Firefall

[Morreion]

Firefall official site

MMO Shooter Firefall Revealed By Ex-WoW, Tribes Creators (Kokatu)

Red 5 Studios, the developer founded by former World of Warcraft team lead Mark Kern, finally unveiled its long-in-the-making online shooter Firefall today. The free-to-play futuristic action game also has a futuristic release date.

Firefall, due “near the end of 2011″, takes place on a futuristic earth from the 23rd century, a “lush, dynamic open world” invaded by the disastrous Melding, a “hostile energy storm” that engulfs the planet. Making matters worse, an alien race known as The Chosen comes a calling, forcing humanity to band together in a large-scale, free-to-play online battle.

A Melding of Genres – Red 5 Reveals Firefall at PAX 2010 (Ten Ton Hammer)
A first look at the new team-based shooter from Red 5 Studios

...But the battleframes were just one portion of the larger picture of Firefall that managed to pique my interest. Rather than small maps with basic control point capture mechanics, Firefall consists of a fairly expansive persistent world which is far from static thanks to the AI director that can generate interesting, dynamic content on the fly. During the presentation, the town of Dredge came under attack and if the invading forces weren’t repelled successfully they could outright take control of the entire town and Crystite mining operation that it sprung up around. Mark explained that the exact same invasion could have happened at an entirely separate geographical location rather than being a simple conditional triggered script as was the case with Tabula Rasa’s control points.

Firefall Gameplay Video from PAX 2010 (Ten Ton Hammer)

The video is 10:56 long- all gameplay.

[Regolyth]

Wow, that actually looked really awesome. I almost didn't even click on the link, thinking the game would suck, but I was surprised at how fun it seemed. I would definitely like to give that a try.

[Morreion]

Firefall General Article: PAX East Overview (MMORPG.com)
Part Team Fortress 2, part MMO, Firefall is an "odd beast" according to MMORPG.com Lead Writer Bill Murphy. Bill had the chance to check out Firefall during PAX East and talk about the game with Lead Designer Scott Youngblood. See what Bill found out about Firefall in his latest article.

The game has three announced frameworks (classes) to choose from, with more to come: the assault, the medic, and the recon. I took my turn behind the controls, and was quickly hit with the opposing Recon’s “Resonating Shot”. Resonating Shot is one of the Recon class’ modifications (skills). Basically it’s a bullet that sticks to the player, can be stacked with multiple hits, and after a short few seconds of beeping blows up with a satisfying effect. I was lucky enough to only have one shot on me, so I didn’t die from the hit, but one can easily see how a good sharpshooting Recon would be a team’s worst nightmare.

PAX East 2011: Firefall, the non-MMO MMO (Massively)

Armies

Just as other MMOs have guilds, Firefall has armies. These are groups of players who support each other and may battle other armies for prestige. However, it's not all about PvP. Armies have to work together to grab resources to build up better armor and weapons. To use the MMO equivalent: It's like leveling your guild. Do I smell a crafting system there? When I asked whether certain armies could specialize in a specific type of equipment, Kern smiled and replied, "We are saving that for another time." I took that as a "yes."

Firefall announces beta, details launch (Massively)

As far as the game's launch is concerned, Mr. Kern goes on to explain that the team already considers the game to be launched, as Red 5 seems to feel that the traditional closed beta to open beta to launch process is outdated "in a modern, online, service oriented business, especially a free2playgame." Instead, they will be modeling the game's launch after Gmail's invite system, wherein certain players will be invited by the team, and those players will receive invitations that they can pass on to friends, thereby allowing the game to gradually grow as layers of invitations are passed around.

You (yes, you) can expand Firefall's gameworld (Massively)

Finally, content expansion in Firefall will be player-driven. Cross-server cooperation will be necessary to craft MRU units that will expand the playable area from 10 square miles to an entire globe. Kern also touches on the trendy games-as-a-service mandate, and he says that as long as players are around to support Firefall, Red 5 will be around to generate new content.

