As some of you know, I recently received the Planetside beta in the mail, and I spent some time playing it this morning after hang-ups through the week made it kind of difficult to get any real experimentation done.
When I first logged in, I had to download patches for 9 hours. That kind of arrested my ability to play the first night--then again, with a beta, I expected things like that. I tried it last night, but the servers were down, and then other things got my attention, so I finally got to play this morning.
Planetside, at first glance, seems like a pretty good game. Lag isn't really a problem with the relatively few people on the server, but that might change when the game goes retail. The best way to describe the MMOFPS is Halo combined with Everquest or something. It's a bizarre concept, but it seems to work. You choose one of three factions (the Terran Republic, the Vanu Sovereignty, or the New Conglomerate), each with their own equipment and specialties, though a lot of weapons and whatnot are common to all three of them. I went Vanu, because they have alien technology and energy weapons, despite the fact that there's currently a very, very small XP penalty (-1%) on the server I'm on for playing a Vanu since they're outnumbering the other factions.
The interface is fairly good--it has the feel of Halo or Counterstrike. The game utilizes a "cone of fire" system which reduces your accuracy if you sustain fire with automatic weapons or try to fire while moving or jumping. It's not extreme, like in CS, but it does make a difference. The targeting reticle, as you might expect, changes size to show how accurate your aim is--a smaller reticle area equals more accuracy. Crouching makes you more accurate, and being a CS player, it came naturally to me to crouch before firing. The game plays more like Halo or whatever in the sense that you can take a few hits before going down, unlike in CS, where being shot usually means you're pretty much dead. I'd compare the rate at which you lose life when shot to Perfect Dark (possibly a little slower), or maybe Goldeneye without the obnoxious damage delay. The game handles grief players by causing you to accumulate "grief points" whenever you damage allies with friendly fire. If you hit someone on accident every once in a while, your grief points will dissipate, and it won't really matter, but if you make a point to shoot your own friends often enough, and on purpose, your weapons will stop working, or you may even be banned.
The FPS element definitely overshadows the RPG element. Combat is the first order of the game. Squads can be formed, much like the party system in an MMORPG, and it's definitely advantageous to be in a squad, as there is no XP sharing--each squad member gets full XP for kills made by the others. There are no stats other than health, armor, and stamina, so "leveling up" is less important than player skill. There are no NPC monsters--it's all about PvP action. Leveling up provides you with more "certification points," which are spent to learn specific skills, such as how to pilot certain vehicles or use various weaponry, in addition to improving skills such as hacking, repairing, and combat medic-type abilities. In addition, you can "unlearn" all the skills you've learned, get the points back, and spend them in a totally different way, from what I understand, so you aren't locked into a character class or skill tree. Some skills do have prereqs, though.
The global war aspect of the game takes place in the form of a Dark Age of Camelot-esque territorial capturing system. Players can use tools and skills to hack into enemy facilities and outpost towers to capture them for their own team, expanding the influence of their side. Capturing a base takes time, and generally requires a concerted team effort, though I'm sure lone-wolf hackers will be able to make a name or themselves capturing outposts on their own--however, they've done some changes to the way XP is awarded, and you don't really get much of a reward for capturing an oupost unless you or your squad has to fight through hordes of enemies in the process, because the XP value of a capture is reduced if you didn't actually have to kill something like 20 unique enemy soldiers.
Personally, I like the equipment system. By eliminating the MMORPG "phat lewt" type system where equipment is dropped, and removing money from the equation, acquiring a gun and getting into the battle is quick and easy. You simply step up to an equipment terminal--the terminal can produce any type of weapon or armor you're certified to use (which is determined by how you spent those points). You're only limited by what you can carry, which is determined by the type of armor you're wearing. The biggest infantry suits can carry two rifles, two pistols, and a fair stock of ammo, medkits, grenades, whatever. There are also battlesuit type armors with build in weapons called MAXes--they come in different varieties, each equipped with different stuff. As far as "phat lewt" goes, you can loot enemy soldiers' corpses, which basically means you can restock your ammunition or pick up their weapons if you want them.
There are a wide range of vehicles to drive, none of which I've had the chance to actually pilot. Light, single-man tanks, dune buggies with machine guns, fighter-bomber type hover jets, heavy assault transport ships, and portable bases (which allow you to respawn closer to the action and restock your ammo supplies, and they cloak themselves for protection) are all on the roster. Vehicles are requisitioned the same way weapons are. You walk over to the appropriate platform and spawn whatever you're certified to drive.
My only beef with the game so far is that I thought it was pretty hard to find any action, and I spent a lot of time walking around looking for things to shoot at. I think that'll be mitigated somewhat when I learn to drive a vehicle instead of traveling on foot everywhere. It may also have to do with the current player density--the game is huge, areawise, and the servers have less than 2000 people apiece on them at any given time. Other than that? Assuming they can keep the lag under control, it looks very promising.
Before you ask, no, I can't send you a pirate copy of the game. It's 3 CDs, which would result in my having to transfer some 2.5 GB of data to someone over AIM or upload it (an impossibility).
o.o Any questions/comments/suggestions? <p>--------
The Archmage: Sadistic GM or handsome bishounen? You decide!
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