Heroes Wanted

Heroes Wanted Review

By, Herman Y.

Heroes Wanted is a free-to-play, 3D social RPG developed by TOAST and published by NHN Studio629, the companies behind Guardian Hunter and Crusaders Quest. Heroes Wanted is a new hero-collecting RPG that takes an old formula and improves upon it, providing a more modern look and feel. Players familiar with the genre will find the game to be quite generic in terms of gameplay with typical stage-based progression, semi-automated combat, and lots of farming and grinding to upgrade Heroes, but Heroes Wanted helps mix things up with high quality, anime-inspired graphics, an intuitive skill aiming system, and various game modes that help add diversity to the game. Still, the lack of innovation and “grind/farm”-oriented gameplay with a low Gacha rate inevitably clumps Heroes Wanted together with the rest of its competition- but the game is, nevertheless, very polished and worth a try.

Monster Killing Needs No Story
The world of Heroes Wanted is divided up into various episodes, with each episode containing four chapters, each of which contain 10 stages, for a total of 40 stages per episode. Each episode has the certain environmental theme (i.e. the first episode has a forest theme) so players will be stuck with similar surroundings for 40 stages at a time- which is a long time- but each stage still has some variation that makes most of them look slightly different. Each stage is quite short, lasting around 1-3 minutes each, and usually involves running through a map killing monsters, although there are some different modes which will be explained later. The graphics in the game are very appealing with a cute, anime-inspired look, crisp visuals, and flashy effects. Completing stages gives player and Hero experience, gold, low ranked Heroes, and more. Attempting stages require Stamina, and players can choose to purchase a 2x speed option before each stage to speed things up. As usual, stages get progressively more difficult as time goes on and requires players to level up and upgrade their Heroes in order to progress.

Despite a singular Story mode, there are various types of stages which add some variety. While most stages involve running through a map (with different sections separated by portals) and killing waves of monsters with a boss battle at the end, sometimes there is a defense-style stage where the goal is to defend a floating crystal (known as the Sage Stone) from incoming waves of enemies, as well as a survival mode where players must stand their ground and defeat monsters from all directions. There is also a main boss battle at the end of each chapter where the player simply needs to defeat one boss without any other minions or need to run around. Overall, these different modes help mix up things up in the single player campaign such that all the stages don’t feel exactly the same.

Dispensing Justice on the Battlefield
Heroes Wanted features a semi-automated combat system with a skill targeting system like that in Wonder5 Masters. Players can assemble a party of up to 3 Heroes (with an additional friend Hero) before each battle, and each Hero fares differently on the battlefield. During each stage, Heroes will automatically move on their own but players can temporarily move their Heroes by tapping on their icons and then tapping on the ground. After the Heroes defeat a wave of enemies, they will automatically move again so players cannot fully manually control their Heroes. Heroes will also attack on their own when enemies are nearby. There is, however, a unique and interactive skill system in which each skill deals AOE damage, either directly in front of the Hero, at a ranged area, or in a straight line, and players can drag the skill onto the screen to choose where the aim it. This manual skill-aiming system is actually quite fun to use and adds some strategy to skill usage. Alternately, players can simply tap the skill for their Heroes to automatically use it in the direction of the nearest enemy. Lastly, players can tap on enemies for their Heroes to focus on that enemy which is useful in harder battles and during PVP.

Heroes Wanted for Battle
There are over 100 Heroes to collect in Heroes Wanted with four different classes and five different elements. The classes include Defender, Melee Attacker, Range Attacker, and Support, and the elements include Fire, Water, Forest, Light, and Dark. Defenders are tough knights with high defense and health but low attack, Melee Attackers are close-ranged fighters balanced in attack and defense, Range Attackers are powerful, long-ranged damage dealers which include both archers and mages, and Supports are backline priests that are specialized in healing and buffing. Each Hero has a specific element, and certain elements are stronger than other elements (Water > Fire > Forest > Water, Light = Dark). Some Heroes can actually appear in different element variations (i.e. Water Kai and Earth Kai) so elements are not exclusive to certain Heroes. Each Hero has two active skills, a passive skill, and possibly a leader skill, which adds a lot of variety to each Hero.