Firefall video diary talks open-world design, shows pretty vistas (Massively)

Keith goes on to explain how Firefall integrates its PvP maps into the rest of the open-world design, primarily by giving non-combatants the option to stop over and watch arena matches and various conflicts in certain designated cities.

Ready, aim, Firefall: Impressions of the closed beta (Massively)

And of course, that's where the fun starts. There is a wide variety of battleframes to choose from, so whether you're a high-twitch player who prefers the sniper-rifle-wielding Recon or just someone who wants to perforate everything in sight with the Dreadnaught's minigun, there's something for you. Each class can be outfitted with a variety of weapons and abilities to customize its playstyle to your liking. Aggressively offensive Medic sound like fun to you? With the right modules and abilities, you can play just that. I went for the Recon battleframe outfitted with a high-speed sniper rifle, an ability that turned my bullets into explosives for a short time, and a long-range landmine that I could use to turn enemies into a fine crimson mist. And let me tell you something: If you've never pumped a charging giant arachnid thing full of resonating bolts and watched it explode into a zillion bitty pieces, you haven't lived, man.

Another key feature of PvE is the concept of resource gathering. We're all familiar with the idea, but this is the future, so your high-tech supersoldier won't be running up to rocks with a mining pick to gather minerals. No, you'll use a handy gadget known as a thumper. This beastly mining device drops in from orbit to pound the ground beneath it in order to extract resources from the earth, but there's only one minor issue: It's hella loud, and that means it's hella attractive to surrounding wildlife that would like nothing more than to destroy your thumper and nom your face, so resource-gathering becomes a test of combat as players must defend their thumpers from attacking creatures long enough to finish gathering materials. Once successfully gathered, these materials can be used to craft a number of useful gadgets such as new weapons, battleframes, abilities, and more.

Discover the origins of New Eden and the Melding in Firefall's opening cinematic (Massively)

And man, is it heavy. From the looks of things, humanity decided it was about time to try its luck with faster-than-light travel and failed miserably, causing a gargantuan starship to come crashing into the Earth... right on top of Brazil. But wait! If the starship crashed on Brazil, then why is it still around? Because the starship's wreckage, and the energy field it generates, is the only thing currently keeping the Melding at bay, leaving the surrounding area as the only currently inhabitable site on Earth. Could have been worse, I say; at least Brazil's pretty even after the apocalypse.

Preview: Firefall Takes a New Approach (Ten Ton Hammer)

Frankly, I’m stunned that, with examples like the Realm vs. Realm of Dark Age of Camelot, and the economic and political goldmine of EVE Online, game developers have consistently failed to deliver truly dynamic player-driven content. Red 5 Studios went 90 degrees from what might have been expected, but I think there’s real chance of success here. Rather than creating a sandbox that allows players to create their own content, Firefall will allow players to unlock additional story as they reach certain milestones. I’m impressed with the concept, and at the fact that it allows for dynamic and developing story, without breaking into the lawlessness and cutthroat savagery of a true sandbox.

The Firing Line: Hands-on with Firefall's beta (Massively)

The aesthetics here in the newbie area are simply awesome. At the risk of repeating part of what I said earlier, I was struck by how much the game literally looks like a live-action comic book. It gets even more beautiful at the tail-end of the day-night cycle, as all the billboards and brightly colored neon signs that make up Red 5's Brazil become even more prominent. Night also plays a role in combat, since it actually gets dark.

The initial level design is similarly spectacular; it consists of a huge array of steps carved into rock faces, shallow streams, towering cliffs, and lots of tropical window dressing, all of which you could explore for hours if you were so inclined. If you'd rather get on with the shooting, your jetpack means you can navigate around or over most of this with ease to reach your next objective.

Refining Firefall - A Preview / Q&A with Scott Youngblood (Ten Ton Hammer)

“Right now, we have 8 different types of resources, each of which has different quality levels and properties – density, malleability, conductivity, etc. All of these stats affect the quality of items.” Scott showed how greater amounts of mediocre resources can be refined to smaller amounts of higher-quality resources.

