Progression Details:
Zealot, level 8.
Performance:
Specs: RTX 2060, 16 GB RAM, Intel i5 10400 2.9GHz, 1080p.
Report: Runs smooth (60fps) on medium settings with DLS on. Starts dipping below 30 fps on high settings.
Gameplay:
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Melee combat is as good as Vermintide, though the melee weapons have a little more range than they visibly could reach. Seems a bit weird.
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The blade weapon has a lag issue with heavy swings. When I release the mouse, it can take ½ to 1 second before my character swings the blade. I don’t experience this issue with the axe. It makes using heavy swings difficult to time and use.
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Hordes feel about the same as Vermintide. I thought you mentioned there were larger hordes, but I don’t feel that. I would like them to be a bit more frequent and relentless, especially when escaping. The game is 4 player co-op, but you only need at most 2 players to deal with the horde, or 1 educated player that understands strategic choke points. You have to bump the numbers up by at least 2x, and reduce the amount of break periods between waves. Just keep the swarm coming nonstop.
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Puzzles are easy to understand once you’ve done them once; however I’m finding teamwork extremely difficult with randoms. Nobody defends the person trying to fix the console. One melee hit and the puzzle game stops. Too many players are more interested in running off and “scoring” as many kills as possible. Either give the player on the console reduced aggression, or improve the ping system so it’s more obvious to other players to help defend an area or person.
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Ogryn. I have to say it, I hate that class. He’s too big. He’s constantly soaking up teammates bullets. He’s constantly in the way. He blocks your visibility. It is the ultimate annoying, grief class. For better or worse, we’re stuck with that brick wall in this game, but I so wish you chopped him off the design block.
Difficulty:
The following is based on my observations playing rank I and rank II missions.
- There’s too many ranged enemies, and fighting ranged units is not fun. We have inaccurate guns and limited ammo. Every time they shoot you, they stagger you. Your attacks stop, your sprinting stops, your ability to dodge and move out of harms way (ie: fire) is slowed. The rooms are often wide open and there’s no cover to cover support. It’s not an enjoyable experience constantly being suppressed as I charge at them and watch my toughness drop like a brick.
Progression / Rewards:
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Levelling to 6 felt good; however level 7 and 8 were quite slow. I imagine it gets worse trying to reach all the way up to level 30. If there were other parts of the game I could focus on, such as buying more gear and trying different builds, this would be fine, but there isn’t anything like that. It’s just mission after mission with the same weapons and nothing new to play with. I understand you’ll eventually unlock more weapons throughout the beta, but I think your game needs something a bit more to justify slower level progression. Something to keep players busy with and feel like each level provides something new to do.
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Rank II missions offer only 100 more XP compared to rank I. This should be improved as it’s too low, especially since rank III gives a lot more XP (around 800’ish?).
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Crafting was interesting in Vermintide, it’s a shame not to have it here. It gives one less thing to work towards, and I think it’s a system you could have improved upon with Darktide.
Bugs:
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Game will sometimes hang during loading of a mission. I suspect another player crashed or disconnected and the server is waiting for everyone to finish. In some kind of bad state and cannot recover. Either way, that’s something you’ll need to look into. If a player or state doesn’t advance after a period of time, disconnect them and let the match move forward.
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Sometimes discarding a weapon does nothing. The item will appear to be removed from your list, but you will not receive any coins. If you back out of the inventory screen and then go back to your weapons list, you’ll see the item there again. Usually discarding a weapon works after the second attempt.
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One mission disconnected after attempting to escape and near reached the transport ship. I suspect the server crashed. I attempted to reconnect, but it just hung waiting to load in.