APB: Finally, I Can Be A PUNK!

[Mrbloodworth]

I looked, you haven't posted your views yet Lorekeep. You should.

[LK]

What's the point?

Seriously. So you can spin my impressions and provide the optimist's viewpoint?

My view is that they nailed the customization and dropped the ball on everything else. Not really on purpose, but this is the culmination of years of work, and I hate seeing so much effort put into something that doesn't achieve the high standard it set for itself. Everyone from Real Time Worlds is going to put a smilie face on their work because it's their baby and even if it's semi-retarded and is missing a leg, they'll rationalize and shrug their shoulders and put as best of a impression out there as they can help. You're going to put a positive spin as well based on a very-specific type of experience that doesn't take into account the wide variety of players out there and their playstyles. You are, defined by your playstyle, an exception. It's unsurprising to me that you would praise the shit out of the game based on you fulfilling the game's ideal scenario for how players play the game. For the rest of us, the game is more along the lines of Stormwaltz's experience.

They know how to create sexy characters, male and female. No other game really hits up the realism and urban customization akin to Saints Row in an MMO space as much as they have. I love the shit out of it; I want to play around with it and use that avatar in other places besides this game. By creating a game that requires login to a server and accounts, they've eliminated piracy until someone figures out how to run private servers, which is somewhat pointless given their game design. They have a small segment of their game that's free; that keeps players interested in the game world when they don't have to pay a subscription and gives them incentive to subscribe if they feel they are missing out.

Everything else: blah.

Tutorial is a travesty. I'm surprised you ignored this bit but you do work on WURM so  . The tutorial shows you two things: Driving is terrible with a keyboard and has none of the smoothness of a GTA that is a joy to drive in, and that the maps are small. They are maybe 1/3 or 1/2 the size of a GTA district. They are laid out poorly. I see a lot of complaints about mission objectives being under sniping spots that are almost impossible to counter. I feel like the maps were designed more around realism than by preventing effective counters to dominant positions.

The tutorial also sets you up for the bulk of your gaming experience: extremely boring, repetitive, pointless just-to-advance missions. The world is a vacuum. It sets a scenario, a perpetual war-state, and leaves it there. Advancement is driven by a desire to unlock bigger and better, that's it. Doing things for the sake of doing them. I admit that I did get a bit of a kick out of ramming storefronts and making off with the goods, but that was the highlight of my experience. The world is dull and uninteresting otherwise. There is no dynamic to the game like you'd find in Planetside, no metagame. Far as I can tell, as you advance, what you should pick to be your best is always an obvious choice based on equipment and mods.

Match-making mid-mission is bad, bad bad. 1v1 scenarios devolve into either curb stomps or lots and lots of waiting. The highlight of my HATE for this game was being put on a "Guard this checkpoint for 10 minutes or kill this guy 5 times". It was the absolute dullest thing I've ever done. It didn't help that my opponent looked like the cop from the Village People. My experience with match-making also put me in very poor situations including:

1. Multiple times I'd join a mission just as it is being completed, frequently resulting in a loss and Threat Level.
2. At Threat Level ~9, I was matched against three different opponents on defense. I could not find Backup in time and was forced to fail the mission because no matter how good one player is, 2v1 or 3v1 can result in a fast, fast death.
3. I was placed as opposition to a mission taking place on the opposite side of the Financial District, 1000m away. By the time I got there it was over.
4. I was placed solo against a team of 4 very experienced players, likely all of them grouped, and this occurred multiple times. Since I didn't know how many allies I had, only enemies, joining is a risky gamble.

The more I think about the UI, the more things I can come up with to pick apart. Judging an opponent's threat level via icons you don't know the meaning of is stupid. Item / Vehicle Drop-Off Points disappear when accepting missions. Hold Tab to see score screen, not toggle press, like every other shooter out there. Reticules were uninformative. It was difficult to know how much damage I was doing to my opponent. Many basic chat commands missing (may have been added in). Double-clicking to perform UI actions not supported. Interacting with the character customization editor is archaic. I didn't even try Vehicle / Sound editor. Lots of UI elements I can't mouse over to get a tooltip explaining what it is. Memory doesn't serve me well on this but I think the Achievements and other character advancement things were not implemented well, nor could I measure progress.

Other game mechanic elements that I had issues with: click-to-aim feels wonky. Climbing ladders is too slow and leaves you extremely vulnerable and are often abused. Smash and Grab hits won't always register. Can't turn my cellphone off in an Action District when doing open-world crimes. Objectives can be covered with vehicles (and other little exploits I'm sure I haven't discovered but can be abused by the system).

