My feedback after playing Arkheron
Quick note before I start: I wrote this with ChatGPT because English is not my first language. All the ideas and opinions are mine. I only used it to organize the feedback and express what I wanted to say more clearly in English.
I genuinely want this game to succeed. I have been looking for something with this kind of combat for a long time: a competitive action game with real depth, a high skill ceiling and enough mechanical expression to keep improving for a long time.
Most of my time was spent playing Spires, the Tower mode where teams of three keep climbing through several levels. I only played a small amount of the Battle Royale mode afterwards, so most of this feedback is based on Spires.
1. The gameplay loop is too slow
This is probably my biggest issue with the game right now.
In Spires, too much time passes between the moments when I am actually enjoying the game. The fights can be very fun, but the loop around them feels too long. There is too much waiting, preparation and downtime before you get into another meaningful fight.
For me, the problem is the ratio between the time invested and the amount of actual combat you get. When I queue into this kind of game, I want to fight, learn, improve and try again quickly. I do not want to spend a large part of the session waiting for the interesting part to happen.
I also think the training phase inside the mode makes the loop feel even slower. I would rather have a separate place to test items, abilities and builds. When I enter the competitive mode, I want the experience to be more direct.
The game does not need to remove strategy or make every match extremely short, but I do think the time between fights should be reduced a lot. The game is at its best when players are fighting, so the structure should constantly push them back towards that.
2. The combat is the most interesting part of the game
For me, the combat is clearly the strongest part of Arkheron and probably its biggest opportunity.
I have always wanted something that captures the fun part of League of Legends teamfights without requiring all the farming, laning, scaling and macro management around them. What interests me is the mechanical side: positioning, cooldown management, reading the opponent, choosing when to enter, when to leave and how to create an opening.
That is the fantasy I think Arkheron can deliver very well.
I play a lot of action combat games such as Ninja Gaiden, but I also play competitive PvP games like Apex Legends and Deadlock, as well as Battle Royales such as Warzone. I think there is an audience that enjoys action combat and mechanical PvP but does not necessarily want to play another traditional MOBA.
When a fight works properly, the game feels really good. You can reposition, dodge, disengage, reset and enter again. Those moments are the reason I am interested in the game, and I would focus heavily on making them feel even more responsive and fluid.
I would look at things such as animation cancels, advanced movement, directional inputs and more opportunities for mechanical outplays. Maybe some kind of parry or active defensive mechanic could work as well, similar to the one in Deadlock, although it would obviously need to fit the game and not become annoying.
The important thing for me is that players feel directly in control. When someone makes a good read or executes something difficult, the game should respond immediately and make that moment satisfying.
Advanced tech could also add a lot of depth. For example, the directional inputs while attacking could have more depth, or the game could include some animation cancels—without them feeling like unintended glitches, as sometimes happens with Riven in League.
I tried experimenting with animation cancels by swapping weapons and using directional inputs to see whether I could change or interrupt certain actions. I did not spend that much time testing it and did not find anything particularly interesting, but it is the kind of thing I would like to explore. Not every player needs to use these mechanics, but people enjoy discovering them and improving at them over time.
3. My experience with the Battle Royale mode
I only played a small amount of the Battle Royale mode, so I do not want to pretend that I fully understand it. Still, my first impression was not very positive.
I played a full match and finished feeling tired rather than excited. The mode felt slow and heavy, and too much of the time was spent doing things that were not particularly fun for me.
The PvE part, especially killing normal enemies, did not feel enjoyable. It felt like something I had to do before reaching the part I actually wanted, which was fighting other players.
Again, the main problem was the feedback loop. There were very few fights and quite long periods of farming and opening chests between them. I reached floor three, received very little progression and thought: “Was that it?”
It felt like I had invested a lot of time without getting much satisfaction back.
Maybe the mode becomes more interesting once you understand it better, and maybe it is simply not designed for my type of player. Still, Spires was much more entertaining to me, even though Spires also feels too slow.
I would be careful about dividing the player base between too many modes, especially if one of them does not clearly show the best part of the game. For me, the Battle Royale structure takes attention away from the combat rather than supporting it.
I would honestly be more curious about a hardcore extraction-style mode than a traditional Battle Royale. Something where you prepare a build, enter with real risk, fight other teams and extract with meaningful rewards could be interesting.
My main preference, however, would still be a strong arena mode with a much shorter and more direct loop.
4. Characters, shop items and build identity
I think the way Arkheron builds characters through items is interesting and gives the game something different from a normal hero-based PvP game.
There are character items and more generic shop items. If you collect four items belonging to the same character, you transform into that character.