Like in all hero-collecting RPGs, upgrading Heroes plays a large part in the game. Heroes range from 1-6 stars, and players start off with a team of three 2-star Heroes. Heroes can be leveled up via completing stages or by sacrificing other Heroes, and the max Hero level depends on their star ranking (Higher ranked Heroes can be leveled higher). Heroes can be upgraded with upgrade material such as Sage’s Fruit, and can be upgraded to a maximum of +5. Once a Hero is upgraded to +5 and is of max level, they can be evolved by sacrificing three Heroes of the same star ranking. Evolving a Hero will increase their rank by 1 star and increase their stats, potentially unlock a new skill, and change their appearance. However, there is a lot of farming and grinding required to evolve Heroes which can be very time-consuming. Leveling Heroes to max level, farming Sage’s Fruits, and obtaining similar ranked Heroes to sacrifice ends up taking a long time especially to evolve multiple Heroes so the upgrading process, as expected, requires a lot of hard work and dedication to the game.

PVP and Additional Modes
Heroes Wanted has an Arena where players can battle it out in asynchronous PVP. In the Arena, players can choose between 3 players to fight against, but the matchmaking isn’t always balanced. Most of the time, players are given a list of much more powerful opponents so the matchmaking appears somewhat random. Once players have chosen an opponent, they watch as their 3 Heroes collide with the opponent’s Heroes in purely automated combat. Players cannot move their Heroes, aim their skills, or choose when to their skills, but instead, can only watch as the two sides battle it out. Players can, however, strategically target enemies by tapping on them so they can decide which enemy for their Heroes to focus on, which is quite useful. Players gain rank points and PVP badges for winning, and can use PVP badges to buy certain useful items in the Arena Shop. Overall, the PVP is fairly lackluster and non-interactive but adds a competitive and social aspect to the game.

In addition to the PVP, there are many additional PVE modes to participate in. First, one of the large focuses of the game is Bounties. Bounties are missions that players can purchase with gold or Gems (premium currency) that offer various rewards depending on the Bounty mission, and are a good way of farming gold, low-ranked Heroes, certain materials, and more. In the next mode, Time Space Criminal, players go through various time-limited dungeons where players can obtain Elemental Shards to awaken their Heroes. Last, Most Wanted is a Boss raid-style mode where players can team up with their friends to complete a shared bounty featuring powerful bosses. All three modes offer a way of farming ingredients to upgrade/evolve Heroes, and add more variety to the game.

Cash Shop/In-App Purchases (IAP)
Heroes Wanted has in-app purchases that give various advantages with fairly low gacha rates that encourages money spending. With Gems (premium currency), players can summon Heroes between 3-5 stars, and purchase in-game gold, energy, experience boosts, and premium Bounties. As a vast amount Google Play reviewers suggest, the gacha rates in Heroes Wanted are quite low, making it quite difficult to obtain even a 4-star Hero from the 3-5 star Summons. This means that spending players will have to spend a lot in order to draw 4 or 5-star Heroes, causing many players to call the game pay-to-win. Ironically, by making it hard for money-spending players to obtain good summons, it actually benefits free players. Still, it shows what a pain the Hero leveling, upgrading, and evolving process will be. Overall, spending money can help speed up the upgrading/evolving and leveling process resulting in faster game progression (even with the low gacha rate) and early advantages in the PVP.

Final Verdict – Good
Heroes Wanted is a polished hero-collecting RPG that improves upon an old formula with high quality, anime-inspired graphics, many Heroes to collect, and a manual skill-aiming system. Unfortunately, it suffers from the usual flaws in the genre such as time-consuming grinding and farming to evolve Heroes, generic, semi-automated combat, and pay-to-win aspects. Still, the game feels more modern and polished than most hero-collecting RPGs, and has a lot of content that makes it worth trying out.

Heroes Wanted Screenshots

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Heroes Wanted Videos

Heroes Wanted Links

Heroes Wanted Official Site
Heroes Wanted Google Play
Heroes Wanted iOS

Heroes Wanted Requirements

Minimum Requirements:

Android 2.3 and up / iOS 7.1 or later

Heroes Wanted Music & Soundtrack

Coming Soon!

Heroes Wanted Additional Information

Developer: TOAST
Publisher: NHN Studio629
Platforms: Android, iOS
Release Date: March 10, 2016

Shut Down: 2017

Heroes Wanted was developed by TOAST and published by NHN Studio629, the companies behind Guardian Hunter and Crusaders Quest. NHN Studio629 is a relatively new studio under the giant parent company, NHN Entertainment, and TOAST is a long-time veteran developer for NHN Entertainment. Heroes Wanted had a pre-registration and soft launch in November 2015 before finally releasing globally on March 10, 2016. TOAST and NHN Entertainment are also behind the popular mobile games, Guardian Stone and Drift Girls. The game was abandoned by 2017.