Some of these may have changed but a lot of my complaints go to the core of the design, things that should have been ironed out and addressed much, much earlier than they have. APB has promoted so much of its customization angle, and for good reason, because that's the highlight of the game. It's a damn shame depending on your graphics settings that you can't really see the designs. I am willing to believe that the game is going to ship without a method via a web browser to check out a player's custom content. It's going to be screenshots and forum attachments instead of what should be supported by the developer, but given the numerous problems with the core game, I'd rather they iron those out then make a whole new feature like I described. They likely don't have the web guys for it either.

There isn't a single feature in this game that is implemented in such a fashion as to lessen the impact of other features. All I really cared about was making a sexy Asian criminal, but the novelty of it wore out fast. After I maxed Veronika Lee and moved on to Shift, seeing the same shit, different district, I gave up.

[Mrbloodworth]

What's the point?

Seriously. So you can spin my impressions and provide the optimist's viewpoint?

Because I would like to read them?

Not sure whats wrong with you.

EDIT: Ok, Wow, not sure why most of the first paragraph was about me.

[LK]

Because I hate cheerleaders. All RTW's promotion of the game up until this point is comprised of cheerleaders despite the home team being sodomized on the field. Fuck, CliffyB was brought in to cheerlead the game. I see what you say about this game as cheerleading. You are ENCOURAGING PEOPLE TO PURCHASE THIS GAME. I find that to be a huge mistake in its current state of development.

[Mrbloodworth]

I'm just posting my experiences, opinion and what ever I know about the game. I kinda figured that was the point. I had already posted about things that concern me. Quite sure I warned people honestly this may not be what they thought it was. My sharing my experiences was to let people form there own opinion, in fact I think I said wait for a trial/try it yourself.

Other than that, I have just been posting tips or info.

So sue me.

/drinks more tasty kool aide

[HaemishM]

There are some nice ideas in APB, but it lacks the hook to keep me (a casual player who doesn't have an optimal rig and connection speed) playing.

This. I wanted to like this so bad. When I first started the Euro beta, I was excited by the gameplay. It's a game you can certainly play for long enough that when you finally drag yourself away from it, you look at the clock bug-eyed and go "WHAT TIME IS IT? OH FUCK!" But it misses the boat on a lot of things. I played the NA beta this weekend to see if less lag would help. It didn't.

The game is agonizingly frustrating solo. That right there is a game killer for me. It's a shooter and I don't mind dying, only I'm constantly dying and I don't know why. The 3rd person perspective does not help. A 1st person shooter is much much more fun to me, and shooting is much easier. The shooting in this game feels like the shooting in the PC versions of GTA - soupy, sloppy and sluggish as fuck. The driving is even worse, especially when lag hits. I expect driving to be at least as good as Battlefield 2 in a PC game. It isn't, it's much worse. I don't feel like player skill has as much to do with it as it should, because the disparity in results between myself (probably intermediate level shooter skill - I don't usually have higher kills to deaths ratios - 1:1 is a great day for me - but I'm not a total suckfest) and others is bad. Either you're very very good or you are fucking roadkiill. The shotgun was popular in beta for a reason. It was the only way some folks like me could get kills.

The missions are bizarre. As an enforcer, I don't act much different than a criminal. The only difference is criminals don't care about running down pedestrians while enforcers need to be careful of who they plow through when in their car. As an enforcer, it's easier for me to steal a car instead of finding a vehicle spawn and spawning my own car. At that point, why am I spending money on my own car? I get it, it's a game, but it still breaks the immersion. The missions do come fast and furious. But the interface, the HUD is jumbled and confusing. The entire game reminds me of an arcade full of pinball machines, all these lights blinking at you and sounds surrounding you until your eyes bleed and you're deaf. It doesn't help that the sound for receiving a mission offer is straight out of a pinball game (even though it's meant to be a cell phone ring).

Two battle zones? REALLY? Yes, they are incredibly detailed (but mostly feel like great zombie-filled backdrops). Yes, you could spend days exploring them and finding all sorts of little nooks and crannies. But their first priority after fixing bugs needs to be building more districts. That city scape is going to get OLD QUICK.

I'm not good enough and my computer isn't fast enough to pay money for this game. I want to, but I know it just isn't worth it.

[Ghambit]

What's funny is, they could've left the action districts "the suck" and have been just fine if they'd put any thought into the social aspects of the game...  tagging, personalization, housing, minigames, events, etc.

The game is a lifeless deadzone as a whole, which leaves no reason to even get involved in the character you create, effectively eliminating the core point of the game - kicking ass to gain "reputation."  This is where it failed to me.  I didnt care as much about the core combat because it is what it is, a UT3 mod.  BUT, the rest of the design left me wondering why I was doing what I was doing.

