To start, it may be helpful to know a bit about me as a gamer. I’m not much for competitive games; especially not FPS. I’ve tried quite a few, Call of Duty and Battlefield of course being chief amongst them, but the community, the gameplay, the faux realism, it never grabbed me. I also tried a lot of other non-FPS competitive games, DOTA(and it’s many offshoots, LoL, Heroes of the Storm, etc) and while I enjoyed the bot modes with my friends on occasion, whenever I was dragged into a PvP match, it was a miserable time for me. Partly due to a lack of mastering the learning curve, partly a matter of community. To date the only competitive multiplayer games I’ve played and enjoyed for any length of time are War Thunder, Hearthstone… and now Dirty Bomb.
It surprised me; I first tried it on a whim after seeing Totalbiscuit’s video and stream, and the intense objective focus, slightly more tanky gunplay style, and amusing characters appealed to me; I do like FPS games, just not competitive ones, but I figured the worst that could happen is I waste a few hours and move on. But instead I found myself engrossed in the game, and falling into that ever so rare zen state of being that few games can put me in, where I was no longer thinking; just acting. According to Steam I’ve put 20 hours in to date, and I fully expect to put in more; in fact I find myself slipping into a bit of obsession with the game; as I’m like to do when I really enjoy something. The way loadouts work similar to a CCG also helps a great deal, feeding that particular like of mine.
But it’s not all good; I do think there are some issues with the game. Some maps could still stand to be balanced a bit. I find underground tends to favor defenders a little overmuch, and terminal the attackers, but this is all amateur feedback at best. I’m no expert, and I fully expect such opinions to change as I learn maps better. The other big pet peeve of mine; and as I see it is a common theme so far, is Phantom. I don’t know if he’s OP or not; I suspect those getting crazy K/D ratios with him are the same players that get great K/D ratios with all the mercs they play. But I do know he’s not any fun to play against.
I suspect it’s a fundamental flaw in the archetype; a melee assassin just doesn’t seem to fit with a game that, for the most part, makes me feel if I die it was my fault. I did something wrong; often immediately recognizable, that I could do better next time. With Phantom, even if I see him cloak and run at me, the one-hit nature of his melee combined with his decent HP and the fact his cloak gives him armor means that unless my marksmanship is spot on against an invisible target; I’m still dead. I just get a few licks in first. Worse; after that one-trick, if I have an ally some 10 yards behind me, they often just gun Phantom down with ease; even if I never touched him. It makes me see him as a one-trick pony; which is fundamentally poor design. It was the problem with Rogues in vanilla World of Warcraft; I think may be the most broadly recognizable analogue. Uber powerful for a short while; nearly helpless once that power is spent.
My other issue with the game is the loadout system. Aside from being less than intuitive at the start(giving 2 default loadout cards with different guns, still no perks, per character would help a bit, I think), I have to give a big thumbs up to the ease at which you can get mechanically optimal loadouts. I’ve already got an idea of which mercs I want to main, which loadouts I want for them, and tallied up how much it’ll cost. That kind of transparancy in a business model is awesome. The way they’ve gone almost completely cosmetic with their loadouts is great as well. I’d say my only reservation is… well, the contrast between the loadout/CCG analogy, and then the ‘promo’ cards.
Now, I get the way the world works. Some people get things you never will, because they were better, richer, or just plain luckier. I know I go to gaming to escape that sad reality for a few hours a day, and I’m sure others do as well. In my fantasy world, I’d like to see at least the possibility of collecting them all. It’ll never happen I’m sure, but War Thunder, for example, semi-regularly puts on special events where you can earn ‘exclusive’ aircraft and tanks that have been removed from the tech tree or store, for those that missed out. A similar system here would be my dream, just the fact I know these little cosmetic goodies aren’t forever locked out to me because I didn’t hear about Dirty Bomb early enough does a lot to keep my interest in a game. But this is all fantasy.
One thing I do find to be a legitimate problem is something I encountered with the Alienware giveaway. Now yes, this does immediately scream ‘entitlement’, I got something for free(sorta) and I’m complaining it wasn’t good enough, wah wah, I’m so spoiled. But I do have to say it was pretty disheartening to get these ‘goodies’, only to find that while one of the mercs the pack was for is one I do play regularly(Aura), the loadout I got randomly was just… one I’ll never use. It would be one thing if the loadout was static; you always got /this/ loadout, but it appeared in the spinner during the case opening all the loadouts were available, and I just happened to get one I’ll never use, because it doesn’t suit my playstyle. And in fairness, even if I could have chosen, knowing there’s all those other cards I’ll never get would hurt my collector’s mindset just as much.
Again, the dream scenario would be that it unlocked a promo card for every loadout; but then that would be effectively giving away two mercs’ full loadout arsenals. A better compromise I think would be to make it a static loadout. It’ll always be this one loadout paired with this giveaway skin, and thus no potential is lost.
Now, why does this mumbo jumbo about CCGs and collecting matter, really? For me at least, it’s the difference between ‘diversion’ and ‘obsession’. Knowing I can’t ever unlock a lot of these cosmetic goodies makes it easiest for my particular brand of OCD to just rule out everything non-mechanical. I’ll get the mercs and loadouts I want; maybe even branch out a bit to more mercs, but I’ll never care about the big money sink of the game; cosmetic cards. That means I’ll likely never be tempted to spend real money on the game, because the mercs and mechanically effective loadouts are reasonably affordable just by playing the game(which is a fantastic thing!)
So in the end, it’s just one person’s thoughts on the game, for however little they’re worth.