With over 3,000 hours accumulated in this game over the past 4 years, I suppose it's probably time to offer a review on it. For all who come across it, I will try to provide a detailed overview on both the positive and negative aspects of the game. Who knows how long this will be. Pros Gameplay Gameplay is fun and definitely addicting. It's one of the core elements of the game. It's also very immersive, which helps bring players back for more. The game is based on squad-sized player groups. Within these squads there's many classes to choose from, and all have specific purposes, so there's a lot of variety when it comes to roles. However, if you're a new player your best bet is to play an easier role such as Rifleman or Support until you have your bearings and a pretty decent understanding of how the game works. This is generally an unspoken rule among all players, but from a practical standpoint it's the smartest way to approach a game such as this one if you're new to the type. The combat in this game is definitely immersive, but requires a great deal of patience. Be patient with everything! It's enjoyable and you will have a blast once you figure things out. It can, however, also be very repetitive, but this is just me speaking on personal experience with 4 years on record. Infantry combat has remained rather consistent for as long as I've played this game, but tank combat has seen some changes over the years. I haven't done much tanking, but as it stands right now I will say it's an enjoyable experience the mechanics of which could see some improvement, both from a combat and technical perspective. Visually speaking map design is beautiful and helps make the gameplay experience quite immersive. Technically speaking, map design in this game is for the most part just as good. Most maps are pretty balanced, although some are more notorious for having capture points that favor one side over the other, the attacker/defender. It's not uncommon to hear complains about certain maps and their design, although I tend to think that every map has certain strengths and weaknesses that must be taken advantage of in order to have a good experience on them. Essentially, if you're familiar with the maps, know how they work, and know how to approach them, you will have a good experience! Community The second biggest component of this game would be its community. Having played this game for 4 years I've seen every aspect of its playerbase. It's a fantastic group. The vast majority of people who play this game are very welcoming and friendly; most people on here just want to play, have fun and laughs, and shoot the shit. I've made many good online friends through this game over the past 4 years, some of whom I'm quite close with, for which I'm very thankful. As with any community there are toxic players, but they're quite few and far between and will be snuffed out by everyone else when they appear. Cons Game Management Having played this game for as long as I have, I have seen the state of the game fluctuate. For a while the game was moving in an upward trend, but over the past few years has hit a wall and stagnated with no clear and definitive path in sight for its future. As it stands now the game is good - there is nothing inherently wrong with it - but it's not getting better. The game does not progress or improve. In its Early Access days, this game was under Black Matter (initial developer). Although Black Matter had its flaws, they were a good development team who had a vision for the game and what it should be, as well as the motivation to take it there. At the time I began playing in July 2020, updates under Black Matter occurred about ever 2-3 months. These updates were great and always added new content to the game. The game was taking off, gaining more popularity and a stronger playerbase, and was heading in the right direction. However, towards the end of BM's tenure as developer it became more clear that the team was losing interest in the project. Many bugs existed for quite some time that BM never resolved, or only partially resolved, and updates became more sparse. The project was eventually handed over to Team17 (current development team) and Black Matter left. Since Team17 has taken over, I believe the management of the game has gotten substantially worse. T17 has done nothing to progress the game further. Since their takeover, they have released over-ambitious roadmaps (then scrap them entirely because the goals cannot be met), have begun to steer the game into a cosmetic DLC-driven direction (which one can understand for funding, but which has seemed to take priority over other, more important features and which has disappointed many veteran players), have considerably stepped back on community transparency/communication, and have increased the time between major update/patch releases. The last two are of particular concern. Where once updates appeared on average every 2-3 months under Black Matter, under Team17 it has consistently taken at least 6 months just for patches or updates to be released, and most of the time these create an abundance of other in-game issues that previously did not exist while hardly adding anything to improve the game. To be quite blunt I find the worst thing about it to be the length between patches/updates and the quantity/quality/type of content within those patches and updates that would validate them taking so long to roll out. To put it shortly, they do not. As I mentioned above, the game isn't bad , but it's not getting better , it's not progressing forward or improving. It just exists in its current state. Without any proper management and a clear direction to take, this game will eventually die out. Clans Clans have become a very important part of the game, especially on PC, but generally from my experience they do more to detract from the experience of the game than they do to add to it. Many clans have rules in place in their servers that essentially work against new and inexperienced players. Most clan servers have leadership role level cap requirements, i.e. unable to play Squad Leader or Commander until "level X" (many times this ranges from lvls. 30-50). And while I can understand why this is done, I don't believe it helps. The only way for players to gain experience in roles is to play those roles, and players who play often enough have a better chance at becoming more experienced at a smaller level. On many clan servers, Recon classes are also barred for usage by players until they reach a certain level. Ironically, Recon is one of the easier roles to play in the game. Restricting certain roles does not help in any way. I have also seen instances in which certain servers are locked unless a player is a certain level (i.e. "at least level 50 to play here"). Many years ago most players in the game were very willing to help out and teach newcomers; it was something the game and its community unofficially prided itself on. These days most veteran players who have been around as long as myself are not willing to teach new players at all, and act condescendingly towards them. This only creates division and does not improve the quality of the game or gameplay experience. It drives players away rather than entice them to return. Not all clans members are like this of course, but many are. Conclusion In short, this is a great game that offers a great and unique kind of FPS experience. There are some bad things about it, but I do believe the good outshines the bad. If you have patience, communicate, and listen, you'll understand the game much quicker, you'll certainly make some friends, and you'll have a great time playing! Worth the buy!
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