Blockade 3D

Blockade 3D Review

By, Marc Marasigan

Blockade 3D is a free-to-play voxel-based 3D MMOFPS developed and published by Shumkov Dmitriy, an independent Russian game developer. The game was released on November 05, 2014 and is available to download and play on Steam.

Blockade 3D is set in sandbox voxel-based maps that players can customize to their hearts content. Players can also play in pre-made maps based on popular Counter-Strike maps like Assault and Dust. In addition, players can also download and play in hundreds of maps made by other players. If you’ve ever played Minecraft or other voxel-based games you’ll probably know that they aren’t known for great graphics or flashy effects. Like most voxel-based games, the game environment in Blockade 3D is made up of cubes placed together like Lego blocks to form structures, trees, and even water formations. The sounds seem like they’ve been ripped from Counter-strike but it works quite well with the game. The game, however, is missing background music, which shouldn’t be an issue since you’ll be hearing gunfire most of the time.

Pixel Fighters

Upon starting the game players are immediately taken to the game lobby where they can join a match right off the bat. Players can view all available games or filter them by game modes. Unfortunately, the game lacks a formal tutorial aside from a loading screen showing the keybindings. Although it shouldn’t be a problem for players who’ve played any type of FPS in the past, especially Counter-strike. The game is also missing a matchmaking system which means that players can join a game at any time, even in the middle of a match. This also means that complete noobs will, more often than not, be playing against a few high level players. Skill is still the key though, and if you’ve got mad skills then it shouldn’t be a problem. Unless of course, you run into a cash player sporting an overpowered premium weapon, which I’ll grumble more about a little later in the cash shop part of the review.

Choose Your Battles

Blockade 3D features a variety of game modes including the classic team deathmatch mode which is a staple in almost all MMOFPS's. Players can also opt to join other game modes such as Survivor, where it’s every man for himself: Capture—a domination-type mode, Carnage—a melee-only game mode, Zombies—where the match starts with one randomly-chosen zombie player and ends when all the remaining players are turned into zombies, and Tanks—where players can hop into one of the spawned tanks and wreak havoc on the map.

Whichever game mode you choose, however, seems to go on forever, with some matches lasting up to 30 minutes. I’d gladly invest 30 minutes of my time if I were playing a Competitive match on CS: GO, which sometimes takes even longer. But for a casual game, 30 minutes is just too much. Fortunately you can leave the match at any time without penalties. Also, all of the game modes allow players to instantly respawn when killed. This may not be a big deal, but personally I find it a bit annoying when a player equipped with an RPG succeeds in camping your spawn point until someone eventually takes him out. Which is exactly what happened in the screenshot below.

Build and Destroy

What set’s Blockade 3D apart from other MMOFPS’s is the ability to place build on and destroy the environment, much like voxel-based games like Minecraft. Players can create stairs, for example, to get to otherwise inaccessible locations, build barricades to stop a mob of zombies, or cut down trees and destroy walls. This gives a bit of dynamic to otherwise ordinary FPS matches.

Money = Big Guns

Money doesn’t buy happiness, but in Blockade 3D, it does buy you overpowered weapons and gear that will allow you to pretty much dominate every other player in the game. Sure, skill still plays a big part in any FPS game. I mean, overpowered guns are pretty much useless unless you can hit the player right? It still doesn’t make it any less frustrating to be constantly killed by a kid on high ground who used mom and dad’s credit card to buy himself an optic-powered sniper rifle that can kill you with one shot.

The Final Verdict - Good

Don’t let Blockade 3D’s looks fool you. The game’s graphics might seem like it was made for kids but the game is first and foremost an FPS and a pretty solid one at that. If you don’t mind the voxel environments and matches that take forever to finish, the game is actually really fun to play. If only those premium weapons weren’t so OP then it would have definitely been a heck of a lot more fun.

Blockade 3D Screenshots

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Blockade 3D Online Videos

Blockade 3D Links

Blockade 3D Official Site
Blockade 3D Steam Store
Blockade 3D Wikia

Blockade 3D System Requirements

Minimum Requirements:

Operating System: Windows XP / 7 / 8 / 8.1 / 10
CPU: Pentium 4 2 GHz
RAM: 1 GB RAM
Video Card: GeForce 5700
Direct X: DirectX 9.0c version
Sound Card: Any
Hard Disk Space:  300 MB available space

Recommended Requirements:

Operating System: Windows XP / 7 / 8 / 8.1 / 10
CPU: Core i5
RAM: 2 GB RAM or more
Video Card: GeForce GTS 250
Direct X: DirectX 9.0c version
Hard Disk Space:  300 MB or more available space

Blockade 3D Music & Soundtrack

Coming Soon!

Blockade 3D Additional Information

Developer: Shumkov Dmitriy
Publisher: Shumkov Dmitriy

Open Beta: November 05, 2014

Original Release Date: November 05, 2014

Development History / Background:

Blockade 3D is a game that mixes elements of popular FPS games, like Counter-strike, with voxel-based construction games, like Minecraft. The game is still in it's open-beta phase and is being developed and published by Shumkov Dmitriy, an independent Russian game developer. The game was initially only available in Russia and Poland before US and EU servers were added on December 23, 2014, and is currently available as an Early Access Game on Steam. The game is set in dynamic voxel environments where players battle it out in classic FPS combat modes.