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Planetside Beta Analysed As Release Approaches

Posted by simoniker on from the neither-planet-top-nor-planet-bottom dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Another Planetside preview can be found over at Dailygame.net. It discusses the scale of the game, and what you can expect from the overall playing experience." The official Planetside site, courtesy Sony, has much more info on this PC MMO shooter title as release (on May 19th) rapidly approaches, and about 30,000 beta testers continue to stress test the game, which is another in a multitude of massively multiplayer titles vying for your money.

26 comments

  1. Sounds great by Asgard · · Score: 2, Interesting

    If they can create a game that truly handles large-scale FPS battles, I am going to join up! Unfortunately I suspect that there will be significant lag issues, plus perhaps the WW2 Online issues with only a small subset of players being visible at once, causing 'invisible killer issues'. It'll be great if it succeeds though.

    1. Re:Sounds great by disc-chord · · Score: 2, Interesting

      As long as you have a beefy system (People with 1GB Ram need not apply) you will be very pleasantly surprised. The server clusters handle like a dream for the most part and it's always non-stop action. Almost every night I find myself deep in a battle of 50+ vs 50+ vs 50+. You might think that this would promote chaotic and completely spastic combat, but this is only true of people with little-to-no FPS experience. If you know what you're doing you can stay alive, at least long enough to take out a dozen of the spastic guys. And if your squad has good leadership you'll have already secured a near-by place to spawn up in when you die.

      I've been playing since early exclusive beta and have seen this only get better. Unlike every other MMOG that's come through the pipes this one is actually stable (both client and server) in beta!

      You won't have any WW2 Online-like problems, but that doesn't mean there won't be invisible killers ;) There's a certification that allows you to train in using a Infiltrator suit. You become nearly invisible like the predator while running, and completely invisible while standing still. (This can be countered with an implant that allows you to see cloaked enemies). Fortunatly the Infiltrator provides no armor protection so if you stay alert and keep your eyes peeled you should be able to kill these guys without much problem.

      Staying alert seems to be the biggest learning curve for players, though the beta is heavily populated with EQers who are too busy trying to "Hail!" each other and cyb0r some elf. I suspect as a more diverse player base comes in at retail fewer people will be falling victim to Infiltrators.

  2. Hmm... by Jainith · · Score: 1

    Looks alot like tribes...

    Jainith

    1. Re:Hmm... by Asgard · · Score: 1

      True, but Tribes is max-64 players (on an imaginary high-powered server and infinite bandwidth), and this sounds like it has much larger scale and variety. Tribes was pretty great though.

    2. Re:Hmm... by Grinn · · Score: 1

      Yes, the game borrows a lot from Tribes, but expands upon so much that the experience isn't at all the same. Putting the incredible graphics engine aside, the gameplay is simply amazing; with 3000 people on a server, you're never far from action. And unlike tribes, the map is persistant and territorial, so the player feels accomplishment when gaining ground in enemy territory. With this comes a greater sense of urgency and ferociousness in player defenses, making both sides of combat intense.

      The game seems to be a mix of WWIIOnline in scope and tactics, and Tribes & Battlefield 1942 in gameplay. Oh, and I cannot stress this enough - if you don't use Voice over IP to play the game with squadmates, then you're throwing away at least 50 percent of the experience. :)

      Personally I was disapponted with Tribes 2. It felt like I was playing Tribes 1 with a prettier environment... *shrug* but with Planetside beeing MM, it's able to deliver exactly where the other games couldn't.

      Grinn.

      Oh I'd like to note that this is the FIRST mainstream MMOG where gameplay isn't all about the ubiquitous leveling treadmill.

    3. Re:Hmm... by The+Evil+Couch · · Score: 1

      not on an imaginary system, I've seen my share of 64 player servers and tribes 2 expanded that out to 128 players, and I've been on servers that had that upwards of 100 people in massed battles.

      those same massed battles are what makes me look forward to getting my copy of planetside.

      --
      The World's Worst Webcomic!
  3. Not quite that many (simultaneous) testers by YodaToad · · Score: 4, Informative

    I'm participating in the beta right now and from what I've seen there's nowhere near 30,000 people stress testing the system. There may be 30,000 people included in the beta, but there haven't been that many people playing. Most I've seen is around 3,500 on the "main" beta world and around 2,000 on the other two. Even so, it's still a blast to play and you can bet I'll be playing when it's released later this month. I can't wait to see what kind of battles break out when there's multitudes more people in the worlds.

