Planetside 2... didn't know it was on the cards

Arris

Posts: 4,719   +451
http://www.planetside2.com/
Spent quite a few hours playing the first Planetside, and after not really getting into the free2play Tribes game this might be my next purchase when it comes out.

Mmm, mowing down Terrans in my Magrider. Good times :)
 
I feel that f2p games have gotten to the point that some are better than this retail trash that major companies are releasing... Tribes was far more fun that many of the retail games releasing lately in my opinion.
 
Found a Beta invite in my old email account I used back when I was playing PlanetSide 1. Also read that the NDA had been lifted so thought I'd share my experience with my first night. Downloaded the client (on my horrendously slow 3mb broadband, should get fibre upgrade soonish thankfully) and installed last night. Now my computer is getting dated graphics card wise (2 x 5850) but didn't think it would struggle with this game given how admirably it deals with Battlefield 3. 1920x1200 with everything turned to max and options like "Fog shadows" turned on. 32 fps as a rough average. Dropped settings down to medium and got a more respectable 50+. I have to say though, for a Free2play they are going to be expecting people to have some fairly expensive graphics cards to play at full details. Seems a little counter-intuitive.

Anyway, onto Gameplay. Game felt immediately familiar having played quite a lot of PlanetSide 1. But one of the first noticeable changes (other than the GPU requirement) was that of scale. Even the smallest outposts in this game almost reminded me of the bigger bases in PS1. A good change is the design of the bases wasn't as constricted feeling as in the first game. No winding corridor mazes with the base. A lot more open stairwells and courtyards making for interesting fire fights across floors. Opening up the opportunity for flanking movements from Light Assault players with jet packs or those dropping in from aircraft above.

I started with the Faction I played with originally the Vanu Sovereignty, and even though I had fond memories of their energy weapons (and mowing down infantry in my Magrider hover tank) I quickly encountered the old downside of slow moving projectiles leading to quite a learning curve with trying to lead targets to actually hit anything. Balance between classes seemed to have been rehashed quite a bit. In the first game an anti-infantry specification Max unit camped in a base defending a capture point was something hard to get by. Had to almost rely on Heavy Assaults with rocket launchers to take one out. Now it seems that infantry have a bit more of a chance vs a Max, perhaps trying to encourage more teamplay. Found myself playing as a Max a few times and finding a nice engineer friend to keep me patches up as we defending one such capture point.

Teamplay was a mixed bag but mostly due to the fact I found the beta social functions a bit clunky. Added a player I teamed up with in a tank to my friends list but everytime I tried to select his name and choose "Send message" from the right click context menu I was presented with a squad view. Even changed my settings to "Auto join squad" but didn't appear to be much in the way of squads to join. Possibly just a time of day/population issue. It is after all only my first evening of playing and no doubt a lot of the issues could be down to "User error". Needless to say it kept me playing for about 3 hours. Add in some more social aspects, guilds(aka Outfits), squads and getting together with groups of friends to assault the enemy outposts from ground and air could be providing me with many hours of fun in the future...
 
Hey Arris,

Little late to respond but I've been playing the PS2 beta now for the past month or so.The game performance has been steadily improving but it’s still a major problem, you really need to play on lower settings even with high end hardware to achieve solid frames (60+) in major combat situations. It's also recommended to edit your RenderDistance in the UserOptions.ini to something between 750-1000 as this game by default is set to infinity. I still think they have a lot of work to do balance wise, but it's slowly improving and definitely a lot of fun. I play on Metis (West 1) if you ever want to hit me up or just PM me on Steam.
 
Im downloading to found a beta invite in my old email the other day hope its good :). I played the first one like 5 years after it was released and love the concept of so many players in each combat.

Btw arris as you know beta to release is huge diff in gpu requirements ill post back after I get in some game time L(

p.s.s..s.
iv been waiting for this game forever

I get 30+ fps max quality with my rig, it only uses directx10 though
 
Thanks for the input, will have a play with render distances when I get the chance. I've basically not sat down with this game since my previous post. Need to download and install it on my new laptop, although will check out if I can copy the installer across as my new homes 3Mb broadband is slooooooooooooooooooow. Should get fibre upgrade soon with any luck.
 
PlanetSide 2 was officially announced on July 8, 2011, yet according to our previous report, Sony made some titbits before its announcement.
 
I actually got an invite to the closed beta, but I honestly haven't been swayed either way to give it a try. My free time is precious, so I find myself being unnecessarily stingy with what I play. Maybe your opinion will be the tipping point...

So the question is; In your opinion Arris, is it worth it to pick it up again?
 
I been in the Beta since sept.

Its defo worth checking out. It takes alot of time to unlock stuff, but there a slow passive gain if you cannot play that often.

You really do need the hardware tho, my aging system barely runs it with everything on low. I get 40~ frames dropping to 20 in massive firefights and this is on the latest build (well not todays, I hear theres a 3 gig patch today)

When I got into the beta I downloaded it on my slow 1 meg line, took a day, and the big patches also took 5+ hours to get. Thankfully in my student digs got a nice 60 meg fiber line to make the patches a breeze.
 
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