Mars: War Logs

Quotation forthcoming.

Amongst the many sins of Mars: War Logs, the total lack of originality is the worst one.

Kudos for the ambition and price, but Mars: War Logs needs more work. A game that succeeds almost in spite of itself.

Mars: War Logs is worth a go as long as you understand out of the gate it’s not a triple -A -title. But as a gamer, a true gamer, you may just find yourself some entertainment here.

Not a good game, but it tries so hard to please it's kind of adorable. [Aug 2013, p.74]

With a dearth of decent western RPGs as of late, players desperate for something new might find that Mars War Logs scratches that itch, but don't expect anything amazing.

In a way, that latter ending fits Mars: War Logs best. It's a competently executed brawler-style RPG, with a political story at its core that actually has some potential. Irrelevant mechanics and sidequests get in the way of the game's best aspects, however, and Mars: War Logs never manages to focus on what's important.

This small studio has done remarkably well, despite limited funds and has presented a sci-fi RPG with a slight cyberpunk mood, that has gathered all the good elements from various genre blockbusters. [June 2013]

Mars: War Logs is an ambitious game with a lot of good ideas, and the execution is decent even if the story is a little contrived. For all the time I spent with the game, I felt like it was a good diversion away from the other typical Mars-based games like Red Faction: Guerilla.

Mars: War Logs is an overly ambitious project that Spiders Studios couldn’t bring on par with its original vision. Despite not fully delivering in this particular venture, the team shows promise and deserves praise for aiming high and not settling for the usual stereotypes.

Ambitious, but weak writing, repetitive combat and difficulty spikes hold it back. [July 2013, p.81]

My review in one word: 'meh'! You see a lot of good intentions, but in the end, the team somehow lacked the courage or the resources to execute on them.

Mars: War Logs has big ambitions, but it feels like it was rushed out the door – perhaps due to budgetary constraints. The makings of an impressive game are here, unfortunately it just doesn't hold together particularly well.

The annoying thing about Mars: WL is that Spiders have tried to do everything at once instead of delivering a smaller, more polished game. Everything feels half done.

It starts as an ambitious roleplaying game drawing me in with its’ opening sequence and fresh scenario. The battle system works well, so does the crafting. But too soon the plot loses its grip, the characters get stale and overall the visuals seem outdated.

With better pacing and a lot more balancing, Mars: War Logs could have been a fresh, satisfying take on BioWare’s proven formula. Its intriguing premise and characters eventually succumb to its broken systems, creating a fiction you’ll hope sooner to finish than completely understand.

I had been hoping (and kind of expecting from the trailer) for a sort of Arkham City combat structure in the form of a more classical RPG. This is not that game. The melee combat engine, while interesting, doesn’t actually balance well, and it results in combat that feels ridiculous and clunky where Arkham was fluid and dynamic.

Inexperience and too much ambition have left their marks on a bland RPG. It contains incomplete game elements, and its combat is the only challenge and entertainment of the game.

Mars: Wars Logs is a decent action RPG with a fascinating background and a cheap price.

As a follow-up to Of Orcs and Men, War Logs is a let down. If you only have $20, however, supporting a studio as intrepid as Spiders is worthy endeavor and there is fun to be had here. Still, caution is advised.

We feel it's limited by time and money, but as a game is a good experience, with some good ideas actually well implemented. If you like sci-fi ARPG, and you've already played the big games in the genre, this could be an option worth trying.

Mars: War Logs has flashes of brilliance, mostly stemming from its combat system. I really wanted to love the game more than I did, but it continuously disappointed me with simple flaws.

Mars is a fairly interesting action RPG with a cheap price on its side, but in all honesty it could do with being even cheaper.

Mars: War Logs is really a low cost game. Sold for 20 euros, it delivers a complete adventure with a decent lifetime in spite of many faults. Even knowing that the game was developed on a tight budget, some points are rally hard to accept and the limited budget does not forgive everything. But we have to admit that for this price, we can't ask too much from a recent studio. Mars: War Logs is a small budget game which will entertain you and it's not a bad start, knowing that everything that was advertised is in the game. The promises are kept. We hope a new episode will come out and correct the many flaws of this game in order to provide a more satisfying game experience.

Mars: War Logs is the kind of experience one can only call serviceable. It exists, it does what it does, and it performs its job suitably. It doesn't do anything terrible, but it never once goes above a basic standard of acceptability.

Mars: War Logs is an interesting take on sci fi RPG, bestowed with a fascinating background and robust hack'n'slashing. On the other hand, it lacks depth and optimization in many of its features, ultimately resulting in a mixed bag.

While only the combat stands out as a true high-point, Mars: War Logs is at least an ambitious attempt at a budget RPG, in a much less overused setting than most.

With a higher budget Mars: War Logs might have become a completely different action-RPG, but even so, despite the many limitations and considering the budget price, the final result is more than satisfactory.

As a whole, Mars: War Logs is a game well worth checking out for RPG fans and, at only twenty dollars, there’s no reason not to. Although frustrating at times, the developers’ ambition puts it above other indie RPGs which seem happy to settle for less considering their price.

Mars: War Logs is derivative, underdeveloped, and features one of the briefest, most rushed final chapters I've seen, but it's also completely playable and even charming in a B-movie kind of way.