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[General Article] PlanetSide 2: Review in Progress - Part 1
BillMurphy
Former Managing EditorMember LegendaryPosts: 4,565
We've been playing SOE's free-to-play MMOFPS, PlanetSide 2, and today we're kicking off our review-in-progress series with a focus on character creation and first impressions.
If you aren’t overwhelmed with the experience and manage to get a hang for what’s going on, the beauty of the game shines through particularly well. At least so far, SOE has succeeded where the original PlanetSide fell short: PlanetSide 2 is first and foremost a solid shooter.
Read more of Michael Bitton's PlanetSide 2: Review in Progress #1 – Character Creation & First Steps.
Try to be excellent to everyone you meet. You never know what someone else has seen or endured.
Comments
The massive confusion of the initial drop and first fight is the best part. That best replicates what war is and I loved it. It was one of few times in a game, let alone a MMO that I felt a "rush" from the first second of the game.
I understand for some people this is to much, but that is the difference between a soldier and a civilian. Soldiers thrive on that, civilians dont. Not knocking civilians, as I am one myself now thanks to injuries from my time in the service, but not everyone is cut out to fight. And that is what sums up PS2, not everyone is cut out to play this game.
So much crap, so little quality.
Cringe.
Like this guy up here that wants to compare this to real life war lol he is in deep and wait till someone pops his head off his neck in game, bet he breaks another keyboard :-)
I love planetside 2, really I do but sometimes i wish there were other enemies populating those massive maps than just players.
You trek across a massive plain and there's nothing to do.
Playing: Nothing
Looking forward to: Nothing
You know... I see these complaints all the time...
"huge treks for nothing" ... are you SERIOUS!?!? Do you NOT LOOK AT THE MAP?
Listen, look at the map. There are "instant action" drops that put you RIGHT into combat. Highlight the area hex's... it'll say... enemy detected, enemy platoon detected, no activity detected.
The United States in WORLD WAR II was in the war but how many major fights were in Iowa or Arkansas? None. So why would you DEPLOY there? You'd deploy to the action.
There's a timer on the drop... if you drop down and there's very little fighting you could be stuck out in the open.
Its like traveling in DayZ, could take forever and a day to get to the next "hotspot" and that skirmish could be over as well or it could be one single newb just fliping stuff... then you have to trek again.
Playing: Nothing
Looking forward to: Nothing
warp to HQ and buy a mosquito.
I suggest finding a squad and traveling with them it leads to more chances of action and it will be safer for you, large open swaths of the battle field are part of the game, and make perfect areas to set up ambushes, especially when you can start figuring out the direction enemys are more likely to start hoofing it from. Going out alone will start to lead to you getting ambushes and killed and then we gotta hear people complaining about gankers, when in a war senario such as this its a legitimate tactic.
Also stated above, theres plenty access to ground or flying vehicles that help get to combat quicker, but you cant expect to see whats going on everywhere all the time, plenty of groups tend to avoid action untill they get to where they wanna strike and then Blitzgrieg it.
Im watching the count down timer patiently....more or less lol
Mess with the best, Die like the rest
I love the game, my complaint wasn't with the long treks so much as the big dead world we play on.
They could spruce it up a bit, make the world feel like a living breathing thing.
Its not that big of a complaint to be honest and wont stop me from playing.
Its just something that i wonder when i am on my treks here and there.
Playing: Nothing
Looking forward to: Nothing
The world seems big when you first get in, but after you've got like 10 hours (or even less) on your belt, you start to recognize locations.
At least that's how I felt.. And once you know the map, and how the instant drop / spawn on squad leader / and re-deploy works, it's very very easy to get to the action, even if you die, it shouldn't take you more than a couple of minutes to be right back in there.. If you wish.
Anyone who reads this, if you're one who thinks the world is too large and dead, try this...
Spawn Scythe / Mosquito / Reaver, fly from your own warpgate, to someone elses warpgate, maybe even time it, I gurantee you'll be surprised at how short the distance really is, and how fast you got there.
Also IMHO, if you are a true mmorpg player than this game is NOT for you! PLANETSIDE 2 IS A SHOOTER MUCH LIKE BATTLEFIELD!! IF YOU DON'T LIKE SHOOTERS DON'T TRY IT YOU WON'T LIKE IT!
For me, i've been waiting for a futuristic shooter game like this ever since Battlefield 2142 and this is much better than 2142 was and I will be enjoying this game for a long time (hopefully).
I tired it today for about 2hours. Im completely new to FPS's and I found the "tutorial" info severely lacking. even the Tutorial youtube videos assume you have prior experience with PS and fps in general. I found the minimap confusing, i couldn't intuitively tell what all those little blips were, noone was talking and I was killed 3 times in those 2 hours by what the game told me was friendly fire.
I just don't know about this game.. Im not ready to give up just yet but Im already frustrated by it.
Watch your thoughts; they become words.
Watch your words; they become actions.
Watch your actions; they become habits.
Watch your habits; they become character.
Watch your character; it becomes your destiny.