    1. Re:Not quite that many (simultaneous) testers by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      30,000 is the number of beta accounts they've made available, but you're right, there aren't that many playing at any given time, more like 7,000 or so spread across the multiple planets. Yesterday had about 2,500 per world on 3 worlds. It played pretty well at that time, though heated battles in small spaces (we were defending a comm tower) get pretty laggy.

  4. Tribes with more depth... by Wheaty18 · · Score: 2, Informative

    I am also participating in the PlanetSide beta. It is very much like Tribes in many ways, with the addition of a semi-deep character development system (something you'd expect out of any pay-to-play game). While it can be quite entertaining at times, I don't think I'll subscribe once it goes retail. I can get just as much enjoyment out of Tribes/2 as I can PlanetSide.

  5. But will it work? by Ritorix · · Score: 1

    It will be interesting to see if a subscription-based FPS will profit. MMORPGs are constantly updated, and are practically designed to addict the player with timesinks and level treadmills. I suspect a MMOFPS will have a harder time retaining players over the long-term.

    1. Re:But will it work? by Grinn · · Score: 1

      WWIIOline is FPS with a much smaller niche than Planetside will have, and despite the rocky start and initial skepticism, it's still going "strong".

      With the marketing power of Sony, the resources for online development of Sony Online, and with Planetside's near-monopoly of the MMOFPS marketspace, it's hard to believe Planetisde will flounder.

      Grinn.

    2. Re:But will it work? by The+Evil+Couch · · Score: 1

      that's a point that one of my writers keeps bringing up to defend his Anarchy Online addiction, however FPS games rarely need to have time sinks or have people experience the XP treadmill to be successful. in various FPS, the clans that form tend to perputate themselves.

      while they vary wildly in devotion to the game, the way the game is set up (battles for land) players will rapidly lose track of time in trying to get their faction ahead in the land grab and wind up burning hours at a time. combine that with an active clan that wants its members on several times a week and the biggest problem with populating the servers is going to be burnout, which happens in all persistant world RPGs as well.

      --
      The World's Worst Webcomic!
  6. (People with LESS THAN 1GB Ram need not apply) by disc-chord · · Score: 1

    Blah I had a sign there, but I must have hit back space.

    I started playing with 512 PC2700 DDR and was "okay" ... but once I upgraded to a gig things really started flying. Memory is dirt cheap, and if you're a FPS fan you should probably already have a gig anyhow.

  7. FPS MMORPGs by Winterblink · · Score: 1

    A little off-topic, but planetside really isn't the first FPS MMORPG out there... Neocron is in the first person, and while not quite as twitch-based action style gameplay as Planetside, it's incredibly fun. It draws heavily from Deus Ex, yet putting it in a MMO setting works for it. Planetside seems a bit too much like just Tribes with a monthly charge.

    --
    "I'm a leaf on the wind. Watch how I soar."
    -Hoban Washburn
  8. Definitly NOT twitch-based by Ransom342 · · Score: 1

    Planetside is definitly not a Twitch-Based game. They have a cone of fire system that makes it quite a bit different style of play than UT and QUAKE. variable like your rate of fire and speed of movement decrease your accuracy. its not a pixel perfect firing system.

  9. Public beta? by moonbender · · Score: 1

    Arrr. I've not been accepted to the beta so far - perhabs because I'm in Germany, or maybe I'm just not very lucky - so I hope they do release a public beta before the game retails. I really would like to try the game, I've been following it since it was mentioned for the first time and it sounds awesome. So I'll likely buy it even if I don't get to try it, but it doesn't feel very good.

    Heck, I even considered to subscribe to FilePlanet to get into the beta, but, gawd, no.

    --
    Switch back to Slashdot's D1 system.
  10. release already? by nekoes · · Score: 2, Informative

    I'm participating in beta, and while it is rather fun, it still has that whole "This is a massively multiplayer game, so that makes it fun!" type of feeling. But really, I still can't believe they are releasing it so soon. Unless they aren't giving us the full version, they are going to be releasing a half product to the public. There are still a lot of bugs in the interface and the game itself. The voice chat is really spotty and crashes the clients that use it, the game refuses to save configs, and whatever else. It's really fun, but I don't think I'd pay for the product if it's anything like the beta clients are like right now.

