Smashmuck Champions: A Fresh Look at MOBAs

The exhibition floor at PAX Prime 2013 had caught a bad case of MOBAitis. Like a rash that spread across the convention center, banners and trailers for League of Legends look-alikes and faux-DotAs were unavoidable. Some booths even blasted play-by-play commentary of demo games (why?) out of minivan sized speakers to add an additional obnoxious layer of eSports authenticity. Whether it featured super heroes or generic fantasy heroes, the Multiplayer Online Battle Arena was unavoidable.

If you couldn’t tell from my word choice, I wasn’t pleased with the bevy of MOBA clones that were all vying for my attention. I was blasted in the face at every turn with an audio and visual wall of glitz and hype to convince me that these lazy cashgrabs were worth my time. It was exhausting.

But there was one MOBA on the sixth floor that won my heart with its brave design decisions and honest to God fun gameplay. Charles, Megan, and I got a chance to play and chat with the devs of Smashmuck Champions from Kiz Studios. We were delighted to find a MOBA that broke the mold and finally explored new and exciting territory.

A Fast Action MOBA

Smashmuck is a MOBA: you control a champion with a small but unique set of skills on a team trying to accomplish a goal through combat. But the second you start controlling your champion you know that Smashmuck is not a League of Legends clone. You use the WASD keys to control the movement of your champion and use your mouse to aim and attack. Left clicking will swing a melee attack or fire a ranged attack (depending on your character) in the direction of your cursor, keeping your attacking and movement keys completely separated. Ranged attacks will cause a momentary pause in movement, but melee attacks are done (and should be done!) while on the run.

Executing one of your character’s three special moves is a simple matter of pressing 1, 2 or 3 and (usually) holding down the right mouse button. For example, if you’re using Ninjette’s special melee ability to swing her swords out in front of her for big damage and a slow effect, you only have to quickly tap the “1” button while holding down the right mouse button. Holding down the right mouse button will draw an area on the ground where you’re currently aiming, reflecting the zone that will be hit by the special attack. Releasing the right mouse button will execute the special attack. You are free to move while holding down the right mouse button.

This control set up keeps the velocity of the combat high, allowing positioning to constantly change. Because melee attacks and special attacks don’t stop your movement every encounter turns into a seething mass of champions beating each other up. But that doesn’t mean that everything is an incomprehensible mess, the ability to queue up a special move ahead of time and precisely aim it and release it with the right mouse button means that you have more control than ever over your champion’s move execution. Smashmuck Champions controls like how I want my action games to control, it’s finally a MOBA that’s let go of its WC3 Custom Map heritage and moved onto better, greener button-pressing pastures.

A League of its Own

The game features five different game modes: capture the flag, a tower defense mode that simulates LoL lanes, point capture, a game mode where you attempt to turn your team’s robot into an unstoppable killing machine by collecting crystals (!), and a randomly constructed co-op challenge mode that’s a mix of horde mode and challenge course. You can have a tried and true MOBA experience in the more familiar modes, or you can go for something more whacky.

The matches also don’t feature any sort of in-game upgrade system. While there are plenty of ways to upgrade and level up your champions out side of a match, the in-game experience is more like an arcade game. This makes matches merely 10-20 minutes a pop. While the strategic element of a 45-minute LoL match is gone, you’re getting a game that’s pure concentrated adrenaline. Imagine a game in Summoner’s Rift that’s only team fights and ganks. That’s Smashmuck.

While the core deviations in gameplay and controls are truly the reason to play Smashmuck, the champion and environment design shows Kiz Studios’ devotion to walking their own path away from money-printing MOBA juggernauts. Their champions range from minotaurs made of rock to guitar-shredding robots to fish teachers in hovercrafts. Seriously. The humorous cartoon flavor of Smashmuck drips from every upgrade and every character.

Also, as a very important personal aside, every champion is designed fully clothed. (Should they need clothes) There is zero sexualization that usually comes from games that depend on skin purchasing for revenue. There is not a single bared midriff in the game, no go-go boots, no bustier wearing pirates. Shit, most characters only have the slightest hint of a sex at all. I can’t praise Kiz for enough for this choice. *Editors note: Maybe there is some skin with Nexi? Even I am saying that’s a stretch with that chibi toon.

To answer the obvious remaining question: Smashmuck has LoL’s business model. The game is free to play with a limited selection of champions available with their default skins. You can use either in-game currency or real world bucks to unlock champions, unlock upgrades, and unlock skins. As far as I can see, real dollars don’t do anything but save you time.

Huge Smashmuck Potential

Smashmuck Champions did what the other derivative and opportunistic MOBAs at PAX Prime didn’t do: deviate from the proven formula. The movement scheme, the attention to both precision and excitement, and a more friendly learning curve create the fun experience that I really wanted out of the monolithic MOBAs that are out now.

This is one of those games that is recommendable to both fans and non-fans of the genre. Its quality is undeniable so fans of LoL and DotA might find a fun new diversion picking it up. But if you’re like me and don’t care for LoL or DotA and want something more exciting, you should definitely check out Smashmuck.

I was impressed! Unfortunately, immediately after PAX, there weren’t enough human players on their servers to really get a good game going, but Smashmuck has since gone live on Steam. Go grab it for free and play some games! I know I’ll be doing the same.