Auto Warriors (iOS) Review

How does one capture the hectic feeling of pure action that warfare between two cards with huge and destructive weaponry on the iOS system? The answer Auto Warriors gives us is by not even trying to capture that aspect. Instead, players are given a more strategic approach on the concept.

The goal is simple: destroy the opposing car with the available arsenal. Instead of giving the player full control of the car the developer decided to make the player steer the car by force them to click on where they want their car to go and with which weapon to attack while the game is frozen. This feels very natural for the iOS system, but sort of unnatural for the concept at hand.

This system would be a fine twist on what people expect, though, if it wasn't for the fact that it grows very repetitive and boring really fast. It plays similarly every time no matter what car the player or the opponent chooses. The goal is, for the most part the same: get close to the opponent, preferably at their back. The only difference ever is if there are more cars. But that difference is simply that there are more cars one must avoid getting on the tail. Boring, but that is not the worst part. The worst is the huge time and pay gates, depending on the willingness to open the wallet.

First of all, there is a traditional energy system, then there are huge wait times for the cars to repair and upgrade, and to top it all off this soft locks how much damage the player can dish out by making the ammo really limited. The result? A video game which can be played pretty rarely between the time locks, and which has to either be farmed, or requires paying a lot of money to keep up with the constantly improving enemy who gets stronger faster than the player will.

While this is normal in the genre, it is extremely transparent and gives the player a feeling of disgust when they keep losing, not because they are destroyed due to unskilful driving, but by running out of ammo. The ridiculous grinding required, mixed with the repetitive gameplay, makes what could've been one of the more interesting and exciting iOS releases, into a really subpar one.