I’ve played about 4 hours now and as someone with hundreds of hours in Vermintide, the one thing that sticks out the most is that it feels like Fatshark are REALLY trying to pigeonhole people into playing fixed roles.
I’m sure I’m not the only one who’s noticed this, but there is this very distinct animation lock ever-present through out melee attacks that really makes you feel like you have less control over your character. You can’t block exactly when you want, you can’t push exactly when you want, you can’t weapon switch exactly when you want, etc.
This is particularly present on Ogyrn, but also seems to occur with the regular melee weapons as well. You can’t dynamically go between different attacks in your moveset with the same fluidity as you could in Vermintide.
Couple that with the fact that they’re actively punishing dodging with ranged weapons drawn, and I feel that somehow playing with a hybrid ranged/melee style is WORSE than in Vermintide, a game that is predominantly melee based. While the melee itself feels like I’m hitting enemies through a thick veneer of molasses.
Doing something like pushing, switching to your ranged weapon to tag a special, then switching back to melee to deal with the enemies in front of you feels borderline suicidal at times because of how long it takes and how risky it is. And the classic dodge/block/push dance with hordes feels “off” as well.
Easing up on the animation locks would go a long way into making the game feel more responsive. Among other things.
I completely agree, it feels way muddier than VT2 which felt extremely quick and smooth. I hope they can make melee combat feel satisfying like VT and make the transition to and from melee and ranged not feel like garbage.
Playing at range feels meh, a long way from great. I really dislike ADS just tilting some guns sideways without actually aiming down the sight, or worse, moving the gun farther away from your eye. I realize some of these characters aren’t military, but nobody aims by not focusing down the barrel or sight.
Playing in melee just feels like I’m 40-50% too slow. Couple this with feeling like I can never get all of the shooters inside my “melee activation” zone to make them switch to their bayonets and it’s just unfun.
I actually have to disagree. I have over 1000 hours in V2 and played i think almost 20 hours in cbt. In my opinion the melee ranged hybrid gameplay feels good to me. I dont feel too slow or too sluggish. Weapon swapping works well for me. True i have to get used to the new whoosh from behind but it is okay. The fighting in a horde gameplay feels just like v2 to me.
And please remember that i am not criticising any of you. I just have a different experience
Agreed. It all feels sluggish, and was movement speed lowered as well? It’s like playing in a swamp, except in VT2 swamps felt great to play in.
IMO gameplay is ruined.
as “veteran” who have more then 2300h in Warframe i can tell you if you want fast paced game go play Warfame, you can do mission under 2 minutes did you see ogryns arms ? they are to the groud, it takes time to swing them around
Absolutely agree, and I’m really bummed about it too. Combat just doesn’t feel responsive and it’s probably down to a lot of factors, though slow animations and delayed key inputs for weapon swapping and blocking are definitely the worst offenders.
I personally don’t like ranged combat, but I can appreciate what Fatshark have tried to do here. I just wish that pure melee was at least somewhat viable with enough skill. But mechanics like dodging canceling your stamina regeneration makes prolonged melee engagements very difficult.
In its current state, I just can’t see myself playing Darktide for any significant amount of time. Combat feels frustrating rather than satisfying compared to Vermintide.
+1 from me. Agree. The animation locks for range weapon swaps and slow swaps for some other really destroys the pacing and crisp gameplay that Tide games were known from.
Now, Fatshark, here is my piece of advice to you: If you think this is “balanced” or “immersive” or “realistic” etc. then know this - this is not fun first of all. This is video game. If you introduce designs and mechanics that are not fun or are frustrating to play around, people will drop the game before you will have time to write the dev blog about how you had 100 reasons to do that.
Fun > everything else when you make game. Especially co-op game. Vermintide 2 was really fun game becaue it was fast, crisp, with smooth transitions between melee and range, rewarding fast, precise and flashy playstyle. Your current changes from Close Bete to this beta is opposite of everything that V2 was good at. Please kindly rethink your choices and remember:
If something was working great, there is no need to fix it
No, i played just the psyker. And my “feeling” is an actual test. If the gameplay “feels” sluggish, how about you do an “actual” test?
So my feeling is just as valid as anybody elses feeling. I do not say that there was no change in the movement and what not, just that it still feels perfectly fine to me. So stop the hate please. Nobody needs that here
I also disagree. Gameplay feels fantastic to me dodge dancing is perfectly possible, pushing, blocking and overall melee gameplay feels responsive, and i dont find that 0,5 sec swap animation fun breaking or disrupting at all.
Granted, i only played autogun and lasgun, havent really tried other weapons or classes yet.
2k in v2. Just saying before you go vermitide elitist on me.
The game is still in beta and you’ve only played 4 hours vs the “hundreds” you have on V2. Give it a bit before you start assuming fatshark is making us do things.
I was trying to figure out what felt off about the melee play / gunplay and I think you said it perfectly, There is just a tad bit of lag with every action and its just straight up not as smooth as vermintide.
In Vermintide you could push, dodge back, whip out your range weapon, kill the special, and swap back into melee. That hybrid play is not not viable in darktide at the moment. Im hoping with polish it comes but they need to be aware the issues exists so we need to keep talking about it.
Except you can’t actually push, block, and dodge the same way anymore, because now you reset the stamina regeneration delay with every dodge.
I haven’t tried many different weapons yet (everything is level gated), but I also haven’t been able to block cancel even light attacks yet. Maybe it’s possible on some weapons, but it certainly adds to the non-responsive feeling for me, when I can’t react properly.
I don’t know what you mean all those delays as Op described them were present in the closed beta as well. I even wrote a comment on them back then. Anyway Op is still right and we both agree so who cares. This current iteration of the game feels - to put it in one word gameplay-wise - really clunky.
Stop trying to flex with playtime here. Even a blind person can see the delays in the animations. - coming from someone with double your playtime on cata+ if you were curious.
I’m not a thousand+ hours player from Vermintide (a mere 600, and comfortable playing Champ-Legend only) but I definitely feel a huge difference (deficit) in the speed and crispness of the melee and ranged play.
did you see ogryns arms ? they are to the groud, it takes time to swing them around