Cheerleading a few fun moments in the action districts is all fine and dandy, but objectively the game has way too many holes and hence wont deserve $50+sub. fee.  At most, it felt like a $39.95 game with some microtrans.   Blood is kinda right, but Lorekeep is righter.

[Mrbloodworth]

Ok, well I don't see where I was cheer leading (I re-read my posts from after NDA dropping), but sure. Ok.

I'll just stop posting, hows that?

My bad for expressing my opinions.

[tazelbain]

Not your fault Lorekeep was traumatized by APB.

[LK]

I just want to rage so hard against this game. I wanted it to be good. I wanted to have a game where I could make a Saints Row-type character with intense customization and have a damn good reason to strut around and have fun with it. I expected triple-A, and I got B or C level MMO that will have a hard time justifying itself against run-of-the-mill cookie-cutter F2P MMOs that come out. The looks factor in heavily but, like Blizzard, it really comes down to the mechanics of the game, not the look of your main character. That's why I didn't post. Calling me out like that and implying I was going to be another one of those "Oh ho ho you criticize but don't contribute so as to make yourself above criticism" is why we're here now.

[Mrbloodworth]

Not your fault Lorekeep was traumatized by APB.

No no. Its me. I'm batshit crazy for enjoying something. I could not have possibly had any fun in the more than 100 hours I played. I honestly wanted to know his views, because his drive by doom casting intrigued me. Anyway, carry on, I just hope he feels better having gotten it out, perhaps eviljohn will put it to good use.

* Mrbloodworth loves the kool aide

I will try to leave the thread unmolested, but ill answer direct questions if I can. Any anyone who wants to join my merry bunch of lunatics, just PM me.

[Sky]

I love the shit out of it; I want to play around with it and use that avatar in other places besides this game.

Heh. Yes.

About maps: I forgot to mention that on the way to one objective I somehow landed under an overpass, couldn't jump over the wall and ran around trying to figure out how to get around it until the mission timed out and I gave up. Maybe if I stuck with the game long enough, I'd know better. But if I've played maybe four times and logged out in frustration every time, something I don't normally do, something's not right.

Ok, well I don't see where I was cheer leading (I re-read my posts from after NDA dropping), but sure. Ok.

I'll just stop posting, hows that?

My bad for expressing my opinions.

What are you, two? Man up and embrace your shilling. At least you didn't get grief titled for it 

[Modern Angel]

Stop being passive-aggressive. It's fine if you want to like it and play it and rub it all over your hard nipples but it's equally fine to point out they've been shoveling some shit and that you'll be done with it in maximum two months. Criminey, if everyone stopped posting when they caught shit for liking something everyone else thought was crappy this'd be a quiet place.

[Furiously]

It's funny, I think both Lore and Bloodworth are correct. It is a flawed game. It sucks ass solo. I have to wonder what they spent five years doing. It feels like a hastily thrown together U3 mod. Endgame doesn't exist, and there music editor and other such as minigames are not enough. It needs a bigger hook to keep people playing. Lots of missions such as the defends and such are poorly designed. There is no way to win them. Every mission needs a X lives to accomplish or you will get lemmingsed.

But...if you just lose yourself in the moment and shoot your enemy doing a few missions grouped with four people it can be hilarious fun. Watching two cars ram and fly 50 feet into the air. Defending a spot and repeatedly killing people. Is it flawed - yep. does it need more - yep. Is it fun to ay if you are not solo - yep.

[Musashi]

There's only one word to accurately describe this game.

Meh.

[proudft]

I gave it a whirl for about half an hour, but it was pretty unplayable on my circa-2006 machine even with all details cranked as low as possible.  Framerate probably around 10 or so.  I wasn't surprised, but still disappointed.  I'll keep it in the back of my mind for if/when I get a new computer, it looked sort of interesting, but hard to judge for myself when it's so slideshowesque.   

[Kageru]

Another forum mentioned that a lot of beta players got to keep all their "end-game" gear and high level characters for the 5 hour trial. Naturallly brand new players with starter gear running into veterans would have been brutal. That's a pretty careless mistake that is going to actually cost them box sales and good will.

Anyway, it all sounds as expected. A game that was so focused on "that's so cool!" flashiness they forgot to put much time into the game-play or develop a plan on how the game will mature. If the shooting is crappy adding more weapons, upgrades and mission types isn't going to fix the lack of fun. And even global agenda had some PvE content to find your feet in, gear up or play when you didn't feel like butting heads. This is worse though because I imagine APB had a larger budget.

