Bloodline Champions [BLC] review

 Bloodline Champions is an arena-based free to play PvP game developed by the Swedish company Stunlock Studios and distributed by Funcom using Microsoft XNA. It won the "Game of the Year" and "Winner XNA" in the Swedish Game Awards 2009.

The players in this game are split up into two teams (Warm and Cold) with up to five players per team. The objective is different depending on the game mode, ranging from team deathmatch and capture-the-flag to map point control.

Bloodline Champions has 20 bloodlines split into 4 archetypes: tank, ranged damage, melee damage, and healer.

1. Tanks are close-quarters fighters and specialize in defense and peeling—removing pressure from allies by putting equal pressure on enemies.
2. Ranged damage have very low health and deal high damage from a safe distance. They generally have many ways to escape melee combat but are taken down quickly if out-maneuvered.
3. Melee bloodlines generally deal the most damage but must be in close range and have slightly higher health than ranged damage bloodlines. They tend to have very limited ways to control fights aside from their high damage output.
4. Healers mix defensive control abilities with respectable damage, but have very limited mobility and low health.

In BLC there are no items , no in game levels or anything that would make you better than your opponents , the characters are well balanced so the way to glory is in your skill , and team play.

There are also tournaments which are hosted daily. There is a "observer" option where players can observe the tournament matches.

You can buy new bloodlines [ characters ] with "Bloodcoins" or "Funcom points". Bloodcoins are awarded for participating in ranked or custom games , Funcom points can be bought for real life money.

There are also ways to customize your character look by buying outfits or weapons.
Players are awarded with "grades". These grades show how you play. You can earn higher grade by getting to a certain arena rating in solo , 2v2 or 3v3 ranked games.

Even if the game is F2p you can buy game packages which give you benefits like more arena teams , unlocked bloodlines with their weapons and outfits , a chat emblem , Funcom points , bonus bloodcoins etc. You can buy a Titan edition which is 89,99EUR and gives you all characters including the ones to be released , or you can buy a Champion edition which is 29,99EUR and gives you all the characters [except for 1] released till now.

Here is a gameplay commentary video:

All in all its an easy to pick up but hard to master fun game.

LINKS:
Webpage
Registration page
Download link

OTHER USEFUL LINKS:
Bloodline rotation
Forums
Their YouTube channel where you can watch champion profiles.