Developer Blog: Creating Dynamic World Events (Firefall official site)

Crashed Thumper – For some reason, either technical or pilot error, some poor battleframe operator’s thumper has crash-landed near you. While it’s too late to save the thumper, you can still salvage its components while fighting back dangerous creatures and hostile enemies. These events are actually part of a designer experiment on our end as we try to master dynamic object spawning while in movement. Crashed Thumpers, as I implied already, are going to have much more context as we progress through beta – after all, thumpers are subject to all sorts of horrible and mysterious fates.

[Morreion]

Red 5 removing Firefall PvP tiers, adding 'regulation' battleframes (Massively)

Red 5's current solution is to disallow crafted equipment in PvP and instead mandate that every PvPer use "regulation" gear. PvP tiers are also being removed, mainly because they "make it much harder for our matchmaker to do its job, which means it's much harder for us to provide balanced and fun games to our players," Red 5 explains.

Bugs, minerals, and jet boots: Hands-on with Firefall's PvE (Massively)

The real core of any shooter experience is the combat, and Firefall's is fast and furious. Enemies spawn in droves pretty much everywhere you go, and every mission is a mini endurance run in staying alive while dishing out pain to your foes. I do have to admit that I felt some frustration here, as several of the missions and activities involve fighting in a very tight space around the mission objective. As a Recon player, I felt sort of lame to be forced into sub-machine-gunning everything down because there was no way to get at range for my sniper rifle. However, more open objectives (like defending or capturing bases) allow for more freedom, and Recon players can have a bit more fun hiding in the bushes and camping out on hills.

Firefall revamps progression system... again (Massively)

Senior Game Designer Cameron Winston states that when the studio first overhauled the game's progression system (replacing the game's more traditional leveling system with battleframe-specific tech trees), the result was certainly for the best, but the change "came with some problems of its own," such as being "hard to understand... [with] arbitrary limitations that prevented players from exploring how they could customize their frames."

To fix these issues, the studio will ensure that players will now have "far more flat access to the frames," meaning that there will still be different battleframe classes such as Assault and Recon, "but each battleframe will now have its own unique progression tree," which the developers hope will give more flexibility and customization options to players.

FireFall at PAX East 2013: Getting the Suck Out (Ten Ton Hammer)

So far this balancing act has been managed fairly well, and truth be told the more drastic changes to gameplay in FireFall have been largely positive up to this point. Things like a proper tutorial intro, richer and more dynamic PvE content, and a much more robust crafting system have all been welcome additions to the base game. Meanwhile, the core combat and Swiss army knife approach to having a single character that can fulfill multiple roles have been stable anchor points that keep getting better with each major overhaul to other aspects of the game.

Massively Exclusive: Red 5 talks pay-to-win and Firefall's open beta

If you haven't yet noticed, Red 5's open-world, MMOFPS, action-adventure, jet-boot-featuring Firefall is now in open beta. The sci-fi shooter saw an extended closed beta period marked by major overhauls to core systems and a slow-but-steady trickle of new content, and last week's open beta launch is the next big step in pushing Firefall toward its eventual release...

So we'll never "sell power", and we'll never restrict access to areas or content. Players will find only convenience items and cosmetic items in our cash shop, things like war paint, experience boosters, helmets, goggles, etc. We believe that's a fair model, and those items sell very well. We also recently introduced our new Battleframe progression system. Players can unlock advanced Battleframes through gameplay with a system that runs in parallel to their normal progression. Or they can purchase the new Battleframes for instant access. This system and our progression overhaul in general have been very popular with closed beta testers.

Red 5 CEO details Firefall fixes, apologizes for open beta issues (Massively)

Firefall jet-booted into open beta on July 9th, but the transition ended up being a bit trickier than Red 5 expected. Tutorials broke, crafting crashed, abilities vanished from hotbars, and logins were jammed. CEO Mark Kern offered a letter to Firefall players today apologizing for the problems encountered and detailing all the fixes the team has put in place.

According to Kern, login errors are resolved, server capacity is raised in all regions, instances are stabilized, tutorials are un-stuck, and calldown menus function again. Additionally, dropships are cruising along the correct flightpaths and the game's crafting and customization menus are smoother, faster, and more responsive.