Clash Royale Review – Real Time Online Duals, Lots of Fun

Clash Royale by Supercell is one of the most popular real-time online strategy game which involves dueling players online with your battle cards. The game is available on Android as well as iOS. We play and review this freemium game to see if this game, which has been downloaded by 100 million+ users is worth the hype.


Source: Clash Royale Official Website

Clash royale is a free to play game and offers in-app purchases. It has a large fan-following, 100+ million users, 16+ million reviews and 4.5 average star rating in the Play Store. If you are wondering if this game is worth trying, or if its pay-to-win aspects destroy the fun, then read our review below to find out:

Gameplay

The Gameplay of Clash Royale consists of dueling an opponent in real-time with your own set of battle cards. These battle cards are unlocked through chests that are awarded once you win a battle. You also get free chests every few hours and crown chest once a day. Unlocking a chest takes time depending on the rarity of the chest or you can spend gems (in-game currency) to open them instantly.

Clash Royale Screenshots

Once you begin playing Clash Royale, you are greeted with a tutorial that walks you through the game mechanics. The game also awards you with an initial set of battle cards (characters) such as Knight, Archers, Giant etc. Once you play a set of tutorials, you are allowed to jump into battle with real players.

Each battle lasts for 3 minutes and the goal is to destroy opponent’s towers with your battle characters while defending your own. There are 2 princess’ towers and 1 king tower on each side of the players, which are capable of shooting arrows and cannon at the incoming enemies. The game goes into overtime if the winner is not decided in 3 minutes. You get Elixir during the battle which is used to deploy battle cards in the arena. Judiciously managing your Elixir is key to winning battles.

From left to Right: Clash Royale Tutorial, Real Battle, New Cards from Chest

Each battle card offers unique battle aspect such as shooting arrows, throwing bombs, melee attacker with swords, a heavy tank which only attacks towers etc. In order to win a battle, it is important to form a battle deck of 8 battle cards which synergize well with each other. There are numerous tutorials, strategy guides as well as deck building guide created by Clash Royale community that can be referred while building these decks.

Unlike other card battle games, Clash Royale offers live interaction between the battle cards due to which the exact position of card placement, as well as timing, is crucial in deciding the outcome of the game. One thing to note here is that the gameplay requires stable internet connection throughout the battle. As the battles are of short duration, any kind of latency can result in battle cards interacting with each other in a different and undesirable way.

The game also offers many other aspects such as battle with friends, joining and participating in a clan, tournaments battle, challenges as well as regular events with rewards.

Graphics

Clash Roayle graphics are polished and the battle characters are lovely and fun to look at. Battle animations are top-notch and you get to see tiny details of how the cards are interacting with each other. There are multiple battle arenas available and the top-down-view during a game allows you to have good look at both: the battle happening in the arena as well as your current set of cards that you can deploy.

Overall, we feel the game offers good graphics which is not very resource-intensive and can be played in smartphones within the lower spec bracket as well. The game graphics scale well with different screen sizes and can be played with small screen phones as well as large-screen tablets.

Controls

Clash Royale battles are controlled using touch and the sensitivity of these touch interactions are well-balanced. The game is easy to play with just one hand, although if your smartphone is bigger, or if you are using a tablet, you would require two hands.

One requires to tap or drag the characters into the battle arena during the gameplay and placing them at precise locations is often required. With a little practice, one can achieve this precise placement.

Cost – Pay To Win?

The big question for any free to play game is whether it has “pay to win” aspects which kills the fun? Like any freemium game, Clash Royale also has in-app purchases which can be used to speed up your progress. However, paying for these in-app purchases is not really necessary to have fun in this game. With a little patience and good community (clan), you can advance arenas and have lots of fun playing challenges, tournaments and making new friends. Advancing the ladder can take longer (months) if you’re not spending money, however, that is the only trade-off one has to take with this game i.e. time vs money.

Our Verdict

Our final verdict for the game Clash Royale is: If you love strategy games, tower defense games, card battle and online battle games then it is a Must Play for you. This game requires a bit of patience, a lot of real-time thinking and good internet connection. You get to make new friends and participate in tournaments and if you are one of the best players at this game, you can also win some real cash prizes with regular competitions hosted by Supercell.

If you like Clash Royale, you may also want to check out these alternative games that are similar to Clash Royale.

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Clash Royale Review
  • Gameplay
  • Graphics
  • Controls
  • Cost
4.9

Summary

Pros: – Enjoyable without paying – Large & active community base – Regular Events and Tournaments – Social aspects (Friends & Clan) Cons: – Cards take long time to upgrade if not spending money – Stable internet connection required – No offline play Download Clash Royale

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