Still, at least I don't have to fight temptation since APB will not be released in Australia though really I have to applaud them resisting the urge to sell it even though the play experience would be miserable.

[Koyasha]

Comments on that link were interesting.  I had always vaguely wondered why no MMO servers seem to be hosted in Australia, didn't know the prices for bandwidth were so ridiculous there.

On the game itself, Lorekeep made a number of good points which I agree with, particularly as far as UI and matchmaking.  Matchmaking really seems to need a good long look at it and an overhaul on the entire system.  Why is it based on some temporary 'what have you done lately?' stat?  It seems to me that it should base off four basic factors:

Lifetime kill to death ratio.
Lifetime missions completed vs. missions failed ratio.
Level (or rank or whatever the thing that determines how strong the equipment you can use is).
Distance between mission objectives and player's current location.

That last one is big because I do get a number of matchmaking type missions that are half a map away from me or more.  And I don't know this until after I accept the mission.  By then, it's too late, I'm on a mission that I am not going to get to the objective before the other side completes it, cause they're already in the area, cause they're already doing the mission.  By the time I get over there they'll be done.

But those four factors are what should really be taken into account during matchmaking, in my opinion, to make the player wind up with a challenge appropriate to their own skill level, but most of all, match them up to a mission they actually have a hope of reaching before it's over.

[Threash]

It's not bad, it's definitely not great.  Meh about covers it, i might pick it up once it goes on sale and buy some hours here and there.

[Ghambit]

You cant effectively matchmake an MMO like this with only 100 people per shard.  Not possible to do.  Aside from this, the crux of APBs design is the "APB."  If you got conservative with the matchmaking you'd end up with way too much dead time, not enough APBs, and an extremely unfun game.

You're better off letting David fight Goliath a few times then not fight at all.

Furthermore, as frustrating as it may be for some people... there's nothing stopping them from ignoring or cancelling the dispatch.  It's not like you dont get to know the players you're against.  That's what reputation/prestige is all about.  "Aww fuck, it's 'LoLSniper' again... /quit"  rather than letting the code decide for you.  Later on, you can get some redemption when you're ready or have a good group to work with.  And there's nothing sweeter when this happens, especially when there's a big bounty.

[Threash]

Or you could make level not have such a huge freaking impact in what should be a skill game.

[Hoax]

Lets just compare this to the other two titles in this genre.

Planetside: Shooting in APB is better, the cone of fire doesn't punish me for doing anything but sitting somewhere perfectly still. Sadly tactically even though in the ghetto we have lean (I love lean) we have almost zero tactical devices at our disposal. At least I'm not seeing any. Also the progression is very very slow in APB.

Global Agenda: Everything about the combat in APB is better. In fact the entire game is better. The only thing Global Agenda has over APB is more persistence and more kudos for winning if you are doing their AvA sub fee stuff. Also Agenda has more tactical nous sort of with the deployables and what not but still its so much less immersive than APB.

Bottom line? Its their sub model if I'm remembering it right that is going to fuck them.

This game screams for cash shop + optional sub to gain perks like faster leveling + no box cost. The younger crowd will love this game but they can't get in because your charging them $50. This game could take the entire playerbase of every single f2p shooter out there easily if they weren't ripping people off (considering how sparse the "environment" of APB currently is) going for box sales. I would really like to play this game a bit more but its very hard to justify the box + sub fees for something so shallow.

[Kageru]

I don't think that's the right comparison, since both those games are not currently success stories. A more valid comparison would be against something like TF2 or BC2.

[Stormwaltz]

In my opinion, APB is not an MMORPG. It's a next-generation FPS (TPS?), with persistent ladders, dynamic matchmaking, equipment unlocks, and extensive customization. The revenue model is a separate issue - I'm judging it by the feature set.

Painting it as an MMG in the marketing is doing both the game and the potential players a disservice.

[UnSub]

In reading this thread, I'm glad it wasn't just me having these issues.

Agree whole-heartedly on the tutorial. There needs to be a separate tutorial experience that covers more of the play experience. Only need to do it once, but things like 'what the icons mean' and 'how to witness a crime' (Enforcers) or even 'how to shoot and cover' need to be clear.

The other thing that has been mentioned is the interference in missions by 'grey' players. If you've got a guild, you can use them to help you keep your opponents from succeeding, be it by driving into them (doesn't kill the target, but pushes them off locations / interrupts fire fights), by forming barriers (get them to let you through, then build a road block and stop pursuit) or even just by acting as spies (I had one mission where a grey guy of the same clan stood on the stairs and told the rest of his team when we were coming).

