What I think of the Firefall launch

Firefall, the sci-fi MMOFPS, is finally ready to officially launch on July 29th! If you happened to think that it had already launched, you’re probably not alone. Firefall has been in beta for years and had, until recently, been free to anyone that wanted to sign up and play as part of its open beta. That all changed shortly before the latest patch at the beginning of the early access period when registration was closed down and the only way to jump into Firefall for a head start was to purchase a launch pack. I’ve been a fan of Firefall for years now, but I have to say that I do find this all just a little bit odd. That said, I’m pretty excited with the direction that they’ve taken this new form of the game and I’m looking forward to what it will grow into.

I feel like I should provide some context for my Firefall experience. I originally signed up for Firefall in 2010 at PAX Prime where they were showing some trailers and talking about the upcoming closed beta test. A year later, I was able to get my hands on Firefall for the first time at PAX Prime 2011 where it was playable on the floor. Then, in late February of 2012, I was lucky enough to receive my invitation to the closed beta. On April 6th, 2012 the NDA was lifted and I was allowed to publish my first article about the game, which I did a couple weeks later. I have been playing on and off ever since then, especially when each of the major game changing patches arrived. On July 9th, 2013 Firefall went into all out open beta and the flood of people that had still been waiting for an invite were able don a battleframe and join the fight.

While I may not be a hardcore player, I have been following the game for almost four years now. I still find the idea of the launch to be really baffling when viewed alongside other free to play MMOs. For the most part, in my experience, when a f2p goes into open beta and assures players that there will be no more wipes, that’s pretty much the same as launching the game. You’ve opened it up to the public and all progression will be kept, so the difference between open beta and launch is nothing more than a title change as far as the end user is concerned. What Red 5 has done is closed everything off from new players (while allowing existing players to continue on), announced a launch, and then heavily revamp the way that the game works on several fundamental levels. Declaring testing to be over and then replacing much of the tested systems with wholly untested ones seems severely counterintuitive.

So what are the changes? Battleframe progression is a big one. Instead of the most recent version where XP was used as a currency of sorts along with various gathered materials to progress a frame along one of several upgrade trees, they now use a straightforward level system like many other RPG style games. In the end, this accomplishes exactly the same thing, only with much greater ability to assess a frame’s capability when it comes to fighting enemies. Then there’s the materials system. This has also been blessedly simplified from over a dozen unique resources on a 1-1000 quality gradient, to three basic types each having tiered variants as players progress. The economy is being hit by a major change with the introduction of credits as a currency. The old crystite currency remains, but is now also used to purchase credits which can be used on the public market or in the exchange to try and purchase red beans (the real money currency) from other players. Frankly, I find that one downright confusing and unnecessary.

This will become a familiar sight to all players.

What I really found lacking in previous iterations of Firefall was the single player aspect. Most of the time, I prefer to run solo in games even when those games are MMOs. Red 5 has absolutely delivered on this for me with the creation of the ARES Job Boards. Anytime I’m tired of thumping for resources, I can go to a job board and choose from one of four procedurally generated quests. Some of these quests include progressing stories from one town to the next as I progress through levels. I’ll admit that I’m not a huge fan of the escort quests, but sometimes people need to travel through hisser infested woods and they need me to protect them. At first glance, this mostly seemed like a fun novelty, but I later realized that this will mean content stays fresh when I go back and begin leveling another battleframe. That made me do a little happy dance. Leveling alts in most MMOs is boring as all hell.

Finally, I want to touch on PvP. If you read my ramblings regularly, you probably know that I couldn’t care less about PvP content. What puzzles me is that it had been a fairly big part of the game in the form of several maps and match types that could be queued for from pretty much anywhere through the nav wheel. Now, however, all that seems to remain is open world pvp in its own continent area. Honestly, I’m probably never setting foot in there because it sounds a bit too much like Planetside to me. I’m sure it really works for some people, but it’s not my thing and I would likely view my experience poorly as a result. If that’s your jam, go check it out and let me know what you think!

Simultaneously because of and in spite of the  changes, Firefall is a wholly unique and enjoyable experience amid a sea of carbon copy MMO clones. I’m also looking forward to the raid bosses (called Titans) discussed in the latest Path to Launch blog, but I haven’t experienced it myself. I suspect that most people that are interested in Firefall have already been playing for some time, but part of this launch is bringing this MMO shooter to Steam. I’m hoping that brings in a wave of new, enthusiastic players to an already thriving community. Red 5 has kept to their commitment of making Firefall free to play without being pay to win and I see no reason to think that will ever change. If you’re not already playing, mark your calendar for the 29th, head over to Steam or to the Firefall home page to download the client and join the resistance against the Chosen!