Time of Defiance

There are some games that are so inherently geeky it's almost an embarrassment to be caught' playing them. If you've taken a quick glance at the screenshots on this page, you will have quickly ascertained that Time Of Defiance is one of them. In its simplest form, it's an online space exploration and planet conquest game with a fairly competent trading system. It's a full-on 3D experience (albeit without a first-person viewpoint) but the finer points of current graphics technology seem to have passed Nicely Crafted Entertainment by, as ToD's functional but hugely unimpressive graphics clearly demonstrate. Not that we care about graphics, we're above all that, well kind of anyway, but a little more imagination and style in presentation wouldn't have gone amiss. We can just about forgive graphical shortcomings, but there are some things we cannot forgive...

Who, What, Where?

There's a lot to keep track of. As you conquer planets (strangely referred to here as islands), build up resources and begin to build ever more sophisticated buildings and vehicles, you'll soon find it difficult to keep up with what's going on. The interface doesn't do much to help the situation either. There is no handy table or database to refer to when you need to move stuff around from one island to another, or from one vehicle to the next. There's a status screen which gives general info, but a breakdown of the islands you own along with everything that's on them would have made a big difference to an often frustrating gaming experience. In fairness, NCE promise that later releases of the client will address this, but as it stands, proceedings can get very confusing at later stages.

Fight, Fight, Fight

Combat is pretty unspectacular too: give orders to your ships and they'll attack or defend according to your instructions when they come into contact with the enemy while you sit and watch.

Despite all this, ToD can become fairly addictive once you get used to its many idiosyncrasies. We get the impression it was released a tad unfinished and it may become much better when it's been refined. We'll be taking another look at the growth of ToD a few months down the line to track its progress. Until then you'd do well to think long and hard before paying out the monthly fee for it. Watch this space and we'll let you know if it gets any better sometime soon.