devtrackers.gg
i really want to like this game but i have a few major concerns.. this was also shared in the survey which if you haven't already you should fill out here: https://first.nexon.com/thinker/direct/public/survey/BCz6rXQnbe
Gameplay:
i think right now the moment to moment gameplay could use a few adjustments but for the most part its really well done. i had a great time testing all the descendants and i feel the gunplay feels great.
The single biggest issue i have with the game right now is grind time relative to reward. during the beta i decided to try farming a few things to test out how long it would take. while most things are simply unavailable in the beta i quickly realized that having 2 levels of RNG with all 4 parts of an object split out feels bad and artificially inflates grind time. if you have to grind for boxes that have a 20% chance to drop THEN grind opening those boxes with only a 15% chance to get what youre after that feels way worse than if you just had a 15 or even 10% chance to obtain the item from 1 piece of content.
on top of this id much rather see multiple parts of an item all come from the same piece of content so that even if you end up getting duplicate parts you have a much better chance of getting something you actually want when farming, and can go "i want weapon X so i just need to farm content Y" instead of needing to do X Y Z and A for an abysmal chance to get just 1 part of one item.
The balance of Time to acquisition is extremely important for the health of this kind of game. you should feasibly be able to get a new descendant over a weekend or two and a new weapon in a day or less. the grind keeps people playing but if it doesn't reward you for your time often enough it becomes a really boring grind and will drive people to quit the game entirely.
Descendants:
they all feel unique and i had a great time playing most of them. they could use a bit of polish though and heres a couple notes i had:
Kyle:
His 2nd ability the shield should block enemies from passing through it. since his playstyle is typically aggressive and in the fray ive noticed enemies will often walk through the barrier to shoot at team mates and melee enemies ignore it completely. preventing enemies from passing through it would make it a lot more fun to use without making it too much more powerful
his 4th ability often clips the ceiling and detonates causing you to waste all your built magnetic charge. not a huge deal but it would be nice if it could detect whats above you and adjust how high you fly accordingly.
Jayber:
could get better with higher levels and more mods but right now his turrets feel very underwhelming compared to other descendants abilities especially the assault turret.
Viessa:
im sure range mods increase the range of her 1st ability but IMO the range should be much longer with range mods mainly only affecting the size of its AOE.
Blair:
his 1st could use just a bit more starting size
Bunny:
Right now bunny is pretty OP and kinda braindead to play. my suggestion to fix this is to reduce the drain of her 2, but increase the drain on her 1 and 3.
This would make her speed more reliable and let her run for longer but require her to be more tactical with her other abilities.
this would be a nerf but make her more fun to play with more speed for longer but require her to actively pick her targets to zip in and nuke rather than just nuking maps as a vacuum of death
Grappling hook:
right now it feels like you lose all momentum the moment you touch the ground. i would suggest adding a sort of "slide" to the end of a grapple to maintain some momentum as right now it feels really sticky like you always land in a glue trap.
other than that it feels good to use and i love that it can be customized some with modules
Monetization:
overall i dont mind the monetization with a few exceptions listed below
Battle pass:
the battle pass is kind of underwhelming with too much filler. the "battle coin" system is also very concerning to me. if i purchase a battle pass i should be able to get everything in said pass without having to worry about some weird battle pass currency especially because you can buy battle coins and they are lost at the end of the season.
you should also be able to progress a battle pass you've purchased after the end of a season. losing the chance to acquire things you've paid for is predatory and frankly shouldn't even be legal.
Paints:
i actually like the random element of paints and dont mind them being locked to a specific thing you use them on. HOWEVER if youre going to make it random, consumable and paid it needs to be way easier to get way more paint. assuming an exchange rate of 100 caliber per $1 USD 5 paints cost $3. this means if i want 15 RANDOM, one time use consumable colors that will cost me around 10$. this is way too much money for too little.
for comparison in warframe you can acquire an entire color palette with 90 infinitely reusable colors for around $6 USD with no random element meaning you can get exactly the colors you want. there are also numerous free color palettes in game and lots of ways to acquire the paid ones with some grinding. ive happily shelled out a good chunk of change for colors in warframe and wouldn't touch the current system in TFD with a 10 foot pole.
the paint per $ ratio needs to be AT BARE MINIMUM doubled to 10 paints per 300 caliber and paint materials should be farmable in game at a reasonably attainable rate.
Bag space:
i dont mind having to pay for bag space upgrades but the current system feels horrible. first of all the "Consumable" (should be renamed material) storage should not have a limit at all. end of story, period. remove this limit.
the default amount of equipment slots is too low and the price for more slots is too high. assuming the previous conversion rate 15 slots costs roughly 4$ and you will absolutely need to spend at least 20$ to have an even remotely comfortable amount of equipment slots. increase the default slots and or reduce the price of slots. right now it feels really bad and predatory forcing you to stop and scrap stuff multiple times per mission, which in multiplayer often means being left behind or losing stuff because you took too long.
Overall im still hesitantly optimistic for the game. the core gameplay is really fun but this game is very much going to live or die based on how fair the monetization systems are and how reasonable the grind for things is. right now the monetization seams kind of scummy and the grind seams like its going to be too unrewarding for the game to succeed long term.
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