Lao-Tze
hmm.. not really. In real life you don't get dropped into a war without any training. In fact, you spend months training. People here are just asking for a decent hour long tutorial or something.
FACT: This game sucks.
After playing the crap outta the first Planetside I am pretty sure PS2 has actually gone backwards in the quality of the game. Next time, steer clear of the F2P model. Ruins everything.
FACT: That is not a fact, that is your opinion.
That said, I played for somewhere between 3-5 hours. I've been playing VS and an engi and having a blast. I'm not a FPS gamer by any stretch of the imagination. I think the most I've EVER put into an FPS would be 44 hours into TF2, and a bunch as well into Perfect Dark back on the N64. Also, I've never played the first, so I had no idea what to expect. But I enjoyed it, and that's what matters to me.
This is so fail that I don't even have words to describe it. My attempt at a summary:
1) Netcode is terrible
2) Graphics and animations are extremely dated (not even rag doll physics for kills - only scripted animations), making the game feel stiff and unresponsive compared to today's FPS games.
3) Pay 2 Win
I'm confused what the target audience is for this game, since true FPSes will not play such a mediocre shooter and MMO fans who are the typical F2P suckers will not be interested in this, so... yeah. My bet is on this game doing quite poorly.
Planetside 2 looks even worse if you compare it to Planetside 1, but... Planetside 1 is P2P, and then there is the whole 'sequalitis' thing, but yeah, you get what you pay for, and what little Planetside 2 does have, isnt really that appealing, i can't see other Planetside 1 vets going for it either, which may be intentional if they want people to continue subbing to Planetside 1. I would be very surprised if Planetside 2 was in any way successful tbh, it may be F2P but the free part isnt really all that free, and if your going to spend money anyway, then Planetside 1 has much better VFM.
Its a decent shooteem up for a bit game just like Planetside. Nothing awe inspiring about it..nothing particualry great about it. Just there and kinda fun..shrug.
My only complaint with it has to do with damage output..imo vehicles particularly aircraft do not do enough damage especially to infantry. Infantry vs Infantry is fine. shrug.
Other then that it is what it is.
How can one make a revieuw when 50% of EU cannot even log in due to Launcher crashes :P
Welcome to Beta, enjoy your stay thanks for your money and we hope to fix the game within 1 year.
I know launch is hard to get done right, but man Prosieben + SOE are making it realy hard for themselves.
Loged in last night for 20 min then got booted and never got back in.
Tried this morning played for 10 minutes then got booted and still cannot log back in.
Sony forums are filled with rage
Bad bad day for Sony.
I am using the SOE launcher and client and that one isn't much better.
I was crashing every 20 minutes or so. Could almost set a clock on it for the next freeze and crash.
I would hope players of this game do not feel that their soldier is a “special snowflake”.
“If you’ve never played PlanetSide 2 before, or if you’re new or inexperienced with shooters, this can be pretty intimidating and even worse, confusing.”
- I can see a hand holding Tutorial being asked for here. The first step to making the game more easymode and he has only just started! SOE should not have to design this game for people who are not familiar with shooters. Just like other MMO’s should not design their game for people who are not used to point and click.
A MMO does not need to be a hand held experience from character creation to top level. The adrenaline rush of sudden combat, the surprise of the intensity of the starter experience. All this is nothing to the reviewer, only the concern that the game is not newbie friendly.
"There’s simply a ton going on all at once with all the players and vehicles and trying to make sense of the various peripheral objectives floating around your HUD at the same time can potentially be frustrating."
- Ok it it not kill ten rats. There is a learning curve, is that so bad? So bad you have to pan a game for it?
"SOE ended up making a change near the end of the test that promises to improve the acquisition of unlocks by roughly 30% in general."
- This does worry me, getting to end level more quickly is never good in a MMO.
Well, I'm not a big fan of fps games, but I had a blast playing PS2 today.
Didn't have any problems downloading the game, and I never experienced lag or disconnectrions.
Was quite surprised about this because all the NA servers were high or full.
Can't say I would make this game my main MMO, but I believe SOE did a great job with this game, and I will be PvPing a lot on this game in the next few months for sure.
My PvE is already covered with other titles so this is a great addition to my stable of MMOs.
No need to purchase a game box so go download and decide if it's good enough for you.
I was in a beta for a bit and didn't really enjoy it, I downloaded it again last night anyway.
The shooting feels really floaty, I have been playing lots of counter strike recently so that won't help, but the shooting doesn't really have any impact at all.
The game also looks terrible on any settings below HIGH, not everyone can play on high and this game isn't for them. Even on the main menu playing at my native res the sample soldier is all blurry, everything in the world is too, its like playing the game in a drunken haze.
I will give it some more time and see how I can change the settings, I also have no proper idea how to upgrade myself yet and progress seems really slow.
It doesn't really have that instant pull, I spent the first 30 minutes trying to find the enemy, once I did we assaulted a base and that was great but I still didn't really get sucked in, I think it's the shooting and the death animation that really kill it for me.