Every MMO can do with more time in the oven, but APB appears to me to be particularly undercooked. It is going to end up in the PvP title death spiral (especially with the idiocy of letting 'max' level characters from beta curb stomp fresh meat players who are still on the fence about buying APB or not) where new players come in and find they can't compete, so drop out, leaving the weakest PvPers to be targeted, who then drop out, etc, all the way to the dedicated few who won't be able to fund the server costs.

To this end, I see the ability to buy hours rather than fixed months of play time working against APB - it will encourage people to hold off that final 10 hours and see if APB improves rather than actually getting them to pay up for 30 days when they come back. If you have a 30 day window, you'll give it a few shots to judge your experience; if you've only got 10 hours left, you'll play 30 minutes and then go back into wait mode if you are unhappy with the experience. That's not a good way to generate revenue.

I may be wrong, but I'm certain APB will go F2P before too long.

[Ollie]

It's funny, I think both Lore and Bloodworth are correct. It is a flawed game. It sucks ass solo. I have to wonder what they spent five years doing. It feels like a hastily thrown together U3 mod. Endgame doesn't exist, and there music editor and other such as minigames are not enough. It needs a bigger hook to keep people playing. Lots of missions such as the defends and such are poorly designed. There is no way to win them. Every mission needs a X lives to accomplish or you will get lemmingsed.

But...if you just lose yourself in the moment and shoot your enemy doing a few missions grouped with four people it can be hilarious fun. Watching two cars ram and fly 50 feet into the air. Defending a spot and repeatedly killing people. Is it flawed - yep. does it need more - yep. Is it fun to ay if you are not solo - yep.

Some of that is perhaps a bit harsh, but basically I agree. The game is an amalgam of half-baked, shallow and brilliant, served with a hefty side portion of "must fill these requirements to enjoy". In the right circumstances, it can be a lot of fun. I'm just not sure it's fun in a very sustainable kind of way.

[FatuousTwat]

Just got done playing it for the first time, and I probably wont be playing it again.

Too many curb-stompings by people who have guns 2 or 3 tiers above you, or teammates who sit 400m away or wont get into a car with you.

Also, voice activated VOIP as a default? Wtf.

Oh, and the tutorials are terrible, the knowledge base was down every other time I wanted to read it.

[Falconeer]

You can't really compare APB to Planetside. One is instanced heaven with lots of small and almost pointless skirmishing. The other is a massive warfare game with better vehicles and epic long battles. As I said I really don't think they should be compared at all, but if you stretch it I consider Planetside about 10 times better than APB, all around. And it's a 7 years old game. In fact, I consider Planetside better than Global Agenda too, which only wins over PS in the shiny department.

[Mrbloodworth]

Link.

[Falconeer]

I admit I couldn't really read the whole wall-worth interview, I skipped through it and seemed nothing new, but was such a post necessary? What about a link, or a quote of the important parts, not to mention a spoiler tag? I don't want to play mod here, but it is really starting to sound a bit cheerleading, Bloodworth. And I usually appreciate all your helpful posts and your enthusistic attitude.

[Mrbloodworth]

 

I normally simply link or add interviews here about games on my radar.  Anyway, done.

[Shatter]

I admit I couldn't really read the whole wall-worth interview, I skipped through it and seemed nothing new, but was such a post necessary? What about a link, or a quote of the important parts, not to mention a spoiler tag? I don't want to play mod here, but it is really starting to sound a bit cheerleading, Bloodworth. And I usually appreciate all your helpful posts and your enthusistic attitude.

/agree, I figured Blood was making kickbacks about 2 pages ago. 

[Azazel]

Without getting into any of the bullshit, I've been seriously wondering if Bloodworth has some business or financial connection with RTW, particularly for the past few pages. That's not an insult, but it's seriously how you've been coming across. Seriously. Your enthusiasm has appeared pretty over the top.

Also, you did call out Lorekeep, who had said what amounts to "fuckit, I'm going to watch". Looks like RTW is going to miss those shiny GTAWOW dollars in the end. I won't be buying this. Not that I could even if I wanted to.  

[Azazel]

bemused by the post that was posted while I was writing my previous post. 

[Mrbloodworth]

That's a bit retarded guys. Not sure how you could even come to such a conclusion if you bothered to read my postings. Its true, I am perhaps more optimistic than most about any game, I just happen to appreciate things differently, and perhaps simply appreciate the work that goes into titles more than you.

However as soon as any thread, or posting becomes about me, in the way lorekeep did, I'm out. I did call him out, but only because I want to read his views, I could give two shits if he disagrees with me, I just wanted to know why he felt everyone who likes the game, must be "Drinking the kool aide".

You can't just post shit like that and not say why you feel that way. I enjoy the discussions on this site, its why I come here.