Something new to the Videogame Volumes, monthly mobile game reviews. One Tuesday of every month, I’ll be exploring one of the hottest mobile games that’s circulating around school.

For this month, I’ll be reviewing the classic Clash Royale from game developers Supercell, who have also developed other popular mobile games like Clash of Clans and Brawl Stars.

Clash Royale is a strategic multiplayer game where you take an 8 card deck and play a 1 vs 1 or 2 vs 2 in party mode, in a corresponding “arena” based on your skill level. When you load into the game, you’ll start out with 4 of the 8 cards in your deck and will be limited to having only 4 cards at one time throughout the game with all cards cycling after it’s used. Each card costs an amount of elixir, which you slowly gain about every 3 seconds until double elixir time, where you gain it about every 1 second until you hit the max of 10 elixir. 

Games go by pretty quickly, usually 3 minutes long but if there is a tie at the end of regulation, then players will have an additional 2 minutes of overtime. It has a good combination of quick thinking and preparation while still being fun and engaging. The game requires a good balance of both strong attacking and defense capabilities while keeping track of costs because if you run out of elixir, you’ll be stranded and powerless for at least 6 seconds, which could make or break your game.

Clash Royale also offers fun ways to play with your friends, whether that’s through custom 1v1s, playing in 2v2 party game modes, or creating a guild where you can chat, trade cards, and challenge each other. 

It’s a great and different take on the original Clash of Clans which is more slower paced with the amount of resources you need to collect. You can learn Clash Royale pretty quickly, you can play casually or seriously, cards are easily obtainable through different tiered chests that only take time to unlock, and it’s a great way to pass any free time you have in class. I would totally recommend giving it a try and I would rate it a solid 8.4 out of 10.