluently into cutscene and cutscene into game. What makes it even more interesting since you will never know is it just a cutscene? In terms of visual effects it also features the best epilogue ever. As it was not enough you can experience a true wesnoth dragon. It is so unusual that it need separate mention. Dragon is fully animated and have some nice custom sounds. Some of it animations are purely character play. Like roar and feasting. And last, but not least it preserves original wesnoth dragon concepts. It attacks with fangs and tail. Although it primary weapon is ranged magical fire breath which works as AoE attack when used offensively. There is one little bug with its animation, but it can't be noticed during playing it anyway. In short this campaign surely establish new standards for wesnoth in department of visuals. Design: Scenarios design is good. All levels are playable. Objectives are clearly formed, so it is known most of the time what to do. There are several minor bugs and one bigger that affects game to some degree. However they do not make impossible to play and enjoy campaign. Campaign is using default units although sometimes with unusual traits and abilities. Custom units are also present, but only as much as they are needed. Which is a great thing since it proves designer skill at using available resources. Beside that I really can't stand campaigns introducing many user made units. I liked much idea of premagic era and weakened magic users. Unfortunately any extra mages aren't useful since you have already better characters of this class. In fact after my recall list was cleaned up after Jevyans Return I never bothered to recruit them again. Gold carryover system is custom which is not a good choice for classic style adventure. Twenty percent instead of forty. Most probably this is caused by slightly overpopulated maps. Campaign is very easy, except two scenarios: Refugees and Loyalty's Cruel Reward. There is no moderately difficult scenarios. The huge difference between average level difficulty and hardest level is just to big. Most difficult scenarios are Refugees and Loyaltys Cruel Reward. Story: Amount of delivered information is enough. Writing style is good. Beginning is terrific. Switching between protagonists is cool, and quite innovative idea. Overall concept is nicely executed and creator skillfully merged a lot of facts from mainline into own story. To fully appreciate this playing The Rise of Wesnoth is recommended. However ending I found disappointing. It seemed rushed and unconvincing. Also few details don't match to reality of Irdya. Fun: Campaign is definitely entertaining. Well done battles. Good dialog. And full of fresh ideas. You can play as good and bad in a single campaign! Although I have nothing against being awesome most of the time enemies fell way to easily to my taste. Replay value: Campaign is nicely done and straight forward. Although there is nothing that would reject you from playing it again, there is nothing that would encourage you to do that either. No hidden secrets, no tactical challenges, no extra levels. No satisfying ending.

Summary: Overall it is well made, really great, easy campaign suitable for beginners with story explaining some events from The Rise of Wesnoth. Bringing new standards in design, especially visual ones. It story is shown from several angles what is unique feature, but unfortunately potential of this solution wasn't used at all. If you are looking for deep plot, and tactical challenge you won't find it here.

Surroundings: 10

Design: 6

Story: 7

Fun: 7

Replay value: 5

Campaign score: 7

Player note: 8

Review by: Wesbane

Link to review: [1]

To Lands Unknown

Description: taken from the campaign file

Hearken ye,

You strangers in a desolate land

To this tale of lands most old,

of the Summoners of Al-Kamija,

Those mighty magi

Of powers untold,

Their Abysmal servants

Both good and bad,

And of Mehir, who had,

As once foretold,

saved all life in this world.

This is the story of Mehir, the Summoner, and his journey to lands unknown. Intermediate level, 20 scenarios.

Summary: The main idea behind this campaign and the Era of Magic (used by To Lands Unknown) is to take Wesnoth graphics to an entirely new level. Maps are no longer simple, repetitive hexes, instead many maps are absolutely mindblowing landscapes. In addition, all units are well made and animated. The story and gameplay, however, could have been done better. The campaign is quite long, and at times battles get boring.

Surroundings: 10

Design: 7

Story: 5

Fun: 6

Review by Dunno

Swamplings

Description: taken from the campaign file Banished by Yushnak the Ponderer, a tribe of lowly swamp goblins endure in the deadly mire of Pogo Bog. Four centuries before the founding of Wesnoth, this is the story of the goblins' struggle against the intrigues and betrayals of the greater races, and the rise of the first wolf rider. 14 scenarios. Complete.

Summary: It's a decent, finished and stable campaign with interesting plot. There are many humorous scenes and some serious ones, there are standard battle scenarios and various original missions. There are also some high quality custom sprites, and maps are very good as well. It won't make your jaw drop, however, it's just a modest, enjoyable campaign.

Surroundings: 7

Design: 8

Story: 8

Fun: 9

Review by Dunno