The character items feel designed around a specific playstyle. Their abilities and mechanics relate to each other, so collecting them creates something coherent. The generic shop items feel more like weaker, more conditional or more isolated alternatives, and using them can also stop you from completing a character transformation.
That creates an interesting idea, but I also think the relationship between the two types of items needs to be clearer and deeper.
To me, they should serve two different purposes. Character items should define the mechanical identity and playstyle you are building towards. Shop items should add strategic depth and allow you to modify or specialize that playstyle without necessarily competing directly with the transformation system.
Right now, both systems seem to exist in the same space, and that can make the generic items feel less meaningful. The character items already have a clear mechanical direction, while some of the other items feel more situational and less connected to a complete build.
I think the game should make it easier to understand what each layer is supposed to provide. A new player should first understand the basic idea of the character or playstyle they are creating, and then discover the deeper item combinations over time.
I would also like to be able to specialize in a particular build and become genuinely good at playing it. I want to learn its timings, matchups, combos, weaknesses and movement options.
I am not as interested in having a completely random identity every match. Adaptation is good, but I still want to feel that I am developing mastery over something consistent. Maybe the game already allows this and I simply did not play enough to see it clearly.
Another idea I kept thinking about was combining two character paths.
For example, if you collected half of the required items from one character and half from another, maybe that could unlock a hybrid transformation, a special ultimate, a passive or an ability variation.
I understand that full hybrid characters would be extremely difficult to develop because of the number of combinations. Still, some smaller version of that idea could make mixing character items feel intentional rather than simply preventing you from completing either transformation.
If build expression is an important part of the game, I think experimenting with combinations should feel rewarding.
5. The game needs a stronger reason to keep playing
Another thing I felt was missing was a clear motivation to continue after a match.
When I finished playing, I did not feel that there was something specific pulling me into the next game, apart from the combat itself being addictive. I did not have a strong short-term goal, an interesting unlock or a progression system that made me curious.
A competitive game can survive mainly because its gameplay is extremely good, but the gameplay needs to be incredibly addictive for that to be enough. Most successful games also give the player small reasons to return.
Brawl Stars and other Supercell games do this very well. The matches are short, but players are constantly progressing towards something: characters, rewards, resources, cosmetics or other small goals.
Arkheron does not need to copy those systems, and I am not saying it needs aggressive monetization or endless grinding. It just needs a better answer to the question: “Why should I play one more match?”
I do not like games that become grinding machines, like modern Call of Duty games. However, maybe Arkheron could use the extraction mechanics to let players obtain things that persist between matches. You could unlock new characters to play, ability variations or something else. I do not know exactly what the solution should be, but there should be some meaning behind each match.
You should enjoy playing because the combat itself is fun—that is the first reward. Then, because you fought and played the match, you should receive another reward that also feels meaningful.
The exact system matters less than the feeling that each session is moving the player towards something meaningful.
A shorter gameplay loop combined with more frequent rewards would probably make the whole experience feel much better.
6. The main question Arkheron needs to answer
For me, the biggest design question is: what exactly does Arkheron want to become?
The game has good combat, but other games have also had good combat. Battlerite had strong combat. Supervive also had interesting combat. That alone was not enough to make those games succeed in the long term.
Arkheron needs a very clear reason for players to choose it and continue playing it.
Personally, I think the answer should be based around making the combat as satisfying, responsive and replayable as possible, while also creating a much faster and more rewarding loop around it.
The best moments happen when I am in the middle of a fight, managing cooldowns, repositioning, entering and leaving the fight, reading the enemy team and trying to outplay them.
It feels like playing the entertaining part of a League of Legends teamfight without carrying the full burden of a normal League match. I do not need to worry about whether I farmed correctly, whether I am behind in levels or whether I made a macro mistake ten minutes earlier. I can focus on the fight itself.
That is the part I would build the rest of the game around.
Final thoughts
I am writing all of this because I really would like Arkheron to succeed.
I want a game that is action-focused, deep, responsive and competitive, with a large skill gap and a lot of skill expression. I want to be able to spend time mastering its movement, abilities, builds and small combat details.
When Arkheron works, it works very well. The fights can be extremely fun, especially when both teams are repositioning, resetting and looking for the right moment to enter again.
My main concern is that the game currently places too much time and too many systems between those good moments. The loop needs to be shorter, the rewards need to be more frequent and the combat should be pushed even further.
I would focus on responsiveness, mechanical mastery, clearer build identity and stronger reasons to continue playing. I would also be careful with the number and type of game modes. The Battle Royale mode did not appeal to me because it spent too much time away from the part I actually enjoyed.
Arkheron already has a combat system that can be genuinely entertaining. I think the most important thing now is making sure the rest of the game is designed to support it.
