don't look at metacritic review scores. they are always polarising. Instead look what the people are complaining about. It might be buggy but i really haven't run into anything game crashing since the beta on day one. and that was really buggy. The best way i can describe the game is that it is not an instant gratification game. A lot of people will be turned off by that since they are used to lots of rewards in games like BF, COD, Homefront etc. There are ranks to unlock yes and some weapons have attachments and upgrades but for the most part the game gets better the longer you play it as you learn the maps, weapon handling, ranges etc. The focus is not on unlocks, more on team-play.
After playing it for a while in single player (yes I know that's not really the mode I should be judging but I haven't had the time to really sit down with the game and feel confident in playing against people) I feel like the game is OK with some odd quirks. In SP, the AI is extremely stupid. I'm not sure if the AI was supposed to get smarter in the second game, but when I can walk all the way up to the window where a machine gunner is camping and wack him in the head without dying, something is wrong. However, AI wasn't that advanced in RO1 either, and as long as I play with people later this won't be a problem. Another thing with AI is playing as a machine gunner or sniper camping in a window and have some random AI teammate decide to camp the same window and lean in and out of your vision constantly. The whole taking cover system and popping up from behind walls to fire sounded cool when I heard about it, but in practice, I've found that this took some getting used to. I've also found that with AI players it's really hard to shoot them when they're moving because of how jerky the animation becomes when they try to take cover. I've seen an AI take cover behind a wall, but the animation showed him walk through the wall for a second then jerk back to him sitting behind the wall. Taking cover myself sometimes helps and sometimes doesn't. I feel like half the time taking cover does what I wanted it to do and half the time it doesn't. When it doesn't, I have to try a few more times before I either give up and find another cover or finally get into the position I was aiming for. I also thought that the ability to change your sights to different ranges was a cool addition, but ultimately I found that leaving the sights alone made me more accurate unless I was sniping something extremely far away. Most of these things I'm hoping will go away as I get used to the game and play with people instead of AI. As an aside, after playing BC2 a ton after buying it on sale, I'm a bit disappointed that the commands aren't heard in Russian or German in this game ^^; (also the voices are kinda annoying -_-).
What difficulty did you play on? I chose normal and found it just ok but that's to be expected. Maybe they act smarter on higher difficulties. at any rate the campaign is a glorified tutorial. I agree that the cover system is a bit clunky. i tend to not use it and simply prefer to use lean behind cover. i'll only use cover in trenches or behind walls where my head shows if i crouch. dialing in the range really cool but i find that unless you're shooting at something over 300 metres (which is rare) then it's best to just leave it at the 100m notch since the bullet drop on rifles is very small. Also, did you find that those russian and german voices sounded like the same actors from metro 2033?
i'd bet my left testicle they are. especially that Russian voice, sounds like that character Bourbon. I almost expect to hear "look out artyom!" when sprinting in smoke.
So I played multiplayer today . Problem was that in the entire like... 2 hours I played, I never did get to see someone moving... I was always either walking up to someone camping or getting shot by someone camping. So I have no idea how choppy the cover animation might look xD. I did notice a considerable increase in the intelligence of my opponents though ^-^. I swear though, I can only play and do well on the Danzig copy map -_-.
oh yes. that map was a real horror in the beta. you need to learn the maps to get it . and by "learn" i mean every damn window those pesky russians will poke their head out of to spill your blood. Apartments is full of nasty CQB fighting and flanks waiting to exploited. Full of those hungry Ruskies waiting to stick their rusty bayonets into honest German flesh. I'd say try playing on a server with the map Spartanova. It's an easy map to learn and quite fun as well. It lets you get a feel for the weapon handling and mechanics. Just remember to stay prone when you jump in that gulley in the first rush. Arty can be quite nasty
they'll probably scathe it for the buggy release. This is the sort of game that gets better with time since tripwire are quite dedicated to a game.
I am finding it clunky and cumbersome at the moment. Can't seem to get into it at all. The cover system seems more of a hinderance than a help. Not that it particularly matters, but the achievement system is completely screwed. Like many others I have received achievements for things I could not possibly have accomplished so far. It doesn't affect gameplay but makes it feel amateurish. Hopefully Tripwire will work on it and make it into a better game - as somewhere in there is a decent game.
Somewhere in there is a reboot of the old Red Orchestra which was an amazing fresh breath of "reality" to the FPS genre at the time it came out. Right now though, I must agree that it's hard to see that past the clunky feeling game play. Anyway, so I'm starting to see that becoming good at this game is going to boil down to me finding out what the normal grouping places are for people shooting at me. ATM, I'm pretty lost as to where I'm even supposed to be running, let alone what direction the enemy might be flanking on lol. I need to find a 100% sniper server again, that was really helpful and fun back in RO1; it taught me how to master the art of camping and showing as little of myself as possible at all times. It also taught me how to aim high which came in handy a lot when I got BC2 ^-^.
basically, if you're german then try to stand in the red boxes. If you're russian then get in the blue ones. And i agree that the cover system feels clunky at most times. they've got some serious fixing to do with the game. I've taken a break 'til they fix the stats and achievements screw up.
Bought this as I've heard a lot about the game/series, and so far I'm wishing I hadn't. The cover system, as mentioned, is deeply flawed and clunky to use, but beyond that I'm finding the single player is simply boring. I end up hiding behind a wall whilst the AI eventually completes the objective because I keep getting shot by somebody I can't see, and will never see, from across the map. I understand it's supposed to be realistic, more so than BF2 etc, but this doesn't forgive bad design...
