33 Immortals Transforms MMORPG Raids Into A Stunning Co-op Action Game
A prison break of biblical proportions.
Some of the best parts of massively multiplayer RPGs are raids — long, mechanically complex battles against bosses that require a full squad to take down. But getting there often takes long hours of grinding, and just putting in the time to reach them can be difficult. For anyone who wants to skip to the good part, one new Xbox Game Pass release could be just what you’re looking for.
In 33 Immortals, your goal is to attack and dethrone God. Seriously, you play as a damned soul in the underworld waging a rebellion against the almighty, assisted by characters from Dante’s Inferno. The way out of Hell, it turns out, is fairly straightforward. You just need to slay demons until you’re powerful enough to take down a deity, and you’ll be back above ground in no time.
Behind its absolutely wild premise, 33 Immortals is a fantastic massively multiplayer action game.
Rather than going the MMORPG route, 33 Immortals is a multiplayer roguelike action game. Each run starts in a hub where you select your weapon and check progress on quests, which offer permanent upgrades in exchange for completing objectives like slaying monsters, opening chests, or using certain abilities. 33 Immortals’ weapons fall neatly into roles that RPG players should be familiar with: a tank, a support class, and two damage dealers.
Each of the game’s weapons has unique mechanics, usually generating some resource by attacking then unleashing it for a special attack, like the dagger-wielder’s leaping strike. My favorite of these are the staff, which lets you cast a spell in a wide area to slow enemies, and the greatsword, which lets you counter enemy attacks with careful timing. Like a well-tuned MMORPG, 33 Immortals is best when players use their class abilities to complement each other. Fortunately, they already work well together.
Where other games might be content with four-player parties, 33 Immortals chucks 33 players into the fray at a time. Once a round begins, you have some time to fight and collect resources before a series of challenge rooms called torture chambers open across the map. Each can fit six players, who battle against waves of enemies and gain power-ups called relics. Once 12 torture chambers have been cleared, everyone still alive needs to hurry to designated zones on the map for an ascension battle — a much tougher wave of enemies that need to be taken out before you can head to the area’s boss.
When players actually work together, 33 Immortals is glorious.
The biggest drawback so far in 33 Immortals is the best and worst part of any cooperative game — the other players. The game’s rules are quite simple, but in most rounds I’ve played so far, players seem to have a hard time internalizing that when the game pops up a giant on-screen message saying that more torture chambers are open, you should probably go take care of that. More than once, I’ve been left to try to guide fellow players to these chambers like a sheepdog, despite them being clearly marked on the map. Players’ reluctance to actually play the game can also lead rounds to drag on for way too long, since they only end when the torture chambers are cleared. 33 Immortals is in its very first days, so it’s likely that these confused players will either figure it out or quit eventually, but for now, it’s an issue.
On the other hand, 33 Immortals can be glorious when players actually stick together. In one of the best times I’ve had with the game yet, I went in with a staff and quickly paired up with a greatsword user, both of us wordlessly following each other from encounter to encounter for the entire round, sometimes teaming up with larger groups before splitting off again. The ways that 33 Immortals lets players help one another — like shrines where you can use the bones you loot from enemies to heal yourself and anyone close to you — really shine when you use the buddy system.
33 Immortals distills MMORPG raids into bite-sized sessions.
Boss battles push this cooperation even further. The very first boss in the game is Lucifer, depicted as a three-headed giant shackled in an arena. Here, players attack specific targets to reduce the power of Lucifer’s attacks while clearing out minor enemies that spawn throughout the fight. Co-op powers, which require two to three players to activate, are also crucial, giving players another reason to pay close attention to each other. I was thrilled by how much the boss battle resembled raids I’d played in World of Warcraft and Final Fantasy XIV, demanding individual skill and cooperation in equal measure.
Still in early access, or Game Preview as Xbox calls it, 33 Immortals is already growing into its own. There’s a messy system of multiple in-game currencies (none of which you actually pay for) that could use more explanation, and the overall pace of rounds can be quite slow. But these issues are really just quibbles. I went into 33 Immortals with essentially no expectations, and thanks to its genuinely novel take on co-op action, I can’t wait to jump in for another round.
