Titanfall

[DragonBlaze]

Other than the occasional Halo parties with friends, I usually don't get that into FPS games, but man, this game is fun.

The campaign is a joke, and I don't think there isn't enough character customization, but the combat is done very well. I love the ability to essentially go anywhere on the map, run on walls, climb up ledges, and fly though windows. It's kind of like parkour, on crack, with a shotgun. Then when you're in a bind, you can drop a giant ****ing mech into battle, and blow **** up.

If more FPS games adopt some of the dynamic combat Titanfall introduced, I may need to start getting into more of the games.

Anyone else play the game or have thoughts on it?

[Archem]

I played the beta and thought it was pretty fun. The level of mobility offered by giving everyone jump packs and wall running felt great, and I have no reason to doubt it'll become the next big thing (like regenerating HP, two guns, waist-high cover, ADS, and aim assist), but this time I'll actually enjoy it. I also enjoy seeing a game that actually embraces a futuristic sci-fi setting again. The best we've had for years either involved the practically modern near-future (such as Ghost Recon or CoD Black Ops 2) or had aliens (Halo, Mass Effect). While that's all neither good nor bad, it's grown a bit dull. This kind of sci-fi is what I'm looking for.

The Titans, on the other hand, left me wanting. I wasn't expecting some full-on mech simulation, but I was expecting a greater sense of power. Instead, I found the power of the Titan weapons to be underwhelming, and Titan-on-Titan combat felt like battles of attrition (A bit funny, considering that's the name of a game mode). In a 1v1 scenario, I never felt like I was doing damage to another Titan. I understand that the game wouldn't be as fun if your big, armored war machine was made of cardboard, but the sudden jump from combat where just a few shots can net a kill to combat where giant cannons and missile barrages don't make much of an impact on your opponents feels disappointing. Maybe I just never got to see the "good" weapons because of the level cap.

The standard on-foot combat, with the exception of the awesome parkour-inspired movement, feels just like Call of Duty. That's not exactly a bad thing, since that means it's very smooth, but it still has FPS tropes that I'm not much of a fan of. Sprinting everywhere, mashing the melee key in CQC, and regenerating HP are big irritants in shooters for me. I would have been completely hooked on the combat if not for the recurring blandness that CoD gameplay popularized. I'm aware that the same people who founded IW founded Respawn (and 2015, Inc. before both), but it would be nice if they could stray from those established roots a little bit more.

The last little bit of nit-picking I have is, again, related to Titans. The anti-Titan weaponry feels very useless. They have next to no punch, even against infantry (which shocked the hell out of me). I understand that they're supposed to be a team-effort weapon, giving in-combat friendly Titans an edge over enemy Titans, or multiplying their effectiveness when half the team focuses a single target, but it still really feels like a drop in the bucket unless the enemy Titan is already doomed. It feels like a finisher, but little else. Maybe it's like Battlefield where there's a weak spot where the real damage can happen (other than Rodeo-ing), but I just couldn't get over how simultaneously powerful-yet-powerless combat that related to Titans felt. All armor, no impact.

I like the bots on the map, though. It's always fun to have cannon fodder to shoot at, especially since the game is limited to a paltry 6v6.

Anyway, most of my views may well be outdated and obsolete (beta gameplay, after all), but what I saw left me wanting in a way I doubt they anticipated. I'd love to get the game, but I'm in no hurry to get it at full price. Really, I'm more interested in seeing the good ideas find their way into other games that more closely suit my interests. I also pine for a game that takes all this and makes a proper single player experience for people to enjoy. As much as I like multiplayer, it almost always comes second to single player for me.