    --
    Hey, it's my OPINION that dogs have eight legs and make a sound like a car horn every time they take a piss.
  11. I'm very dubious on it by analog_line · · Score: 1

    I was participating in the beta. A friend of mind got a second CD Key from Sony which he gave to me. There have been several gameplay changes along the way that pretty much require you to have a guild (or outfit, as Planetside calls them) if you ever want to see any real action. As I already play Dark Age of Camelot and don't think I'm quitting soon, and am messing around with Everquest because I'm curious and got a deal on the Gold box, I just won't have the time to maintain a position in a hardcore guild. I solo a lot in the MMOs I currently play, because I don't want to be bogged down by a group if I have to leave for whatever reason. You just cannot solo in Planetside anymore.

    I also would recommend that anyone with less than 512MB of RAM should not even think about buying this, because they'll just be wasting their money.

  12. As a tester.... by Sarcasmooo! · · Score: 1

    ...first I should echo the performance issue. It's really the only thing keeping me from wanting to pay $10 a month to play. I run a 1.2GHz Athlon with an ATI Radeon 8500LE 128mb, and 256mb DDR. Not the greatest machine, but something that I feel should let me play newer games at around medium detail. That's just not the case with PS. I've tweaked it enough lately that I can stand to play in large battles, but there are just annoying little oddities, like a 1.5 second pause when opening a new door.....usually it's only loading a mid-sized room full of crates. What is the big pause for? I can't count how many times I've died assaulting a base as a result of this short pause. One of the major draws in PS (for me anyway) is that the combat can get large, and highly tactical. It is almost routine for squads to hold at a door and wait for the attackers, which is obviously bad for me.

    Anyway, what I really wanted this post to focus on is how much better I think the game would be with a level system that reset players to level 0 after a given number of deaths. Maybe 3 or 10 or somewhere in between. And levels would come much faster, with certification terminals in all bases to allow quick upgrades after a level. This system would be much more fitting with planetside's fast paced FPS gameplay, IMO. As it is now, leveling is bathed in the stench of an MMORPG time-sink level system -- the visualization of which is actually more annoying than any MMORPG I've played. You gain exp to fill up one bar, but filling it up only fills in one block in a line of blocks that all have to be filled in before you actually GAIN a level (which gives you 1 certification point.....it take 2 to 'buy' any abilities). The only purpose of this not just being one line seems to be to show me that someone in the developement team thinks I am a moron.

    Seriously, the point seems to be that coloring in the blocks will give me some kind of sense of accomplishment when leveling gets slower (as it, in true EQ-ish RPG style, does with every level). And someone is probably hoping that by the time the player gets to the point where leveling is so painfully slow that it feels like they're standing still, they'll be hooked.

    But again Planetside's gameplay is so fun that it's not impossible to just ignore leveling and play, as I've done. It just takes away from the game, waiting days to get a new ability.

  13. Re:HOLY TACKY COLOR SCHEME, BATMAN!! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Being moderated off-topic twice in a row?

    OH GOD IT BURNS!

  14. Re: large scale FPS by Kyriani · · Score: 1

    I have to agree with disc-cord, I'm in beta and it handles up to several hundred (100 on all 3 sides) battles flawlessly as long as you have a computer that is up to spec with the game. It can be amazingly hectic and fun, especially if you have a good squad. Its invigorating and addictive. :)
    The major problem I have with the game is the friendly fire issue, in large scale battles I get killed by my own side as much as any other side. People with itchy trigger fingers not taking time to check whether that sniper (me) is on their side or not are my bane. Sigh. I wish there was an option to turn friendly fire off, but I understand why its there.

    --
    Qui tacet consentit
  15. Also Dubious by bobcrotch · · Score: 0

    Ya i have a 2100+ running at 2300mhz with 512mb pc3200 cl2.5 Ti200 wd400bb and i have the same problem. seemingly tons of video lag. i'll have 1-2 second pauses with door openings. dropped frames all over the place ect. i dunno, either it's def a beta or just a resource hog. i don't really ever get that great of frame rates either it's pretty much always skipping. i used to play EQ and it took them a REALLY long time to get it 'optomized' aka running how it should have before it was released. wich i think was over 2 years before they got it right. i even tried putting my CPU and memory back to stock frequency because some apps do run funny on my system when it's overclocked. but it made no changes, for the better or worse. i dunno the game has a lot of promise, it is sort of like tribes but the diference between it and tribes is that i like it. but as we all know sony's out for the $ and thats it. they know people will play it regardless, thats how they get away with releasing unfinished games and still bringin' in the capital.