World of Warcraft Experience Hurt Firefall Development
On the contrary, World of Warcraft may have positively inspired Firefall's level design. I was only able to try out one environment, a tropical island area with a busted up boardwalk, pools of water, and other colorful features, but the map was a far cry from the rusty, industrial environments of other shooters. It was like a battle vacation.
Kern added that while putting tons of players in one area might be fun, Red 5 determined that smaller skirmishes are sometimes even better. I tried a 5v5 match and the variation of class abilities combined with drops that might give players a cloak or similar bonus made Firefall feel like the unique type of shooter Red 5 is going for, because I was never just running around with an automatic weapon on blast. Instead, I was judging which attacks would be best to use in various situations, jetpacking to a safe spot to snipe from afar, or dashing over to a fallen ally to save him (which can deny the other team a kill).
The combination of shooter-focused gameplay with a persistent world in which Kern said Red 5 is doing its best to implement quests that are more than just "kill X space marines" has potential to lead to an extremely fun and deep action-based experience with MMO elements. The final product could appeal to MMO fans sick of pressing a key to watch themselves attack a bear over an over, and shooter fans bored with simply fragging lots of noobs.
Firefall will be free-to-play and supported by an in-game marketplace. It's expected for release on the PC in 2011.
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On the contrary, World of Warcraft may have positively inspired Firefall's level design. I was only able to try out one environment, a tropical island area with a busted up boardwalk, pools of water, and other colorful features, but the map was a far cry from the rusty, industrial environments of other shooters. It was like a battle vacation.
Kern added that while putting tons of players in one area might be fun, Red 5 determined that smaller skirmishes are sometimes even better. I tried a 5v5 match and the variation of class abilities combined with drops that might give players a cloak or similar bonus made Firefall feel like the unique type of shooter Red 5 is going for, because I was never just running around with an automatic weapon on blast. Instead, I was judging which attacks would be best to use in various situations, jetpacking to a safe spot to snipe from afar, or dashing over to a fallen ally to save him (which can deny the other team a kill).
The combination of shooter-focused gameplay with a persistent world in which Kern said Red 5 is doing its best to implement quests that are more than just "kill X space marines" has potential to lead to an extremely fun and deep action-based experience with MMO elements. The final product could appeal to MMO fans sick of pressing a key to watch themselves attack a bear over an over, and shooter fans bored with simply fragging lots of noobs.
Firefall will be free-to-play and supported by an in-game marketplace. It's expected for release on the PC in 2011.
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