I wish so, so badly that this were a better game.

Throwaway lore justifying the type of "pirates v. ninjas" conflict that the internet of ten years ago seemed so madly in love with. A fighting game core stripped down to its basics, so that even people who don't normally engage with fighting games can enjoy it. And I do, but none of the modes here ever feel like the one that you're meant to be playing. I'll break this down in detail below, but if you want the TLDR you can skip to the end.

1v1 - The character movesets offer mixups and combos that are easy to memorize, but leave very little room for player expression - there are players who use the entire hero's kit, and players who only know how to chain together 2 or 3 moves. Very rarely will you feel like you've played someone who has used a hero in a unique way, meaning that 1v1s feel more like a training mode for the "real" game than a mode that can stand on its own. There's no glaring flaws with 1v1s, so I understand why this is one of the more popular modes, but what am I doing this for? A lot of the things that draw people to play fighting games aren't present here - continuously honing your play on a character you like, expressing yourself by developing your own playstyle, etc.

2v2 - Mostly the same problems as 1v1, except for with the wrinkle that there are now additional players to worry about. Typically, people in this game mode will pair off into 2 duels, and whoever wins their duel first has to go deal with the remaining opponent. Sure, you could gank while your duel opponent is still alive, but because they can clearly see where you spawn and every hero is roughly the same speed, they're just going to come slap you in the back of the head as soon as you get to their teammate. This feels like the right number of players for a game mode in For Honor, but with no neutral objectives or macro gameplay to worry about, there's not a lot to chew on here either.

4v4s - There are a couple iterations of 4v4, but Dominion is definitely the more popular of the two. You capture and hold 3 zones that passively grant you points, and once your team has 1000 points, respawns are disabled for the enemy team. This is definitely the closest For Honor comes to having a "core" game mode, at least in terms of how it feels. There are entire systems present in 4v4 that are unusable in smaller game modes, and the maps allow for all kinds of traps and playing around enemy sight lines, taking advantage of the fact that 4 people is just enough that your brain can't hold all of that info while you're squaring off with someone chain-spamming Orochi's light attacks. The loadout system and the objectives allow people who are weaker mechanically to contribute to the team, and it means that even heroes with more rigid movesets (warlord) can still contribute to the game by adopting a support-like playstyle (or by cheesing players into environmental hazards). The issue here is that the fighting game-like nature of the game makes the ganking and other "no honor" behaviors incredibly frustrating for everyone involved. Despite all this, this game mode is so chaotic that there's no real way to strategize unless you can recruit three friends to join you (lol good luck). Most of your time in Dominion will be spent running from capture point to capture point, trying to formulate a personal strategy that makes sense amidst the broader chaos. Time for the Revenge mechanic!

Revenge - This is one of the ways the game tries to balance things for players who get ganked. Your combat options are severely limited unless you lock onto a player, at which point a little "shield" pops up on your HUD. With rare exceptions, every attack comes from the left, right, or the top, and you defend by matching the direction. When a player ganks you, any attacks from them will always be from the side they're standing on, making it easier to defend against them, and you'll build up extra "Revenge" meter, a buff not worth describing here except for the fact that you hulk out and temporarily gain a larger health bar. Skilled players can often 1v2 with the help of this mechanic, and skilled gankers will often try to repeatedly guard-break an opponent instead of throwing out a parryable attack. What this means is that a gank from an unskilled player will often result in the victim killing both of you, frustrating both attackers. If it does work, it feels like playing a fighting game where a second enemy player suddenly connects and starts throwing out special moves in the middle of your opponent's normal combo.

Conclusion: There are some interesting ideas here, and I really like the medieval-ish fantasy aspects to this game, but the same mechanics that are intended to serve as anti-frustration measures often make this game more frustrating for everyone involved. It's a shame that Ubi didn't immediately knock it out of the park with this new IP as it's one of my favorite ideas from them in recent years, and I'm not even sure what to call it other than a "truly 3D" fighting game. If you want For Honor without playing For Honor, your closest comparison is probably Absolver (maybe?), but I never felt like Absolver's world does anything to sell a fantasy. Beyond that, I'm not aware of anything that plays like this. This is the kind of fighting game that I want, the kind of fighting game I'd like to learn, but this iteration of it definitely needs more time in the oven. I'd love to see For Honor 2 (or a shameless rip-off), but I don't know if I trust Ubisoft to take the right lessons from this game.

it was a fun time with friends a long time ago back during release, but it really never captured me much outside of playing with my friends during those earlier months of its release. i think it's kind of an interesting approach to disguising a big aaa service game as a sort of almost fighting game, and mechanically i remember it being decently fun, but sometimes not the most balanced. when i'd play with friends usually i would be the one that was the most behind in terms of skill and levels in comparison to my friends and the rest of the lobby who would grind the hell out of this game, so public matches would sometimes be a blowout where i felt like i was bringing down the team. i was never really a huge fan of the game's progression and i never cared enough to play the game on my own time so it would suck being like a level 9 raider against 7 other guys who were all like prestige 3 level 17 or some shit when i would party with friends after the game had been out for a couple months and the good players were the ones who were still most active in the game. outside of that though i still got to make good memories playing private matches with friends and fucking around with the classes we rarely played as.

i think ultimately most of the fondness i associate with this game was just being able to use it as an outlet for playing a game with my friends who all didn't really have the most similar game taste. like i said before i think after the game had some time to let people get really good at it, hopping on to play some matches while being severely unexperienced and underleveled was just a pain and kinda killed the game for me. that isn't to say though that i dont think the game had something going for it, it had a neat concept and gameplay style, and there was most definitely a period of time early on where i considered the game a fun time in public lobbies.

I have lots of great memories playing this game with friends during launch and the months afterwards even though it was a complete mess. Ubisoft did end up fixing and adding some cool things over time into the game but just not fast enough. Plus all the monetization and crap servers in a full priced game didn't help.

I can't help but feel out of all the Ubisoft games that force a generic open world that it would have actually benefited the For Honor campaign. Pick a starting class as Knight, Viking, or Samurai and have different starts for each one. Hell, when they did DLC they could've added more to the campaign adding replay value but I know that's asking to much of small indie company Ubisoft.

All frustrations aside if they announced a sequel that isn't the same game with a fresh coat of paint I would be genuinely excited to see what it would be like and would probably end up getting it at some point. If they can make a game that changes the parrying to be more like Sekiros and the servers are actually good I'd buy in a heartbeat.